DVD Review HTF REVIEW: The War of the Worlds (1953) - Special Collector's Edition (Recommended) (2 Viewers)

[Michael Elliott]

David, I haven't got anything to compare this new dvd with and I'm not overly familiar with the title to go by memory. I certainly noticed new things here but it very well could have been because I hadn't seen the film is over ten years. I caught bits and pieces on AMC and TCM over that time frame but again, I probably shouldn't trust my memory with just that. The biggest difference (from memory) that I noticed was the strong details in the color. Another thing was the little "flairs" under the spaceship, which I hadn't noticed before but this here could be due to me not knowing the film.

Again, I'm really not sure because I don't know the film very well but I was always under the impression that the wires could be seen. With the new transfer showing them better it just seemed that was due to us seeing such a fine print for the first time. I mentioned other films that this happened to so I just figured it was the same. Someone said THE WIZARD OF OZ now has the same problem of seeing the wires on the scarecrow much more clearly.

As someone else stated, I'd guess that the director and producer might have taken the liberty of removing the wires had they been around today but I still think fans from one side would be unhappy. One side would say the director can do what he wants with it while the other side would say leave the film alone as it's already a part of history. Even if the director said remove the wires....then we enter STAR WARS zone.

Which means a DVD producer must have the worst job in America. I'm sure producer's want to make everyone happy but that's going to be impossible to do so I wonder if they ever feel all their hard work is for now reason. :frowning:

 

[Robert Crawford]

David,
Seems to me, you're passing judgement on me, but since you don't know me nor my thought process, it would be best that you stop trying to look for a deeper meaning into my stated opinion.





Crawdaddy

 

[DaViD Boulet]

Since the best we can do is understand each other based on the words that we share, let's take care to make sure that our words and our tone do the best job possible to communicate our thoughts without mispresentation. In the inevitability of misunderstanding, we can give each other some slack...

 

[Robert Crawford]

David,
Let's move on or take it off-line.




Crawdaddy

 

[FrancisP]

The trouble is that we don't know what the filmakers saw.
If the print was softer then the wires might not have been visible. If they had known about it and had the power to take it out then they probably would have taken the wires out. It does not alter what the filmmakers wanted the public to see. If it had been up to me I would have removed the wires but either way its a trivial thing in an otherwise excellent film.

 

[Johnny Angell]

As was commented earlier, even if the director and producer were around to supervise only one change, removing or obscuring the wires, some would be unhappy. We all have different preferences.

Even though I'm in the "remove the wires" camp, I'm still happy with the DVD and it is one of the best value DVDs I've ever purchased.

This business of remembering what the movie looked like when originally released to the theaters is tough to figure out. I am reminded that several years ago (less than 12 years), my wife and I attended a theatrical presentation of 'The Wizard of Oz'. I was shocked because I caught myself thinking, "this movie was shot on a movie set." It was obvious to me that the Land of Oz was artificial. The last time I had seen the movie on a big screen, I was a child and it didn't seem make-believe to me then. How do I compare those experiences? I don't know.

 

[Damin J Toell]

Unless Byron Haskin, George Pal, et al., went blind immediately after filming of the effects was completed but before any dailies, pre-print elements, or prints were struck for their review, they saw wires in the film.

DJ

 

[Ed St. Clair]

Wires or no wires, its now become a "Solomon" question. Therefore the answer is the person with the purest love for the film wins. Those that say they will give up modern advances and leave the film alone.
Both sides love the film. Just when in question, the purest argument, of leave it alone, was the right choice from the studio.
Still can't believe how much everyone is into this!!!
This is GREAT for film. If we care this much for a 50's SciFi film, look out!
Glad my ten year old nephew will get to see the wires.

 

[Johnny Angell]

The "leave the film alone crowd" wins in that they got exactly what they wanted. The "remove the wires" crowd wins because they've got a great DVD of the movie.

I disagree that that "leave the film alone" means you have the purest love for the movie. The other side, at least in my case, is saying "let the movie be all that it can be" and let it find a new generation of fans. The highly visible wires will discourage that, though there will be new fans of the movie that can get beyond the wires, just not as many as there could have been.

I don't believe my position is right and you are wrong, I just believe I've got a valid point of view.

 

[RickER]

I cant believe we have gone 3 or 4 pages about the wires. Jeez, they have been there 50 plus years. Can we call it a day about the wires...please?

 

[Johnny Angell]

I good with that.

Has anyone listened to the entire commentary by Robinson & Barry? I started to listen but got sidetracked. It was my impressions the Robinson was going to dominate and Barry wouldn't have much to say.

 

[BarryR]

NO MORE WIRE HANGERS--woops, wrong film.

:b

 

[Joe Karlosi]

Sure. But probably wires which were more subdued and not as prominent as the new technology brings them out.

 

[DaViD Boulet]

BTW, I still need to check the documentary!

 

[Damin J Toell]

I doubt the wires are more prominent on the DVD now than they were in the dailies, on the neg, on an interpositive, etc. The "new technology" of simply doing a high-quality transfer does not make them appear any more prominently than they appear in the film elements themselves. As for the original dye transfer prints, Joe Dante, for his part, claims that the new DVD gets the softness of those prints correct. Bill Warren, another commentary participant, opines that the wires are less noticeable now than in older VHS transfer derived from Eastmancolor prints.

It seems to me that someone suggested that the wires were originally less visible, and now we just keep having it repeated to us from no particular source, sometimes masquerading as fact...

DJ

 

[DaViD Boulet]

Yeah...several people who have seen projected film prints from the 1970's and earlier (more detail on that in the other forum thread another poster linked to earlier).


BTW, taking any given film source and opening up the contrast could affect the visibility of "shadow detail" on home-video and make issues like this become more apparent on DVD versus previous projected prints. Indeed, even the previous DVD showed the wires in the sense that the resolution captured that level of detail...they just weren't as obvious because the shadow detail in those scenes was a bit more collapsed/darker when tended to obscure them and blend them into the background.

I can't be sure which was the desired effect...but I tend to believe that the original projected film prints may have been a bit darker in these scenes than what we see on the DVD which would have helped hide this anomoly. Given what others have seen who saw projected prints, that seems reasonable.

changing topics...

Ok...I'm watching that documentary tonight!

 

[dpippel]

 

[Damin J Toell]

This is a perfect example of what I'm talking about. Mr. Harris stated that the dye transfer prints "most likely would have better hidden the effects work." He made a general statement on the qualities of dye transfer prints, and did not give a specific factual analysis of what dye transfer prints of WOTW actually looked like. This is now being transformed into people using his statement to "prove" that the dye transfer prints "definitely did make the wires less visible than the new DVD" (or, as some would seem to have it, the dye transfer prints made the wires completely invisible, and now we must digitally remove them because that's what the filmmakers wanted).

A generalized hypothesis on the qualities of prints of era, now being used as specific confirmed fact. Thanks for making my point for me.

DJ

 

[Damin J Toell]

DJ

 

[GregK]

RAH aside, there are other well respected HTF members such Peter Apruzzese and Bob Furmanek who have seen original Technicolor prints and verified in this as well as previous threads that it is difficult to make out the wires.