Sergio Leone Special Editions (1 Viewer)

[Stephen Ford]

1. First page of extras in 2nd disc, highlight "Leone's West" and press right-key once to reveal rope-icon. Press enter-key and you will see Eli Wallach talking about horses. (10 sec)

2. First page of extras in 2nd disc, highlight "Leone's West" and press left-key once to reveal rope-icon. Press enter-key and you will see Clint Eastwood talking about long lunch break. (44 sec)

3. First page of extras in 2nd disc, highlight "Leone's West" and press left-key twice to reveal rope-icon. Press enter-key and you will see Eli Wallach talking about how to speak fake Italian. (40 sec)

4. Second page of extras in 2nd disc, highlight "Extended Tuco Torture scene" and press left-key once to reveal rope-icon. Press enter-key and you will see Eli Wallach talking about how to hold gun. (59 sec)

 

[Mark_TS]

its a shame Play.com wont ship to the USA-their prices are great-CDWow does-and post free-but their selection of titles is limited.

 

[Dave>h]

Responding to an earlier thread:

The scene with Tuco in the cave, wasn't that scene added to introduce Tuco's three companions, the ones that Clint kills later in the town, when he is getting a shave.

Maybe I am thinking of the wrong scene... I have not watched the special Edition in a while. And while I enjoyed it, I would actually love to have a 5.1 DTS version of the US version of the movie, the one I grew up watching. That would be very cool.

Also, when these all come out on R1 DVD, they are mine. I have never seen Fistful of Dynamite and I am a huge James Coburn fan. Looking forward to that.

I had never seen Once Upon a time in the West and really loved taht film. Have watched it more than I have watch my TGTB & TU DVD. Who knew I liked Jason Robards...

Dave

 

[John Hodson]

Further to the release of the R2 SEs, there are claims on thedvdforums.com that FAFDM has been cut by MGM - see the posts in this thread here on this page.

If this is the case - and while I love these films, I certainly don't know - maybe the Sony / MGM delay will allow the new owners time to sort this out before a R1 release?

 

[John CW]

That is indeed the scene. The DVD producer decided it was "nice" to know the origins of those bad guys... you know, the one's that are killed in the next scene they appear in.

Hmph.

If GB&U was released in the wrong aspect ratio, or didn't feature the original mono track, or was slightly misframed, it would have been a scandal here. I'm still really surprised that not more people are upset about a DVD producer adding a scene back into a movie that the director (and not just any director!) wanted removing.

Kinds of defeats the point of having a special edition if they're just going to change the movie. :frowning:

I wonder if it was a deal with Eli Wallach... he'd only take part if he got x amount of new scenes or something?

 

[John Hodson]

Leone wanted them removed John? Can you expand on that a little

 

[richardWI]

Well, there's no English mono track. What good is an "original" mono track with Clint Eastwood dubbed... Clint Eastwood dubbed over by some Italian actor?? Lee van Cleef dubbed? Eli Wallach dubbed? Oh man...

The track is a curiosity more than anything else. The primary actors spoke English when filmed, and rerecorded their own voices, so that's the original language by default, not these Italian dubs.

And few complain. The 5.1 mix sounds way too directional and modern. The spastic panning feels gimmicky. There simply weren't enough elements in the original recording to justify such a radical 5.1 mix. Leone had no idea that hacks would be monkeying with the dials over 30 years after he finished the film, or adding Wallach's creaky old man voicings on pointless scenes. (At least with Lawrence of Arabia, the late dubbing met with Lean's approval.)

Anyway, the SE is the mangling of a classic. The PQ is a vast improvement over the previous dvd, but it fails in just about all other areas. Well, the postcards and booklet are nice; the "ummmm" filled commentary track wasn't very informative. The old disc with the new PQ would have been great.

 

[LarryDavenport]

Fucking Sony!

 

[Bill Hunt]

The R1 releases were originally slated for release in December in the States by MGM, but they've now been delayed indefinitely due to the Sony merger. Sony will have to make the final decision about the U.S release plans and they have yet really even begin looking at MGM's pre-existing DVD release plans. Hopefully, we'll know more in the next few weeks. We've posted news and a follow up on this at The Bits.

 

[LarryDavenport]

Sorry for my outburst. :b

What is Sony's current reputation for releasing classic films?

 

[John Hodson]

I quite agree, but I think more than a few did complain (particularly about the gunshots); but it was simply after the fact, and either MGM didn't hear, or refused to listen. Where did I read that Sir Christopher Frayling has recorded his own commentary for GBU, just in case it was needed for another release?

Meanwhile, we have the live issue of cuts to the new SE of FAFDM in R2, which look likely to be carried through to the R1s unless someone takes action soon.

Sony; are you listening?

 

[Dale MA]

I thought the GBU surround track was great, I mean sure it would've been nice to have the original mono but I thought it was great to hear the movie in 5.1. Mind you, I'm not an audiophile!

I've preordered the new DVD sets & I'm looking forward to getting them, sucks that they've cut For a Few Dollars More but I've never seen the scene in question, so I probably wouldn't have noticed it missing if I hadn't read it on here.

 

[Anthony Thorne]

Just a quick note for John Hodson - there is no way at all that the cuts imposed on the Region 2 release of FISTFUL OF DYNAMITE will be 'carried over' to the eventual Region 1 releases. The restorations and extras for the MGM Special Editions of these Leone titles were carried out by MGM in the States - they were the ones that undertook new prints from the original negs, and (for what it's worth) DVD Savant Glenn Erickson and MGM restoration guru John Kirk were involved in post-production. I even remember Glenn Erickson mentioning in an email how - in his role as an AVID editor - he had just reinserted the end flashback footage (the extra footage once exclusive to the Italian print) back into DYNAMITE for the upcoming restoration over a year ago. These restorations were done and finished in the States, not in the UK.

The cuts to DYNAMITE occurred after the restorations were complete and were simply due to the BBFC's UK censorship laws regarding animal cruelty (or their perception of it). It's essentially the same as them cutting an action movie like ERASER (which they once did), or a horror film like HENRY-PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER prior to the UK DVD release. The Stateside versions remain uncut. DYNAMITE will not carry over the BBFC-imposed Region 2 cuts as MGM in the States already have uncut masters. When they'll actually release them is another good question.

 

[John Hodson]

I'm not questioning the cuts to 'Dynamite' Anthony, and I fully understand why they've been made, as I've made clear in earlier posts. I am referring to cuts made to dialogue in For a Few Dollars More - I did say FAFDM - which have nothing at all to do with the BBFC.

 

[Damin J Toell]

Of course, Lee Van Cleef is dubbed by someone else in the new English track for the extended vesion, anyway. Hardly anything "original" about that.

DJ

 

[John CW]

Leone presented his final cut of the movie, the "Director's Cut" if you will, to the rest of the world. The US distributors decided to chop some scenes out of the film before the dubbed track was even recorded (which is why Clint and Wallach were back recording dialogue for the old scenes). In Italy these scenes were always included, and the director was very unhappy that the US distributor had removed some scenes for their country's release.

The DVD producer had access to ALL the deleted scenes (not just the ones the US distributor removed against Leone's wishes), and in the process of restoring the scenes that the US distributir removed, he decided that he liked one and re-inserted it into the movie.

It's like a UK DVD producer re-inerting the 'rat' scene in the 'The Abyss' and then decided to add a few other scenes that he liked personally.

:frowning:

 

[John Hodson]

So, just to be clear, the cave scene was not in the original cut presented at the Rome premiere?

 

[John CW]

I'm not sure if it was present in the Rome premiere. It's not unusual for a director to tinker a little more after the premiere to get something s/he's truly happy with.

I'll have to get the DVD out and give you an exact quote from the DVD's producer.

 

[Haggai]

DVD Savant said the following, in his review:

 

[John Hodson]

Thank you Haggai

I've loaned out my Something to Do With Death, so I haven't a clue what Frayling says, if anything, but I trust Glenn on the matter.