This Island Earth and The Deadly Mantis ? (1 Viewer)

[GregK]

It's not looking good at this time....
http://www.dvdactive.com/news/releas...and-earth.html

 

[Doug Otte]

Hmmm. Notice the menu shot on that page? It doesn't look 1.33:1; it looks more like 2:1. Maybe they just use stretch mode on their display when they do screen captures?

Regards,
Doug

 

[Douglas R]

I love that cover. Looks like Universal as well as Fox are following Warner's lead in using original cover art. At last they have got the message!

 

[Steve Christou]

Nice cover but I wished they had used all the poster artwork as on the previous dvd release -



Here's a link to DVDBeaver's review of that version with screenshots, lets hope we're not getting that same copy. Too bright, wrong ratio and bleached out technicolor.

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/Reviews/tie.htm#tie

 

[GregK]

If the menus are widescreen, it wouldn't be the first time a full screen DVD release has had 16x9 enhanced menus, with It Came From Outer Space being a good example.

I'm afraid at this point we can only hope someday to see a deluxe restored edition, presented in widescreen with the original perspecta tracks properly decoded. :frowning:

 

[Jeff_HR]

Well I guess I'll have to wait & see if this is worth a repurchase! :frowning:

 

[Danilo S.]

I'm an assistent director here in Italy and I'm a fan of the old classic SF movies.

I must say thanks to Jack that opened my mind to the fact that many classic SF movies was filmed with normal lens but thinking at an widescreen presentation.

In the last week I saw again THIS ISLAND EARTH (US DVD by Image Entertainment), TARANTULA (UK DVD by Universal), CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON (ITALIAN DVD by Universal) and THEM! (US DVD by Warner).
ALL this movies on was in FULL FRAME 1.33:1 on DVDs. I saw every movie with my widescreen tv with the zoom function on to control if the "look" (the composition) of all the scenes was looking good to be sure if the directors of this movies made them for a widescreen presentation. And YES! ALL this movies look not only very good in this way but every scene in the movies is perfect.

I have to control another SF classic IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE. I will do this next and I will post here the result.

Really, really I hope that in future we will can have an enhanced
widescreen edition for all this movies!

Danny (sorry for my not perfect English)


P.S.

I fell that the home video sector of the Studios don't know the OAR of this movies.

In my opinion in the 50' they filmed this movies on the set thinked more at a 1:85 then a 2:1 (this came from the look-composition of the scenes) but this is only my opinion.

 

[AndrewWickliffe]

The flip side to this argument is Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which was matted 2.35 against the director's wishes and has never been available in the intended 1.37. The pan and scan are not open matte, rather pan and scan of the 2.35.

 

[Doug Otte]

Thanks, Danilo. Such a shame that most of us will never see these films in their intended AR, unless we use your zooming technique.

Doug

 

[Danilo S.]

Tonight I saw IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE in the zoom mode. I must say that it don't look so well in that way. In many scenes the composition of the image look more nice in 1.33:1 and, more, this movie was made in 1953. This let me think that probably this movie was made to think at a no widescreen presentation.

Probably someone in this forum can confirm this if have same old magazines.

Danilo

 

[Jack Theakston]

IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE was shot in early '53, before the transition. Universal had just premiered THUNDER BAY as their first widescreen feature (the first film in matted 1.85, actually). IT CAME was pushed into being shown "widescreen" even though it wasn't shot for that format.

By July of '53, however, almost all of the studios were shooting exclusively widescreen, Universal and Columbia being the forerunners in widescreen presentation.

 

[Steve Christou]

Danilo, according to a Variety review dated May 27 1953, It Came From Outer Space was a "3D-Widescreen" presentation.

From the review - "Three-D, widescreen, stereophonic sound science fiction thriller. Stout b.o. outlook." , "Previewed in an aspect ratio of 1.85 to 1 on Universal's huge studio screen, offering proves that 3-D has been waiting for, and needing, widescreen projection."

 

[Danilo S.]

Jack and Steve thanks for the informations.

So I think that now we can say for sure that the studio promoted IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE like 3D-Widescreen (and it was a widescreen presentation in many theatres) but it was shooted for the old traditional format.

 

[Jack Theakston]

Also, it was announced in trades that IT CAME would be released in "monocolor" (sepia toned). This was not an artistic decision, rather a technical one to gain more light from the projectors that were being cut down from the Polaroid filters. MAN IN THE DARK from Columbia used this technique. After seeing MAN IN THE DARK in theaters, Universal decided that the technique was not satisfactory and abandoned the idea, sending prints out in straight black and white.

 

[Doug Otte]

Review of This Island Earth is now at dvdbeaver:

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/Reviews/tie.htm

The reviewer likes it better than the old edition, but there's no mention of P&S vs. widescreen.

Cheers,
Doug

 

[Jesse Skeen]

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...3826473&q=KTLA

 

[Mark Oates]

I've watched the new Universal edition of This Island Earth having just seen it broadcast on a local movie channel in its official OAR. The transfers were very similar (apart from one being shown anamorphically at around 2:1) and the other being a 1.33:1 open matte transfer. I suspect that a single master print has been used for both transfers as much of the neg dirt visible is identical between the two.

The Universal DVD is in 1.33:1 open matte, devoid of extras apart from a heavily worn trailer and subtitling. It's a disappointing presentation for one of the landmark sci-fi movies of the 1950s, and leads me to wonder if Universal regards the MST3K version of the picture to be the official one and the original movie is to be dismissed George Lucas style as a work-in-progress

As regards OAR, having watched the movie in both aspect ratios, I have the feeling that maybe some 1950s movies were composed visually for the full Academy frame, and could-if-you-wanted be shown widescreen in appropriately set up theatres. This Island Earth - IMHO - looks as if it was shot to be seen open matte. Some close-up shots in the widescreen edition look simply too close, and I wonder at the risk of raising the ire of OAR purists if more movies haven't been shot with an ambivalent attitude to framing.

 

[Steve Christou]

Hmmm the plot thickens, that does make sense Mark. I've seen the film countless times and to me 1.33 looks like the optimum ratio for this particular film, widescreen was still an exciting new 'fad' in US cinema screens back in 1955. So the filmmakers probably cropped the film top and bottom to get that 'widescreen' effect, and I'm sure This Island Earth wasn't the only 1.33 ratio film to get that treatment at that time.

Edit - I've read that the 1953 House of Wax was cropped from 1.33 to 1.66 for some screenings on it's release, not as tight as cropping to 2.1 but still.

 

[Jack Theakston]

My ire is raised!

Universal was composing for widescreen and widescreen only by the summer of '53. Of course, you can run anything open matte, but despite what has been said in other threads, that's just wrong.

While it is true that certain films were being "forced" into widescreen (certainly films like IT CAME FROM OUTER SPACE), we're talking about releases that were in the Sprint of '53, when widescreen was jut emerging. Two years later and they're still not "doing it right"? I don't think so. 95% of the screens in the US had already switched to widescreens by April of '54 alone! (That's a fact!) It's possible most places ran TIE 1.85 rather than 2:1... Universal frequently used the term "up to 2:1" or "up to 1.85". But the fact of the matter is that you can't compose for more than one aspect ratio (you can certainly protect for one).

I would like to see the UK transfer that was widescreen. My guess is that the station itself was responsible for the matting. Unbeknownst to them, the latest transfer available is somewhat zoomed in (see DVDBeaver's comparison).

While I wish everyone had the luxury for every film, the only way to tell wth this stuff is to run it in 35mm, the format in which it was shown in theaters.

 

[James Phillips]

Here's a screen grab from the widescreen version shown in the UK: