IT's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World Restoration - Page 9

Paul_Nyman · 12-23-2006, 06:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Robert Harris

The problem would be less budgetary, and more simply flying way below any corporate radar. The entire budget of a reconstruction / restoration could be made back via cable sales.

Mr. Harris,

Thank you for the response today. Who is a contact at MGM or Fox that could carry the ball and get it far enough to see the potential to earn back the costs of reconstruction/restoration via cable sales?

Robert Crawford · 12-23-2006, 07:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paul_Nyman

Mr. Harris,

Thank you for the response today. Who is a contact at MGM or Fox that could carry the ball and get it far enough to see the potential to earn back the costs of reconstruction/restoration via cable sales?

Let me break in here for a minute, but I doubt Mr. Harris will share that information with you for obvious reasons like a flood of unwanted emails to that individual.

Crawdaddy

Paul_Nyman · 12-23-2006, 09:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Robert Crawford

Let me break in here for a minute, but I doubt Mr. Harris will share that information with you for obvious reasons like a flood of unwanted emails to that individual.

Crawdaddy

Thank you for posting Mr. Crawford! My questions are in the interest of understanding and reaching a positive outcome. I can't speak for Mr. Harris nor expect him to reveal contact information. Respectfully my intention is which direction can be taken on rescuing the film and supporting the cause today. What is the actual state of the film elements now? I hope that if potential costs would be recovered in the example Mr. Harris suggested this can change the direction IAMMMMW is going and allow all the material to be saved.

Ethan Riley · 12-24-2006, 01:55 AM

Robert, has all the footage necessary for a restoration been located yet? Is the (discovered) scene of Edie Adams spinning around and round from the Roadshow or was that something they never used?

george kaplan · 12-24-2006, 03:27 AM

Let me break in here for a minute, but I doubt Mr. Harris will share that information with you for obvious reasons like a flood of unwanted emails to that individual.

Wouldn't that be a good thing? Bringing it to the attention of the powers that be so that it's no longer flying under the radar?

Robert Crawford · 12-24-2006, 05:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by george kaplan

Let me break in here for a minute, but I doubt Mr. Harris will share that information with you for obvious reasons like a flood of unwanted emails to that individual.

Wouldn't that be a good thing? Bringing it to the attention of the powers that be so that it's no longer flying under the radar?

If you want to bring it to the attention of the powers that be then use the tools of the internet to identify the necessary home video people and write personal letters to them. Don't publicly ask RAH to supply a name which places him in an awkward position. Also, the old fashion way of writing letters is still the most effective way of getting attention because anybody can write an email while a letter campaign conveys effort and passion to the receiver of such.

Crawdaddy

george kaplan · 12-24-2006, 07:52 PM

Please don't misunderstand me. I wasn't suggesting that Robert do anything untoward. But if anyone knows some that can be contacted that would actually do some good (and I have no faith in my ability to magically do an internet search that would give me such a name), as opposed to some marketing person who doesn't care and couldn't do anything about it if they did, then that would be at least worth a shot.

A restored Mad World Roadshow is my #1 holy grail of all possible dvds (higher than the gas chamber scene cut from Double Indemnity, higher than deleted pizza parlor assassination in the Godfather, higher than the pie fight from Dr. Strangelove) and it just breaks my heart that there's nothing that can be done.

Joe Lugoff · 12-24-2006, 09:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by george kaplan

A restored Mad World Roadshow is my #1 holy grail of all possible dvds

I just wanted to be "officially" on record as saying, "Same here."

TonyD · 12-24-2006, 09:54 PM

found these posts from about 2 years ago now

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vincent_P

What's absolutely amazing- and incredibly disheartening- is that Hollywood executives are willing to THROW OUT an entire $35-million budgeted film and refilm it with a new director (i.e., EXORCIST: THE BEGINNING)- or even the SAME director i.e. CURSED- at great cost only to find out when they release the resultant POS that they should've simply released the first version, yet they won't spend a couple million at most to restore one of their catalogue classics.

This is just downright absurd. There needs to be established a "classic film restoration" fund or something. If some of these billionaire Hollywood directors i.e. Spielberg are truly in love with cinema, you'd think they'd be willing to donate to such a fund, no?

Vincent

Quote:

Originally Posted by TonyD

doesnt scorsese already have one of those foundations.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TonyD

i think amc used to have a film preservaton weekend that was sponsored i some way by scorsese.

i cant find anything on this at amctv.com.
but have wondered for as long as we have been discussing this, why martin scrosese hasnt been brought into this.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TonyD

i found this at amctv.com
http://www.amctv.com/article?CID=1049-1--0-3-EST

Our culture, literally, is going up in smoke. Less than half of the twenty-one thousand films made before 1950 still exist, because their nitratefilm stock, over time, turns to acid and burns the images away. Even more recent films are at risk; movies shot in Eastmancolor from the 1950s through the mid-70s, for example, lose their color over time, fading toa pale pink (more evidence for Joe McCarthy of a Hollywood Communist conspiracy).

AMC is proud to join The Film Foundation and its founders ? Martin Scorsese, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Robert Redford, Clint Eastwood, Woody Allen, Francis Ford Coppola, and others ? in an effort to save these decaying films and thereby save the twentieth century's most important means of cultural expression.

Film preservation is a recent idea. As early as twenty years ago, the only people preserving films were underfunded archives. The big studios simply saw film libraries as an unnecessary storage expense that they were unwilling to indulge in. Often, films would be copied onto video tape and the negative destroyed. This haphazard "preservation," however, didn't take into account the low quality of videotape compared to the high-definition digital technology available today. And who knows what technology awaits in the future? In addition, some of the video transfers that were made were of edited cuts of the films. Often the films were not letterboxed before the transfer to video, which caused them to lose the wide aspect ratio of big-screen cinemascope movies, thereby sullying the integrity of the film picture.

Film preservation is now recognized as an important cultural endeavor, and some of the studios have built preservation facilities and improved the preservation policies of their libraries. But funds have been shrinking. Adjusted for inflation, government funding of the effort is less than half of what it was in 1980. A black and white film costs from $10,000 to $50,000 to preserve; a color film from $30,000 to $300,000. AMC's efforts to raise money through our annual Film Preservation Festival are now more important than ever in helping archives preserve not only Silent and Golden Era films, but irreplaceable historical documents like newsreels as well.

In the past, AMC has raised over $1.5 million to support the Foundation's six member archives. We've helped raised the money to restore and preserve films like Stagecoach (1939), My Darling Clementine (1946), and All Quiet on the Western Front (1930).

another article.

http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/enc...eservation.htm

i think i found the link to the main site for Film Foundation.
http://www.film-foundation.org/default.cfm

mybe they dont even know the problem with mad world.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Robert Harris

Mr. Spielberg is a major benefactor in a number of areas. It is not his responsibility to fund the restoration of films, the copyrights (and asset trails of which) are owned by huge corporations.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TonyD

i wasnt suggesting the mr spielberg has a responsibilty to this or anyone else, just that he is a member of a film restoration group, and maybe this film needs a group like that to get restored.

no one else is gonna do it.

Paul_Nyman · 12-26-2006, 10:31 AM

I've never stopped writing letters and would encourage anyone else that has not to do the same. Again I'm very interested in keeping the positive discussion going here. I hope someone at MGM or Fox looks through the Threads and reads this one on the HTF and recognizes our interest in IAMMMMW being restored.