A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray - Page 3

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

The documentary by David Strohmaier on disc one is very, very good. Easily one of the best docs I have seen on a home video release. From a historical filmmaking perspective, perhaps even worth the price of this Blu-ray by itself. I began watching the documentary last night and was immediately engaged in the subject. Didn't stop until it was finished.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

DVDBeaver has posted some caps comparing the regular and the SmileBox version. And boy, do they look amazing! Absolutely gorgeous.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

So is the Smilebox version supposed to be slightly cropped from the standard version? I read the above post but am still confused.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

Cinerama has an aspect ratio of 2.59:1, and the three panels (which each would have an aspect ratio of 1.33:1) have an aspect ratio that's 2.89:1. This would be the first time you'd see every bit of information, but the SmileBox version still has the correct intended aspect ratio.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

Neither of the two Costcos around Boise stocked this title, either in SD-DVD or BRD. I had to go over to BB myself.

I've only got a 720p DLP projector so consider the source....but this smilebox BRD appeared to have full resolution up to that of the projector itself. By which I mean to say that I doubt any video version could have any more resolution which I could see. On my 110" screen the smilebox presentation was stupendous.

I hadn't seen the film since the original release, which took place when I was 11 years old. All I remember from that experience was that the film had too little action and too much boy-girl "mush". I avoided the previous video incarnations for the obvious reasons (poor quality). Now with 40+ years of age added I've really seen this film for the first time.

The plot line reminded me so much of my own family history. My part-Scot part-Blackfoot Nation grandfather running away from home in Missouri to become a restauranteur in 1910 Seattle and later San Jose. My great-great grandmother taking the Oregon/California trail in 1862 and later founding the town of Live Oak CA (I still have her Colt model 1851 revolver). My great-grandfather, born in Lyme Regis England, posting as an MD to the missions in Korea before settling in San Francisco in the 1890s. Newcomers (post WWII immigrants to the West) don't have this kind of family history and don't have the gut-level personal appreciation of how the West was won. The film used as its thread the family history of the Prescott family and this plot device will certainly resonate with people whose families lived the same kinds of experiences.

Plot hole: in the river sequence, someone cries out "we must have took the wrong fork!" Hate to say this, but rivers fork upstream and not downstream.

Unintentionally funny moment: the Robert Preston character tries to pad his marriage resume by claiming to have "a big ranch in Merced". Owning lots of real estate in Merced nowadays means you are broke: it's the ground zero of the US real estate collapse.

Major annoyance: the epilog showed a montage showing how the West turned out. Why oh why did they take up the bulk of the epilog showing endless LA freeways? This is NOT the pride of the present West.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

Maybe not now, but filtered through the sensibilities of 1962, I suspect the then-new freeway system was a pretty big deal. Also, much of the film showed how much difficulty there was moving across the vast expanses of the west. The juxtiposition of a river raft and a modern freeway would be an effective presentation.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

I don't know, Obi. It's just that a montage has the capability of quickly showing many different topics. They could have shown tourists laughing going down rapids in rubber rafts, or skiers enjoying the snow-covered mountains, or dude ranch guests playing cowboy. This would have captured the essence of the change in the West: that those things which were once considered hardships are now prized for their entertainment value.

I guess this gets to the central point of what does the word "won" mean in the statement "how the west was won". Does "won" imply "civilizing" the West (i.e. make everything look like New York City), or rather does "won" imply that pioneers' sacrifices made possible living there comfortably and safely enjoying the essential raw nature of the West?

For example, the Winchester 1873 was the "gun that won the west".

But we all know what this meant: it finally gave the whites superior firepower over the Indians. I don't think this is the meaning of the word "won" that the film makers had in mind.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

One of our avid, qualified readers involved with the Cinerama
process asked me to post this regarding the samples posted on
another site...

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

I ordered this and a few other titles via Amazon today. I'm really looking forward to seeing HTWWW in something like its full cinematic glory. This is an exciting release.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

I watched the Smilebox version last night, and was totally blown away. The audio also is outstanding. And I echo the remarks about the Cinerama documentary, it is fantastic!

We haven't seen the Godfather set yet, but right now HTWWW is the frontrunner for Blu-ray disc of the year.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

I have to laugh at this point. From my earlier posts you can see
that I was concerned that the smilebox presentation would be "hokey"
as I questioned the importance of including it.

I have to admit that ever since I saw HTWWW in smilebox
format, the marvel of the presentation still resides in my head. I think
about it often and wish that other Cinerama films were presented in
the same manner.

I would think that the larger your display the more effective the smilebox
process will be for the viewer. On a 65" display it was remarkable.
You really find yourself enveloped more into the film -- especially in its
three major action sequences.

I agree that this Blu-ray is now the frontrunner for disc of the year.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

I've just gone Blu and my first disc is HTWWW. I just want to add my praise to the picture quality of the disc which, in a word, is fantastic! The sharpness and smilebox presentation takes me right back to how I saw the film those many years ago on the giant Cineram screen. Thank you Warner Bros!

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

Welcome to the blue side, Doug !
Although starting out with HTWWW you did not exactly reverve the best for last

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

This arrived the other day and I watched a few minutes just to sample the Smilebox. The movie itself, which I've never seen, was quite hokey (at least the first couple of scenes), but the Smilebox was awesome on my 65"! I can handle hokey if it's entertaining, though (in which case it's just "old-fashioned" ). I watched some of the Cinerama doc as well, and loved it.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

It is kind of hokey, but is a good reminder of how people thought in that time. There was huge enthusiasm for the future, massive optimism. Things were going well and could only get better. Even the past looked very good, and was prettied up. People were not so much into looking at the ugly stuff...that started not long after. So this is kind of nice as how America viewed itself not long before people got more critically introspective later in the 60s. Basically Disney-ized.

Sure there is plenty of whitewashing in the film that also makes it seem hokey. It may have been "accidental" in it's just the way those who made the decisions viewed history, or intentional in that they wanted to keep it totally upbeat and entertaining, I don't know. The "whitewashing" that bugged me the most, and I have no idea why as I have no historic "allegiance" to any of it, is that no Confederate soldiers (in uniform so you could tell) were shown in the Civil War section during the battle scenes. (I may be wrong here, only watched the BD once, but I think not.) Instead we only see the Yankee soldiers who got injured, to compound the one-sidedness. How the West Was WON is truly about the "winning" IMO. (Sorry about the OT, but this really did bug me, and saying it makes me feel better LOL...)

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

I only saw the beginning -- were there any characters who were Confederate soldiers? I mean, was there any particular reason to show them?

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

^ No, there wasn't a reason I suppose (just a minor character), we all know they must have been there for the battles. It's like they weren't important enough to show or something, like they were excised from history...it just was glaring and quite bothersome to me for an inexplicable reason LOL. Probably just a budget thing in reality. I didn't think the Civil War had a whole lot to do with "winning the West", if anything more like an impediment to it, more to do with maintaining continuity with the characters' story lines.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

That song used in How The West Was Won got me thinking...the Erie Canal couldn't be just 15 miles long. It turns out that was as far as you got in a day pulled by mules.

I'm really confused now about that river segment. The Erie Canal dumps you off in Buffalo. But somehow they got onto a river (never named) where Jimmy Stewart was going "upriver to Pittsburgh". That makes it the Ohio River. How did the Prescotts get from Lake Erie to the Ohio River?

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

We sang "that song" a LOT in grade school. "Low bridge, everybody down..."

For the apparent answer to your question, see THIS PAGE under "Canals."

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

Oddly enough, HTWWW turned me Blu too (shortly after George Feltenstein said that was EXACTLY what was happening and I vowed not to do the same ).

It is simpy gorgeous. I've just read (this may have been discussed already, so forgive me) in this review:

"Most recently, for example, I found the Blu-ray transfer of How the West Was Won to be largely exceptional, even though I heard through the grapevine that even some people involved in the background of the new release were incensed that an IB Technicolor print wasn't referenced for color timing."

Now were they 'incensed' because they felt that Warners went about things in the wrong manner, or where they incensed because they felt it harmed the end product? I'm quite curious.

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

We got a demo of this on our Hollywood trip last week. The work that went into this was AMAZING. The really cool thing was how they showed us the 'making of' the smilebox version was really a simple hack, they created a curved surface in Maya (probably just a simple NURBS 'saddle') and then used a virtual projector to send the new restoration stream to this surface and a virtual camera to capture it! The rendering power needed to do it was enormous but the setup is really easy, even someone like me who only knows a little bit about Maya could have done it!

Re: A few words about...™ How the West Was Won -- in Blu-ray

From the site Mike linked....

Some things never change.

It's noteworthy how transportation canals were important in the East but not in the West. The great period of transportation canal building in the East apparently was 1820-1840, immediately prior to the age of the railroads. By the time the West required more transportation infrastructure, the railroads were ready to supply it.

In addition, the West wasn't hospitable for canals anyway. There are only two navigable river systems going inland: the Columbia is navigable up to Lewiston Idaho, and the Sacramento is navigable up to Sacramento/Stockton. All the other rivers go down steep mountain gorges - or, e.g. the Colorado River, lie at the bottom of a big ditch. Where the geography is flat enough for canal building (e.g. Nevada and Utah) there isn't any water. Although the film didn't state this, the railroad technology was essential in taming the West.

The primary canal building in the West serves to transport the water itself, e.g. so LA can steal other people's water.

In regards the Civil War section, there were Confederate soldiers pictured: they weren't in uniform but rather ragged street clothes. That's history. A large percentage of Confederate troops never were issued uniforms since there were no textile mills in the South at that time and the Union blockade prevented the importation of cloth. The Western expansion could be said to the the cause of the Civil War as there was endless bickering in Congress whether new states would be admitted as free or slave states. The Civil War gave a great boost to railroad construction. It also showed a generation of farm boys how to travel huge distances and live off the land, skills that they could use to travel West. Finally, many of the Army officers who later killed off the Indians got their training in the Civil War (e.g. Sherman, Custer). Well, maybe not Custer.

Wow. Just rented and watched this movie over the last few days in the smile format. What a cast. And what a score. And the sound quality is amazing. The way they timed the opening of the score with the mgm lion roar was great. Listened to those first few minutes as the credits roll a dozen times.

Loved the songs at the beginning and in the intermission.

Fun movie, and somehow surprisingly emotional for me. Must be gettin old.  Thinking of buying it..

I finally sat down to watch HTWWW for the first time ever (and since buying the DVD back in 08) and I absolutely loved it. What a great film! Enjoyed it so much I went right out and bought the BD version. My reaction was one of shock, mostly from noticing the huge difference in picture quality from DVD to hi-def: Holy Cow! I actually believe the DVD looks only slightly better than VHS. I remember reading an article online about how the studios deliberately release subpar product on DVD to get people to buy into Blu-ray. The studios not porting over the DVD extras to BD fueled my suspicions  but now this has solidified my belief. In any case, now I want all of my classics collection on Blu-ray: Mutiny On the Bounty (another great movie I just saw for the first time), Bridge On the River Kwai, etc. They cant arrive fast enough!

Quote:

The DVD that was released concurrently with the Blu-Ray looks fantastic and has no signs of being significantly "dumbed down" to make the BD look better by comparison.  The original DVD release was an eyesore, though.  I agree that the BD is a substantial improvement, but that's for all of the reasons a Blu-Ray *should* look better.  I assume you are not comparing the "smilebox" presentation to the conventional letterboxed presentation as that is apples and oranges.

Regards,

I sampled the smilebox version and while it appears to be even sharper than the conventional widescreen version, I don't know if I'll be able to view the entire film again in "curved" format (it just looks awkward to me). Regarding the superiority of the hi-def format, I keep forgetting that DVD only has 480 lines of resolution. For ten years I collected DVDs and was totally satisfied with them, then along comes an even better format that blows away everything before it. Every time I watch a DVD now it just doesn't feel "good enough" anymore.

Edited by elDomenechHTF - 5/17/10 at 8:18am

Luis do you have more info then just "I read an article"?

 

I've been seeing this said for a year or so but it seems more paranoia then fact.

Unfortunately, Tony, I don't recall exactly where I read it so I can't back up what I posted with a link. I do remember reading about it during the early days of the BD format, though. I wouldn't chalk it up to paranoia. Setting aside the arguments of hi-def resolution versus that of DVD for a moment, its easy to conclude that studios haven't put forth their best efforts when it concerns some transfers (on DVD).

 

I think it's 100% paranoia. What would be the point of dumbing down DVDs? The average consumer can't tell or doesn't care about the difference between a great DVD transfer and the transfer on one of the 'conspiracy' titles (plus, they're already assuming the Blu-ray is better because the guy at Best Buy told them it's HD) and the vast majority of people who can tell or desire the best presentation have already converted or want to convert to Blu-ray. So who would be the people that they're targeting with these dumbed down DVDs?

 

I have no problem saying that some studios have become lazy or don't pay attention to detail as much as they may have used to and that's the explanation for more shoddy DVD transfers but anything else doesn't make much sense to me.

There is no real reason to "dunb down" a DVD compared to Blu-ray.  DVD is already so technically inferior.