LAND OF THE DEAD dvd (1 Viewer)

[Inspector Hammer!]

Deleted.

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

Good night, fella's.

 

[Drew Reiber]

removed by me

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

Deleted.

 

[Thomas Newton]

Which is it? Vastly "superior", or "mostly cosmetic" in its differences? It seems like it would be hard to have it both ways.

 

[Thomas Newton]

For that matter, if the differences are so "cosmetic", and the desire to save on disc costs is so great, why not take advantage of a DVD feature called "seamless branching"?

 

[Drew Reiber]

You know, you can re-edit your posts rather than reply to the same one twice.

First of all, the statements about this cut being superior to the original comes from the Romero/Universal camp. Being that they had to knowingly soften the blow of a horror film and not for the better, one would assume they know what they're talking about.

As far as cosmetic, several people here (myself included) have explained the problem with the "cosmetic" alterations. They were changes made to existing shots and sequences, with CGI people and mist. Being that I already discussed why "seamless branching" doesn't work, you might also want to think about reading previous posts before jumping into a discussion.

 

[Drew Reiber]

removed by me

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

Deleted.

 

[Drew Reiber]

I'm not sure what you mean by "ANY" horror titles, but you're not really giving that whole F13 debacle a fair shake. Paramount *RE*-released those films, with an extremely mediocre set of special features that were still missing supplements from the original single editions. It was a sloppy, unnecessary set that didn't bother catering to anyone who didn't already have the films.

You also neglected to mention that Paramount didn't go so far as to pick up the phone as previous Friday cast and crew members offered to volunteer for special features. Most of what was on the disk, if not all, was just stuff Paramount casually and lazily collected at a horror convention. It covered maybe half the films, and some of them were spread out onto Best Buy exclusive discs. I honestly think the transfers were the only place left where they hadn't made a offensively poor job of arranging the package.

This is where the "uncut" fight started, because it was the only avenue Paramount had left to pursue that would have validated re-releasing the entire series. Whether it was possible to do or not, I don't claim to know, but as they were doing little more to gouge that audience one more time, I really I don't see how they were wrong to be angry.

 

[Drew Reiber]

Then why play this out as the victim? Why don't you just give people the time and energy they invested in you? You were running away already, now you're just doing it while pointing a finger at me.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Alright guys.

This debate is getting out of hand.

Why don't the both of you just drop it
and move on. No further responses are
necessary.

 

[Drew Reiber]

I should check to see if there is a copyright on the version of Dream of the Dead I taped off TV. At the time it hit, I was wondering if it was something that would appear on the Land disc or the upcoming re-release of Document of the Dead.

I've heard other people mention it might be longer down the road, but no verification other than some comments it might have been cut short to get it released with Land once the date was pushed up from October to July. I know the doc was missed the first few dates on IFC causing some controversy. Also, there was a thanks to some people in the credits who didn't show up in this version and who were mentioned on his brief Cinema Eye column.

I think Frumkes is just about to premiere the feature length documentary he produced for Street Trash sometime before the end of the year during a screening of the new print done by Synapse. Maybe we'll hear something from by then?

 

[Vincent_P]

What I had heard (and I apologize for not having the source handy) is that the Frunkes LAND documentary was/is supposed to be a lot longer, but when the release of LAND OF THE DEAD got bumped up from October to June, he had to hastily finish a shortened version for the IFC airing. Hopefully, he'll be able to complete a longer cut in time for the DVD release in October.

Vincent

 

[Michael Thomas]

What is the "drive-in" cut?

 

[Michael Elliott]

I'd suggest reading Ron's post in the GLADIATOR thread.

Either way, Paramount won't be having any of the inside sources spilling information this year. :frowning:

 

[Drew Reiber]

According to producer Richard Rubenstein on the Extended Dawn commentary (if I'm not mistaken), the R-cut was made without any official input. As soon as they found out about it, they had it removed from circulation. Romero and co. were dead serious about keeping their unrated versions the only ones available, even so far as to turn a Warner Bros. offer down before United Film picked up Dawn.

I'm still in awe that we're living in a day and age when an R-cut of a Dead film has to be made but gets replaced within six months by the real thing. When I stand back and just look at how content rules work for theatrical versus home video, it just doesn't make sense to me. I know the reasoning behind it, I just don't understand why we're still using that reasoning for the theatrical run0. Just another reason why I don't blame people for sticking to the home theater experience. Same is gonna go for The Devil's Rejects and Sin City.

 

[Justin_S]

From http://www.davisdvd.com/news/news.html


Hope they wind up including a commentary with Romero. I know it'll likely never happen, but a Romero/Hopper commentary would be golden.

 

[Michael Elliott]

Drew, I'm not sure if you missed the announcement but Paramount won't be releasing ANY horror titles this year. Going back to what Ron said in that other post, I'm curious if "fans knowing everything" is a reason behind it. :frowning:

Back to the topic at hand, I'm somewhat shocked Universal is losing sales by releasing the theatrical cut and the unrated cut at the same time. Looks like they'd milk fans by releasing the theatrical cut this year and then a SE, uncut version next Halloween. God knows most would have bought both versions this way.

 

[Adam_WM]

I would doubt that are going to see extensive re-releases beyond these editions of LOTD considering its box office gross.