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TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX HOME ENTERTAINMENT DEBUTS Manufacture-On-Demand DVD SERIES (1 Viewer)

Robert Crawford

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Robin9 said:
Don't cut your throat to spite your face. The Fox Blu-ray division is not the same as the Fox MOD division and has a different attitude. Most Fox BRDs are state of the art. You'll probably be very pleased with those two BRDs.
Right, Fox is doing very fine work with their BD releases. However, their MOD program is on the other end of the spectrum.
 

davidHartzog

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At least Fox is getting some movies out there, even if they have the same quality issues as their news network. Universal Vault is slow-on-a-stick.
 

Eastmancolor

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Got to see like new 35mm prints of THE BEST THINGS IN LIFE ARE FREE and APRIL LOVE at the 49th annual Cinecon film festival at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood over Labor Day weekend. These were the only two Scope titles run, Cinecon schedules mainly films from the 20's, 30's and 40's, and they were great to see in all of their widescreen glory. Gorgeous color, great sound. APRIL LOVE was in stereo, BTILAF mono. Shirley Jones and Pat Boone were there for the screening of APRIL LOVE too.

The preservation folks at the studio did work on these awhile back, supposedly making new video masters at the same time, so the people in charge of the archive disc program have no excuse releasing old pan and scan versions on DVD-R.
 

Robin9

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Eastmancolor said:
Got to see like new 35mm prints of THE BEST THINGS IN LIFE ARE FREE and APRIL LOVE at the 49th annual Cinecon film festival at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood over Labor Day weekend.
I envy you.
 

lionel59

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Maybe Twilight Time should seek a master from the restored elements of APRIL LOVE -which they originally planned to release- and do a Blu Ray edition.I'd imagine the video master they were shown earlier was pre-restoration as they were not happy with it. (Maybe the master used for the Wide Screen broadcasts on AMC)
After all the frustration and criticism created by the Cinema Archives release, I'm guessing they'd sell well. Maybe they could be persuaded to do a Blu Ray of THE BEST THINGS IN LIFE ARE FREE too, as it fits their original agenda of releasing the Fox CinemaScope classics of the '50's+ early '60's.
 

Matt Hough

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At this point, if Fox won't release them on Blu-ray (and neither was part of the Vote Your Choice program), then let Twilight Time or Criterion have these.
 

davidHartzog

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Received The Sweet Ride, 1967, today, very nice transfer, excellent color and sound, but it is pan and scan, which is disappointing.
 

JoHud

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I've been mostly ignoring this line but the few I have seen appear to actually include trailers, a first for this line over the past year of existence of over 100 releases. Pretty sad that after a year, that's the only improvement they could bother with.
lionel59 said:
Getting back to the Cinema Archives releases, I have finally found someone online who has commented on the transfer of HILDA CRANE. The person commenting (on a blog) states that it is " a lovely widescreen transfer". The back of the cover states "4:3 Letterbox" but I have not had this verified. It could be a misprint. It may be 16:9. I will let those reading this topic know once I have my own copy, later this year.
It's letterboxed, which is kind of a plus. Unfortunately it has quite a bit of video noise, which gives itself away as a pretty aged analog transfer. Certainly nothing "lovely" about this transfer. Another loser from the Fox Archives.

I can also confirm that The Right Approach is P&S with squished opening titles. Lame.
 

Doug Bull

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All right all right, so I weakened and bought another two Fox Archive discs after I said I wouldn't.

The two discs were, "Three Little Girls in Blue" and "Coney Island".
At least I knew that there would be no aspect ratio issues.

As reported previously in this thread and elsewhere "Coney Island" was probably cleaned up in preparation for another Betty Grable DVD set.
As a result it is one of the better looking Fox Archive discs. (If only they all looked this good)

The same cannot be said for "Three Little Girls in Blue"
It is just another ugly offering copied from yet another ancient video master.
The colors have no vibrancy and once again the blacks tend to be heavy and crushed.
The image is mainly very soft.
Sound is acceptable.

The wonderful Vera-Ellen production number (probably one of her best) is all but lost in a veil of darkness. :angry:

The movie is one of my favourites, so this awful DVD, unfortunately, will have to suffice until something better comes along.

3girls1.jpg
3girls8.jpg


3girls3.jpg
3girls6.jpg
 

rdimucci

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Clyde's Place said:
The people on here that I've seen and in every other forum I visit, expect films to be at the proper aspect ratio. It's probably why we seldom see a film released in two different formats any longer. The viewing audience has wised up.
I wish I was as confident as you that the bulk of the viewing audience has changed from the days when most viewers wanted to make sure that "the screen is filled up." But I suspect that the only thing that widescreen displays has done for most of the audience is to give them a button that makes it easy to fill that screen. Whether they are stretching or cropping those Academy-ratio films to fill the screen, or doing the same to pan-and-scan transfers of widescreen films, it makes no difference to them.

I suspect we'd all be surprised at how few people watch all of those properly presented Warner Archive films in their correct ratios. That is the audience that is supporting the Fox program. When Fox puts a disclaimer at the beginning of one of their pan-and-scan atrocities saying that "This film has been modified to fit your screen," and then the film actually doesn't fit a person's widescreen display, I'm afraid that most people will just hit enough buttons until it DOES fit their screen.
 

Matt Hough

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For any company to still be using that outmoded "modified to fit you screen" disclaimer when there are several different screen sizes in use nowadays is simply absurd and shows their complete disinterest in their potential customers.
 
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rdimucci said:
I wish I was as confident as you that the bulk of the viewing audience has changed from the days when most viewers wanted to make sure that "the screen is filled up." But I suspect that the only thing that widescreen displays has done for most of the audience is to give them a button that makes it easy to fill that screen. Whether they are stretching or cropping those Academy-ratio films to fill the screen, or doing the same to pan-and-scan transfers of widescreen films, it makes no difference to them.

I suspect we'd all be surprised at how few people watch all of those properly presented Warner Archive films in their correct ratios. That is the audience that is supporting the Fox program. When Fox puts a disclaimer at the beginning of one of their pan-and-scan atrocities saying that "This film has been modified to fit your screen," and then the film actually doesn't fit a person's widescreen display, I'm afraid that most people will just hit enough buttons until it DOES fit their screen.
While there is no way to prove who is correct, I can only go on my own anecdotal evidence. The vast majority of people I meet who buy these films from the Warner Archives and others, always seem pretty savvy as to the purity of their film watching. And younger viewers, few of whom probably purchase these lesser known classic films, would be appalled at one of their blockbuster films being panned and scanned especially in this day and age of 16:9 flat screens, which is why releasing the film in both formats have pretty much gone by the wayside.The people you describe are those like my brother-in-law and others. They watch films on AMC or the Fox Movie Channel, and zoom or electronically format the pictures themselves. These are the same networks I never tune in myself for obvious reasons.But seldom if ever, do I see them purchasing classic films of any kind or seeking them out on the internet. They seem to be content to just sit at home in their strato-lounger and watch regardless of how crummy a presentation they are watching. Why would they bother buying a DVD when they can get it for free? What we'll never ever know is how many sales Fox is losing because of their insistence on continuing to release terribly inferior products as a cynical money grab. This is coming at a time when I receive an email from the AFI to aid film preservation by joining their organization. It's a very worthy cause, but when you see the attitude of a multi-billion dollar conglomerate like Fox simply disregard any pretense about preserving their library, it makes one a bit cynical. Those in charge at the AFI really need to take a studio like Fox to task and I tweeted them as such although it probably will never be viewed by anything but a machine.There's no hard and fast rule regarding who is watching what and why, but unless some studio decides to come out with some hard sales data (don't see that happening) there is no real way of knowing except that Warner is successful and growing, and Fox is trying to get by on the cheap. I just believe that the majority of those seeking these films out know what they want. Others may not exactly know what they are getting which is why I wrote up a full review of April Love on Amazon dealing with the quality issue. Will it have any effect? Well, maybe, maybe not. But it's one thing to write about it in this single forum topic, it's quite another to try and make a difference elsewhere and educate people. Whether you succeed or fail is not the issue. It's whether you tried.I notice the price of April Love has dropped to $15.98, and I intend to write more reviews. I unwittingly bought a digital copy of Goodbye Charlie from Amazon before Fox Archive Collection released it and it was of course, pan and scan as is the DVD. It will be my next review soon.I'm not saying you are wrong or I am right. Maybe I'm just hopeful. But either way, I just feel better about at least making some effort.
 

rdimucci

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Can anyone who has actually viewed the discs comment on the aspect ratios of :

April Love (1957)
Battle at Bloody Beach (1961)
Mardi Gras (1958)
Marines, Let’s Go! (1961)
Three Brave Men (1957)
Untamed (1955)
Young Guns of Texas (1963)

Guru, The (1969)
Life In the Balance, A (1955)
Walk With Love and Death, A (1969)
 

JoHud

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I've actually seen most of these, so I can answer with 100% certainty. Unfortunately, you will not like the answer. None of the ones I've seen are widescreen, anamorphic or otherwise. One is open matte with as strong transfer and is the only one I can possibly recommend getting. It's also the only one that looked like it was transferred to video within the past 10 years.

Battle at Bloody Beach (1961) P&S
Mardi Gras (1958) P&S
Marines, Let’s Go! (1961) P&S
Three Brave Men (1957) P&S
Young Guns of Texas (1963) P&S
Life In the Balance, A (1955) Open matte with a high quality, recent transfer.

While I've never seen them, the others appear to be P&S with the possible exception of The Untamed, which might be non-anamorphic letterboxed.

The only difference between some of the P&S titles is that some have letterboxed opening credits and some have squished credits. Though the fact that they are P&S is so unpardonable, it really makes no difference.
 

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