haineshisway
Senior HTF Member
Working my way through the last two batches of Twilight Time releases and thought I'd post my thoughts - yes, MY thoughts. Agree, don't agree, it's all good.
First up was The Mississippi Mermaid, from the novel Waltz into Darkness by William Irish (aka Cornell Woolrich). I posted a bit about this in the A Few Words About thread. I saw this film many times on its original release. I liked it better than Truffaut's other Woolrich adaptation, The Bride Wore Black, even though Mermaid kind of peters out by the end. You can't do better than Mr. Belmondo and Miss Deneuve, and the score is terrific, by Antoine Duhamel. I was expecting the worst with the transfer, but it's not bad at all, in fact it's quite nice, IMO. One expects the absolute worst the minute the Les Artistes Associes credit comes up - out of focus, filled with scratches and ugly as all get out. But as soon as it cuts out of that to the newspaper ads, we're fine. Most of the transfer has nice detail, the color is fine (and you know how I am about color) and because I watch movies rather than freeze frame, zoom in looking for things, or sit on top of the screen, I enjoyed it thoroughly. Is it a 4K restoration? Of course not, that was never in the cards. Everyone purports to want a moviegoing experience in their home, but that's where this has all gotten very peculiar. Because when you have a 4K restoration that is pristine and directly off the camera negative, and that's put on a Blu-ray, you're not actually having a moviegoing experience in the sense that that's what a release print you'd have seen in a theater would have looked like. So what people really seem to want is some idealized moviegoing experience that never really existed, as release prints were generations away from the source. Add in opticals and dupes and you're even further away. So, The Mississippi Mermaid rather looks like it did in the theater. Yes, there's a few dirt specs here and there, just as you'd have on any release print run more than one time. There are a bunch of opticals in the film and in this film it's not always that easy to figure out where they begin and end. So, no, not everything is razor sharp, but the majority of the film is fine and dandy in terms of its look. I have seen MUCH worse than this and this doesn't even deserve a "worse", at least for me. I'm sure the transfer is several years old but there's no crime in that when it's an MGM/UA thing - you get what you get, but it's a 1000 times better than the DVD. So, if you're a fan of the film, get it.
Next up, A Man for All Seasons - on that one, I'm in agreement with Mr. Harris - it looks really good. I can't get into the aspect ratio argument as I really have no history with the film at all. The acting is amazing, the script is amazing and Mr. Zinneman was a really fine director.
Then it was on to The Young Lions. I've always enjoyed this film tremendously - I'm a big fan of Mr. Dmytryk, its director, and the cast is wonderful, and the score by Hugo Friedhofer is exceptionally great. The transfer is brand new and it's a stunner - incredible black-and-white scope with terrific detail and contrast. You will not want to miss this one.
And finally, Absolute Beginners. Again, we're in MGM/UA land, so you're dealing with a transfer that is several years old. So, out of the gate, yes, it could look better, yes there are a handful of dirt specks and no, it is not off the camera negative. And again, lots of opticals in this film, so those shots are softer than the rest. The detail ranges from excellent in closer shots, to improvable in the mid-to-long shots, but there's nothing in disaster territory here or anything approaching that. The film is a one-off, wacky, insanely stylized piece of work, and at times it prefigures Mr. Luhrmann's excesses. The color in this thing is mind-blowing, as are the sets and the camera moves (the opening shot, which appears to be one very long take, but isn't, is astonishing in what it achieves). It's a completely weird film about teens in the UK in the late 1950s, along with race riots and music and dancing. It's a phantasmagoria of color and sound and I had a great time watching it. A new transfer off the negative would be incredible, but since we're not getting that, this will do just fine.
First up was The Mississippi Mermaid, from the novel Waltz into Darkness by William Irish (aka Cornell Woolrich). I posted a bit about this in the A Few Words About thread. I saw this film many times on its original release. I liked it better than Truffaut's other Woolrich adaptation, The Bride Wore Black, even though Mermaid kind of peters out by the end. You can't do better than Mr. Belmondo and Miss Deneuve, and the score is terrific, by Antoine Duhamel. I was expecting the worst with the transfer, but it's not bad at all, in fact it's quite nice, IMO. One expects the absolute worst the minute the Les Artistes Associes credit comes up - out of focus, filled with scratches and ugly as all get out. But as soon as it cuts out of that to the newspaper ads, we're fine. Most of the transfer has nice detail, the color is fine (and you know how I am about color) and because I watch movies rather than freeze frame, zoom in looking for things, or sit on top of the screen, I enjoyed it thoroughly. Is it a 4K restoration? Of course not, that was never in the cards. Everyone purports to want a moviegoing experience in their home, but that's where this has all gotten very peculiar. Because when you have a 4K restoration that is pristine and directly off the camera negative, and that's put on a Blu-ray, you're not actually having a moviegoing experience in the sense that that's what a release print you'd have seen in a theater would have looked like. So what people really seem to want is some idealized moviegoing experience that never really existed, as release prints were generations away from the source. Add in opticals and dupes and you're even further away. So, The Mississippi Mermaid rather looks like it did in the theater. Yes, there's a few dirt specs here and there, just as you'd have on any release print run more than one time. There are a bunch of opticals in the film and in this film it's not always that easy to figure out where they begin and end. So, no, not everything is razor sharp, but the majority of the film is fine and dandy in terms of its look. I have seen MUCH worse than this and this doesn't even deserve a "worse", at least for me. I'm sure the transfer is several years old but there's no crime in that when it's an MGM/UA thing - you get what you get, but it's a 1000 times better than the DVD. So, if you're a fan of the film, get it.
Next up, A Man for All Seasons - on that one, I'm in agreement with Mr. Harris - it looks really good. I can't get into the aspect ratio argument as I really have no history with the film at all. The acting is amazing, the script is amazing and Mr. Zinneman was a really fine director.
Then it was on to The Young Lions. I've always enjoyed this film tremendously - I'm a big fan of Mr. Dmytryk, its director, and the cast is wonderful, and the score by Hugo Friedhofer is exceptionally great. The transfer is brand new and it's a stunner - incredible black-and-white scope with terrific detail and contrast. You will not want to miss this one.
And finally, Absolute Beginners. Again, we're in MGM/UA land, so you're dealing with a transfer that is several years old. So, out of the gate, yes, it could look better, yes there are a handful of dirt specks and no, it is not off the camera negative. And again, lots of opticals in this film, so those shots are softer than the rest. The detail ranges from excellent in closer shots, to improvable in the mid-to-long shots, but there's nothing in disaster territory here or anything approaching that. The film is a one-off, wacky, insanely stylized piece of work, and at times it prefigures Mr. Luhrmann's excesses. The color in this thing is mind-blowing, as are the sets and the camera moves (the opening shot, which appears to be one very long take, but isn't, is astonishing in what it achieves). It's a completely weird film about teens in the UK in the late 1950s, along with race riots and music and dancing. It's a phantasmagoria of color and sound and I had a great time watching it. A new transfer off the negative would be incredible, but since we're not getting that, this will do just fine.
