A Few Words About A few words about...™ My Fair Lady -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Robert Harris]

Originally Posted by Adam Lenhardt /t/315932/a-few-words-about-my-fair-lady-in-blu-ray/450#post_3934639
In other words, it's about creating a baseline so that future efforts will look no worse? Whether for a 2K restoration for Blu-Ray or some other purpose down the road, the 4K scan is always the starting point, not an ending point?

We can get very off track discussing generalities, as different films may need different solutions. There really is no such thing as a 2k "restoration" for Blu-ray. Possibly a digital clean-up. Problem is the 2k scan doesn't really get you anywhere. Neither fish nor foul. Might as well do clean-up in HD and save budget, if all that one wishes in the end is an HD master.

RAH

 

[Doctorossi]

Criterion MFL: Not gonna happen.
2014 MFL 50th Anniversary blu-ray re-release Special Edition, from Paramount, with flower-scented pencils: gonna happen.

You know, I'd probably even put up with the pencils if I knew I could mark your words down as anything more certain than just ironic optimism.

 

[Ethan Riley]

You know, I'd probably even put up with the pencils if I knew I could mark your words down as anything more certain than just ironic optimism.

I'd bet money on it.

 

[Dave Moritz]

I am assuming that My Fair Lady Bluray release is still flawed and has not been fixed yet. It is a shame that they would screw up such a classic and let it be released like they did! Will not buy this one till they have re scanned it!

 

[JParker]

I am assuming that My Fair Lady Bluray release is still flawed and has not been fixed yet. It is a shame that they would screw up such a classic and let it be released like they did! Will not buy this one till they have re scanned it!

I don't think we'll see a fix any time soon, if ever!
See here: http://lewrockwell.com/spl4/trophy-investments.html

7 Trophy Investments of Billionaires
The Electric Barbarellas
All-girl electronic pop groups usually aren’t an octogenarian's cup of tea. But Sumner Redstone isn’t most octogenarians.
The 89-year-old media tycoon, who serves as CEO of Viacom and is a majority owner in CBS Corporation, was such a fan of the Electric Barbarellas – described as “a cross between the Pussycat Dolls and Spice Girls, except raunchier and not as musically gifted” – that he dreamt up a reality show chronicling their attempted rise to starlettdom and strong-armed MTV into green-lighting it. (The show ran for a single season last year.)
Sumner’s investment in the band, including a half million dollars just to fly the six members to various record label meetings, angered a number of Viacom insiders. His granting of company stock to frontwoman Heather Naylor, who later sold her shares for $157,000, also drew criticism for loosening Viacom’s strict option grants restrictions for his own personal interests.

 

[Mark Oates]

Man's gotta have a hobby!
In any case I recall a few years back Sumner Redstone making a keynote speech about exploiting the library assets of the entire group in home video, syndication, downloading and streaming. I'd say Paramount Home Entertainment's track record over the past couple of years has shown how much attention they pay their owner.

 

[GMpasqua]

With all the hundreds of millions this property has made in the last 50 years, you would think they could afford a better master off the restored 70MM elements

 

[Mark Oates]

Hollywood accounting. As far as the tax man's concerned it's probably still making an operating loss.

 

[JParker]

Man's gotta have a hobby!
In any case I recall a few years back Sumner Redstone making a keynote speech about exploiting the library assets of the entire group in home video, syndication, downloading and streaming. I'd say Paramount Home Entertainment's track record over the past couple of years has shown how much attention they pay their owner.

In all fairness to Mr. Redstone, if he saw this and still had influence, I suspect he'd chew those CBS boys out!

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,209 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

 

[Robert Harris]

In all fairness to Mr. Redstone, if he saw this and still had influence, I suspect he'd chew those CBS boys out!

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,209 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

MFL is presented precisely as he wishes. Why might one presume anything different?

 

[Techman707]

MFL is presented precisely as he wishes. Why might one presume anything different?

I don't think he even gives it a thought, which is why so many film are butchered when put on Blu-ray. In the next couple of years there will be NO FILM distributed to theatres at all.
It's interesting to see all the "one night" showings that have come about (the latest one is Sing'in in the Rain), since they can distribute them digitally on hard drives for a fraction of the cost of a film print. You would "think" that for the 50th anniversary of "My Fair Lady" they would make sure they had a good digital master to run it in theatres. But, I'm willing to bet they will use the same defective transfer that's on the Blu-ray. It's just a sign of the times.

 

[JParker]

Man's gotta have a hobby!
In any case I recall a few years back Sumner Redstone making a keynote speech about exploiting the library assets of the entire group in home video, syndication, downloading and streaming. I'd say Paramount Home Entertainment's track record over the past couple of years has shown how much attention they pay their owner.

MFL is presented precisely as he wishes. Why might one presume anything different?

Well, if Mark is right, maybe he's not seen it himself...the sales figures aren't good. Maybe you're right; I don't have the facts. MFL is not MTV. So you could be right, Mr. H.

 

[Robert Harris]

Well, if Mark is right, maybe he's not seen it himself...the sales figures aren't good. Maybe you're right; I don't have the facts. MFL is not MTV. So you could be right, Mr. H.

He is ultimately responsible for its presentation.

 

[GMpasqua]

Originally Posted by JParker /t/315932/a-few-words-about-my-fair-lady-in-blu-ray/480#post_3945539
Well, if Mark is right, maybe he's not seen it himself...the sales figures aren't good. Maybe you're right; I don't have the facts. MFL is not MTV. So you could be right, Mr. H.

Maybe one reason the sales figures aren't good is because the disc got negative reviews all around (Even on Amazon!) and word of mouth quickly spread.
Plus it was voted the worst disc of the year in two catagories on this forum alone.

Meanwhile, "The Sound of Music" (really the only film it can be somewhat compared to) seems to be doing very well and it is available in three different versions on Blu-ray!
Audrey Hepburn is the maindraw at this point (though Paramount has only released two of her films and no other companies have released any of her films)

Where is the Box set? And with all of Audrey's original song vocals appearing all over the net, why not include them on the blu-ray?

 

[JParker]

What would be the costs of a new film scan for both Spartacus and My Fair Lady, indeed what are the true costs of a 4K film scan and then the work that follows to make it a worthy blu ray release. ?
Didn't Universal screw up the re-release of Out Of Africa with too much additional processing. 

You misunderstood, the link was bad: http://www.hometheaterforum.com/t/315932/a-few-words-about-my-fair-lady-in-blu-ray/30#post_3867035
Robert Harris replied regarding a Criterion Collection Edition:

While it would have been nice if Criterion could have been involved, it must be kept in mind that they would only have a license toward specific limited rights, which disallows the funding as needed.

CBS would never admit error or the need for a re-issue, unlike Universal, which at least did finally provide a better Blu-ray release (which I've not seen) of Out of Africa, and will evidently honor a return of the prior Blu-ray:

UPDATE: 3/27
Apparently Universal has decided to institute a replacement program for those who purchased earlier Blu-ray releases.

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/t/319102/a-few-words-about-out-of-africa-in-blu-ray

 

[JParker]

Well, look at it this way. It could have been worse. He could have insisted via the magic of ILM and CGI that his The Electric Barbarellas were put into the Ascot scene or the embassy ball!

 

[JParker]

Hollywood accounting. As far as the tax man's concerned it's probably still making an operating loss.

I'm sure you're right, given this maze of rights, etc. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Fair_Lady_%28film%29#Copyright_issues
And the losses are not just for the "tax man"...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_accounting

Art Buchwald received a settlement after his lawsuit Buchwald v. Paramount over Paramount's use of Hollywood accounting. The court found Paramount's actions "unconscionable", noting that it was impossible to believe that a movie (1988's Eddie Murphy comedy Coming to America) which grossed US $350 million failed to make a profit, especially since the actual production costs were less than a tenth of that. Paramount settled for an undisclosed sum, rather than have its accounting methods closely scrutinized...
A WB receipt was leaked online, showing that the hugely successful movie Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix ended up with a $167 million loss on paper.

 

[Robert Harris]

Deleted

 

[Robert Harris]

I'm unaware of any "maze of rights." MFL is owned by CBS. Simple as that.

RAH

 

[GMpasqua]

CBS backed the original Broadway production of "My Fair Lady" for $400,000 of course they made their money back on the show (it ran 5+ years) plus they owned the Cast Recording - which made a ton of money.
The got the London cast recording and the motion picture soundtrack - all big money makers - they probably made more on the cast album then they did on the stage show. They also got some of the motion picture fees ($5.5 million was paid to lease those rights for 7 years). CBS would have gotten a chuck of that. They also got home video sales fees, international productions, revival productions etc and TV rights

They made millions off their $400,000 investment - which is why they restored the film in 1994. It's a gold mine