A Few Words About A few words about...™ Quo Vadis (1 Viewer)

[Matt Hough]

The fleshtones on the Blu-ray certainly look more pinkish and less brown. And, of course, there's no comparison with the sharpness and detail.

Thanks for that link!

 

[Patrick H.]

Gave this a rent the other night since I've never managed to see it before. While I agree that the colors on the DVD seem a little muted for Technicolor, for a film this old, it otherwise looked really good. I noticed one weird thing, though...at the layer change on disc 1, when Nero first gets the idea to burn Rome (it's pretty obvious since it's in the middle of a stationary shot of Ustinov), the color values noticeably shift. I can't imagine it's a film element issue, since it occurs during a shot. Some sort of encoding discrepancy?

 

[Robert Crawford]

I can't hardly wait until Easter.




Crawdaddy

 

Did this film have an intermission originally? I have heard conflicting reports.

 

[Joe Lugoff]

Originally Posted by Eric Scott Richard

Did this film have an intermission originally? I have heard conflicting reports.

"Quo Vadis" was probably the last film MGM released in New York under a system which was quite common in the 1930s and 1940s -- opening it at the Capitol with "popular prices" and continuous showings, and six blocks south on Broadway at the Astor with reserved seats and two showings a day. These were the same theaters and the same policy MGM used for "Gone With the Wind" and most of their "big" movies in those days. (The hefty top price at the Astor for the "Quo Vadis" evening performances was $2.40.)

I think it's reasonable to assume that the reserved seat version of "Quo Vadis" was shown with an intermission, while the "popular price" version wasn't, which would have resulted in two versions and the conflicting reports. But I don't know for sure.

 

[Joe Caps]

Quo Vadis certainly had intermission and intermission music.
Even in its reissue in the mid 1960s, these were still in place.
Somewhere along the way, MGM joined the final scene of Act One (Robert Taylor riding away in the chariot) to the beginning of Act Two.
However, since turner went back to the original negs for this, wouldn't the original negs have that scene leading into the Intermission Card?

Indeed, Film Score Monthly just released the soundtrack of Quo Vadis on cd. the original Vadis LP has a piece called Chariot Chase. There, you can hear the complete music for the End of Act One.
Further, the piece that is now the Overture for Act One, is actually marked Intermezzo, leading to believe this was originally the Intermission music.