A Few Words About A few words about...™ Dr. Zhivago -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[benbess]

ahollis: I usually love Jarre's work. Yes, the cinematography of Young is jaw dropping in all of those films. It's the little and big things that are amazing--like crystals in the snow in Dr. Z. I've seen snow like that....

Didn't they wait a year to get that storm for Ryan? Now it would just be cgi...

 

[benbess]

ahollis: Yes, I think Mills deserved that award, but I've read at least one brutal critique of his performance and the way the role was written....

 

[benbess]

I'm a sucker for epics, but I always thought that Lean's were the most complex, thought-provoking and beautiful of all the epic films that I can think of. I'm sure there are many individual epics that equal Lean's kind of complexity and beauty, but....has anyone directed 5 films of that kind in a row?

 

[lovingthenet]

Hello

make money from home

 

[Robert Harris]

You'll find that DL's "epics" were small, very personal story, wrapped within earth-shaking events.

Many people didn't come to like Ryan, as they didn't understand what it was. He felt that with that film, the problem could have been solved with the addition of a single piece of dialogue: "Rosie, you're lookin' at the world through rose-colored glasses."

Can't wait for it to arrive on Blu. Another brilliant film.

No one has ever done it better.

 

[Ken_McAlinden]

Originally Posted by benbess ">[/url]

...
And famous reviewer Ken McA even prefers it to Dr. Z~!! Any chance you'd be willing to tell us why? You're so eloquent in your reviews, which I've really enjoyed....
...
[/QUOTE]
I saw both movies long after their initial theatrical releases. Given its success and reputation, I had exceptionally high expectations for "Dr. Zhivago" and was ultimately disappointed. The exact opposite was the case with "Ryan's Daughter". I actually offered up my modestly negative thoughts on Zhivago in a review of the "Essential Classics - Romance" collection from three years ago. Here's the excerpt:


[QUOTE]Originally Posted by [b]Ken_McAlinden[/b] [url=http://www.hometheaterforum.com/forum/thread/255566/htf-review-essential-classics-romances]

 

[ahollis]

Originally Posted by benbess

ahollis: I usually love Jarre's work. Yes, the cinematography of Young is jaw dropping in all of those films. It's the little and big things that are amazing--like crystals in the snow in Dr. Z. I've seen snow like that....

Didn't they wait a year to get that storm for Ryan? Now it would just be cgi...

I had forgotten it, but you are right about them waiting for the storm. I am not sure CGI would have helped the intensity of the scene. I might have looked like THE PERFECT STORM which while amazing, it overwhelmed the film.

 

[ahollis]

Originally Posted by Ken_McAlinden


I saw both movies long after their initial theatrical releases. Given its success and reputation, I had exceptionally high expectations for "Dr. Zhivago" and was ultimately disappointed. The exact opposite was the case with "Ryan's Daughter". I actually offered up my modestly negative thoughts on Zhivago in a review of the "Essential Classics - Romance" collection from three years ago.

You are right. When I saw Ryan's Daughter on the screen, the reviews were not the best, so my expectations were much lower and I was captivated by the film and struggle of Sara Mills character. That is one of the reasons I liked the music in that it portrayed her unhappiness while also giving a glimmer of hope that she was looking for. While so many people look at Ryan's Daughter as a failure, I put it right up in the top 10 of Lean's film. I also hope that this film can see a Blu-ray release.

Dr. Zhivago was the first Road Show that I saw and just the presentation puts this film in a special place in my heart. I did not know what an overture was until I heard this one and I thought something was wrong with the projector and curtains since there was not light on the screen and the curtains remained closed. What a jaw dropping experience it was when the MGM lion showed and the curtains parted. True showmanship that we rarely see today. I was hooked and never missed a Road Show from then own, even a bad one in the latter years.

 

[24fpssean]

Warners did a gorgeous tranfer for Ryan's Daughter several years ago for DVD, so a new one for Blu ray should be stunning. Their 2001, also shot on 70mm, looks amazing.

 

[benbess]

RH wrote: "You'll find that DL's "epics" were small, very personal story, wrapped within earth-shaking events."

This is an excellent capsule summary of what makes his films so impressive, deep, and enjoyable time after time.

24p wrote: "Warners did a gorgeous tranfer for Ryan's Daughter several years ago for DVD, so a new one for Blu ray should be stunning. Their 2001, also shot on 70mm, looks amazing."

Yes! This gives me hope!

ahollis wrote: "You are right. When I saw Ryan's Daughter on the screen, the reviews were not the best, so my expectations were much lower and I was captivated by the film and struggle of Sara Mills character. That is one of the reasons I liked the music in that it portrayed her unhappiness while also giving a glimmer of hope that she was looking for. While so many people look at Ryan's Daughter as a failure, I put it right up in the top 10 of Lean's film. I also hope that this film can see a Blu-ray release.

Dr. Zhivago was the first Road Show that I saw and just the presentation puts this film in a special place in my heart. I did not know what an overture was until I heard this one and I thought something was wrong with the projector and curtains since there was not light on the screen and the curtains remained closed. What a jaw dropping experience it was when the MGM lion showed and the curtains parted. True showmanship that we rarely see today. I was hooked and never missed a Road Show from then own, even a bad one in the latter years."

KM wrote: "Truth be told, I have never been a huge fan of David Lean's "Doctor Zhivago", but I fully acknowledge that there are a lot of people who disagree with me. The epic story of a Russian physician and poet who falls in love with the right woman under all of the wrong circumstances (they are both married and their country is being torn asunder by the Bolshevik revolution) is beautifully written, expertly visualized, and well-acted, but the central relationship between Zhivago (Sharif) and Lara (Christie) just never interests me at any point in the film, robbing it of much of its poignancy. That being said, I certainly do not hate the film, but I find myself only able to admire it from a distance."

Nice reviews. I'd have to watch both again. I thought there was some chemistry in Z, but maybe it was just poetry....

 

[willyTass]

well if Zhivago lacked "poignancy" someone please tell the millions of fools who flocked to it to make it the 8th highest grossing film in human history

 

[Ken_McAlinden]

Did you miss the part where I said "I fully acknowledge that there are a lot of people who disagree with me"? [/url]

well if Zhivago lacked "poignancy" someone please tell the millions of fools who flocked to it to make it the 8th highest grossing film in human history

 

[benbess]

One small but interesting thing to me about Dr. Z is the way it culturally fit into the Cold War politics of the time. Obviously it's to a significant degree an anti-Soviet film. But, it's measured and complicated, I think. The causes of the revolution are, iirc, sympathetically portrayed. One of the things I enjoy about the film is the role of Alec Guiness as the Soviet officer. When I saw the opening sequence as a kid I was truly frightened by him and the spectacle of Soviet militarism on display. But, even though he has very little screen time, when you see him again in the end he becomes a pretty sympathetic character. And in the context of the time that was fairly progressive and pro-detente, I would say--to take a seemingly cruel and frightening Soviet officer and humanize him by the end.

I like Alec Guiness in everything I've seen him in. One of his neglected films is the brilliant and beautiful A Handful of Dust. What a role he has in that at the end reading Dickens! A Handful of Dust would be great on blu, but I imagine the odds of that are small...

 

[24fpssean]

The film actually opened to empty theatres, then MGM poured a million or so into ad campaigns, which resulted in the flocking.

 

[24fpssean]

Charles Sturridge's A Handful of Dust is really a great little film, along with his Where Angels Fear to Tread (the best of the E.M. Forster adaptions, IMO). The only change of getting these on blu ray will be if they are released Region Free in the UK.

 

[Adam_S]

fabulous article on the restoration, also touches on Kane

http://www.theauteurs.com/notebook/posts/1771

"You can't do preservation without a fair amount of restoration. But I usually separate preservation from creating something for distribution purposes. Two very simple paths. First, you take the original materials, always the original sources, or closest to the originals you can get, and literally preserve them. Copy them, migrate them to a new piece of film. Film is currently our preservation element because it's a rather inexpensive medium. It's very dense, it can hold up...it's quite substantial. You can leave it up—not that we would—but you can leave it up on the shelf for seven years and come back to it and know it will be there. Data at the moment is not quite that reliable. So what I do is scan the camera negative of Doctor Zhivago and immediately output it to film, so you're oversampling out to film from 8K. Then we take the data and then we go downstream that for distribution. We start the dirt-fixing, we start doing the color correction. And at that point we work in film space. We complete our restoration in film space. And that restoration would be potentially for theatrical relese prints. And then we make another version for digital cinema. Which is a different color space. And then we make yet another version, which is for high-definition TV, and that's what's on the Blu-ray. Which is in yet a different color space."

 

[DavidJ]

Thanks for the link Adam. It is a good read.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Sounds great. Thanks for another fine "few words" (and the good news), RAH.

Looking forward to picking this up via Amazon UK (along w/ a bunch others) since it seems much cheaper to import this one. The UK version won't have the nice-looking digibook, which I (like some others) have mixed feelings about (mainly for its durability) -- and may possibly have some other small diffs like subtitles, etcs -- but I'm fine w/ that.

_Man_

 

[benbess]

24p: Thanks for the tip. I'll try to look up Where Angels Fear to Tread. But--has anyone else experienced this?--at this point it's a bit difficult for me to watch something less than blu now that I'm used to it.

I saw Dust in the theaters during its original release. Was that 1989...? How time flies.

Adam S: Great article on the restoration. Many thanks. One thing that was interesting but a little worrying to me was the discussion of how much mastering a film like this costs. I mean they have to think about the length!? It makes sense, but it just means that there's still a steep economic calculation to be made before something can make it to blu.

For instance, Star Trek is the only TV show I know made before 1980 to make it to blu. I would like to see other shows too, but it doesn't seem likely. Star Trek, as we all know, has a fanatic fan base (that I'm part of) and so it makes sense there. But for other shows--classic Westerns, dramas and comedies, it doesn't look that likely...

 

[Steve...O]

Great reading in this thread - thanks all.

Not to sidetrack too much, but is there definitive word on whether two other Lean classics, Lawrence and River Kwai, are coming to BD any time soon?