A Few Words About A few words about...™ Mr. Smith Goes to Washington -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Patrick Donahue]

The first 2 releases bearing fruit from Sony's restoration program supervised by Grover Krisp of the Capra Columbia film catalog gives me great hope for the recently-completed work done for "Lost Horizon"...already have "It Happened One Night" along with Kino-Lorber's "Pocketful Of Miracles"(which looks better than I've ever seen before) and am waiting somewhat impatiently for "Mr. Smith" to arrive on Dec. 2nd...thank you for your highly positive reviews of these initial Capra restorations, Robert!!!

Really hoping to see a nicely cleaned up Lost Horizon. One of my absolute favorites (the books as well)...

 

[MatthewA]

Really hoping to see a nicely cleaned up Lost Horizon. One of my absolute favorites (the books as well)...

Have they found any new footage for this version or is what they've already found all there is?

 

[Mike Frezon]

Have they found any new footage for this version or is what they've already found all there is?

Start at THIS POST, Matthew and read to the bottom of the page for a discussion of the Lost Horizon footage.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Picked up my copy today, and couldn't believe how nice the package is for a title with a $19.99 MSRP. It even comes with a beautiful 25 page book as part of the package.

On the second to last page, Grover Crisp wrote a brief essay on the restoration, filling in some of additional details from RAH's concise summary in the first post of this thread. The most interesting detail for me is that Frank Capra's personal nitrate print, which only came into Sony's possession a decade ago, is the source of the audio for this release. Parts of that print were also scanned to replace some of the poorly made dupe footage that had been edited into the original negative.

 

[Matt Hough]

My copy came today, but I didn't get to watch it this evening. Maybe tomorrow.

 

[ShellOilJunior]

I'm going to dig into this on Saturday.

At $12.99 it feels like this package is a steal. Bravo, Sony!

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Got a chance to watch my copy tonight. There are moments where the texture of the image changes as they switch from the camera negative to other sources and back, and there are a few transitions where the image is pretty rough, but otherwise they did a miraculous job on this release. If there's a down side, it's that the greater image clarity makes it more obvious where plate photography of our capital's landmarks was used in the background of scenes, because the grain and sharpness is different than the foreground. On the other hand, the genuinely location shooting, particularly the scenes shot at the Lincoln Memorial, have never looked better. And the additional detail makes me appreciate all the more the extraordinary full-scale recreation of the Senate chamber on the Columbia lot:

Also, the mono audio track is the best I've ever heard this movie sound. Clear as a bell the whole way through.

 

[Dick]

This release is so gorgeous in every possible way (packaging, transfer quality, bonus materials) that I can hardly believe they could profit from it. Calling it "a steal" as an earlier poster did hardly describes what a great value this is. I'd love to see such lavish editions of other great films come out at this sort of price point, but I almost feel guilty paying so little for it...

 

[Scott Merryfield]

We watched this last night. The title is a steal for the price. My wife had never seen the film before, and she thoroughly enjoyed it. We both are huge Jimmy Stewart fans.

BTW, my mother and Jimmy are from the same hometown -- Indiana, Pennsylvania.

 

[Mark Booth]

I'm really itching to watch my copy but we're showing it in the Booth Bijou Garage Theater (along with 'Guardians of the Galaxy') next Saturday, so I'm doing my best to wait another week!

Not easy though!

Mark

 

[GlennF]

I agree with Adam that there are places where the picture sort of "pulses", which I guess is the texture changing, as they switch from one type of film element to another, but overall it looks great - particularly the scenes in the Senate towards the end. How Robert Donat beat Stewart for the Oscar that year I will never understand! (It was also interesting to watch the two trailers and see glimpses of the ending that was cut - looks like a lot of money down the drain.)

 

[TonyD]

I got this at Target for 12.99.

Hopefully ahve a chance to watch it next week.

 

[LaserKen]

I really love all of Capra's films, too, but wish fervently that somewhere a decent surviving print of MEET JOHN DOE may be waiting to be discovered.

Hallelujah. This is a great film that deserves attention -- would *love* if Criterion took this on.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

What I found interesting -- and I hope I am not wrong about this -- is that
it seems Jimmy Stewart was never really in Washington during the filming.

Towards the beginning of the film, we see him at what appears to be at the
Washington train station. However, the increased resolution seems to make
it look as if he is standing in front of a rear screen image of an information booth
with crowds of actors walking back and forth.

Even the sight-seeing tour of Washington looks to be entirely done in rear screen
images with Stewart walking in front.

 

[atfree]

What I found interesting -- and I hope I am not wrong about this -- is thatit seems Jimmy Stewart was never really in Washington during the filming.Towards the beginning of the film, we see him at what appears to be at theWashington train station. However, the increased resolution seems to make it look as if he is standing in front of a rear screen image of an information boothwith crowds of actors walking back and forth.Even the sight-seeing tour of Washington looks to be entirely done in rear screenimages with Stewart walking in front.

Here's some info per Wikipedia:The film was in production from April 3, 1939 to July 7 of that year. Some location shooting took place in Washington, DC, at Union Station and at theUnited States Capitol, as well as other locations for background use.In the studio, to ensure authenticity, an elaborate set was created, consisting of Senate committee rooms, cloak rooms, hotel suites as well as specific Washington, DC monuments, all based on a trip Capra and his crew made to the capital. Even the Press Club of Washington was reproduced in minute detail, but the major effort went into a faithful reproduction of the Senate Chamber on the Columbia lot. James D. Preston, a former superintendent of the Senate gallery, acted as technical director for the Senate set, as well as advising on political protocol. The production also utilized the "New York street set" on the Warner Bros. lot, using 1,000 extras when that scene was shot.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

What I found interesting -- and I hope I am not wrong about this -- is that
it seems Jimmy Stewart was never really in Washington during the filming.

Towards the beginning of the film, we see him at what appears to be at the
Washington train station. However, the increased resolution seems to make
it look as if he is standing in front of a rear screen image of an information booth
with crowds of actors walking back and forth.

Even the sight-seeing tour of Washington looks to be entirely done in rear screen
images with Stewart walking in front.

A lot of it was done on sets with rear-projection. However, according to Marc Eliot's biography of Jimmy Stewart, the actors shot some of it on location as well:
"Early into filming, Capra decided to personally escort his principal players to Washington D.C., to shoot some location scenes while hopefully instilling in his cast a deeper patriotic feel for the material they could use in their performances. Along with Stewart and Arthur, Capra took the always spectacular and profoundly underrated Claude Rains (Senator Joe Paine), the Capra regular and ever-dependable Edward Arnold (state machine boss and corrupt publisher Jim Taylor), Thomas Mitchell (perennially tipsy D.C. beat reporter Diz Moore), and Harry Carey (benevolent vice president and president protem of the Senate.
"It was the first time Jimmy had been to the nation’s capital since he was a boy, when he’d once gone with his mother and sisters to visit Alexander while he was stationed there during World War One just prior to his being shipped out to the front lines of France. This time Stewart fell deeply in awe of the capital, particularly the monuments, and especially the Lincoln Memorial, which was to play such a crucial role in two of the movie’s pivotal scenes."

Mr. Stewart is quoted in the same book as saying, "Director Frank Capra, who taught me a lot about acting while we were making Mr. Smith, refused to build synthetic Washington street scenes at the Columbia lot or use process shots; he took the cast to Washington and caught scenes at the exact moments when natural settings dovetailed with the story. In order to get a certain light, we made a shot at the Lincoln Memorial at four in the morning. To catch me getting off a streetcar, a camera was hidden in some bushes. I got on a regular car, paid my dome and, to the motorman’s amazement, departed, two blocks later – in front of the bushes. For shots of me going up the Capitol steps, I sat in a car and, at a given secret signal, went trudging up through the swarming lunch-hour crowd. This search for absolute realism, plus the superlative work of the supporting actors, had a great deal to do with ‘making’ the picture. I think especially of the grand performances of Claude Rains, Thomas Mitchell and Jean Arthur, a fine comedienne who proved in Mr. Smith that she could handle dramatic moments with equal skill."

So it sounds like the Lincoln Memorial scenes, the shots of him immediately outside the Capitol, and the shot of him hopping off the streetcar, were all filmed on location. If you watch the Lincoln Memorial scenes, there is an immediacy and consistency to the image that you don't get from some of the rear-projection stuff.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Thanks for the clarification, guys. Seems like I was wrong on this.

 

[Race Bannon]

I finally ordered this today. I hadn't seen it since I was a teenager. After rewatching it from TCM recording, I was suddenly of the opinion it was one of my all time favorites.

Shame on me for waiting this long, but I can't wait for a rich reviewing of this restoration, as well as a listen to the commentary.