A Few Words About A few words about…™ The Greatest Show on Earth – in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Matt Hough]

Yes, I'm not much of a fan of Knights of the Round Table either.

 

[SFMike]

Recently suffered through Knights of the Round Table on TMC and was surprised how awful it was in almost every aspect. I makes Greatest Show On Earth look like like the great piece of popular entertainment it was in the 50's. Don't think Knights deserves any more valuable restoration funds.

 

[AlexNH]

This reviewer has a much different take than Colin.

The Greatest Show on Earth Blu-ray (Paramount Presents #16)

The Greatest Show on Earth Blu-ray Release Date March 30, 2021 (Paramount Presents #16). Blu-ray reviews, news, specs, ratings, screenshots. Cheap Blu-ray movies and deals.

www.blu-ray.com

 

[Colin Jacobson]

This reviewer has a much different take than Colin.

The Greatest Show on Earth Blu-ray (Paramount Presents #16)

The Greatest Show on Earth Blu-ray Release Date March 30, 2021 (Paramount Presents #16). Blu-ray reviews, news, specs, ratings, screenshots. Cheap Blu-ray movies and deals.

www.blu-ray.com

In terms of whether or not it's a good movie? Indeed he does.

But he and I pretty much agree on the quality of picture/audio...

 

[lark144]

Recently suffered through Knights of the Round Table on TMC and was surprised how awful it was in almost every aspect. I makes Greatest Show On Earth look like like the great piece of popular entertainment it was in the 50's. Don't think Knights deserves any more valuable restoration funds.

It's the greatest film ever made when you're six years old. Come to think of it, I still loved it when I was 10--I was a total maniac about the Arthurian legends at that point--and it was reissued with "Ivanhoe". You have to remember, I didn't have "Excalibur" and Lancelot du lac" to compare it to. I saw it at Loew's State downtown on that big 100 foot screen. Halfway through I went up to the balcony and let the whole thing sweep ovre me. It was an excellent afternoon's entertainment, great color, sets and costumes, and all for 35 cents. What more could one want? But I wouldn't watch it on TCM. Some films are intended for a really big, and I mean BIG, movie theater, with the aroma of popcorn wafting from the lobby.

 

[richardburton84]

Knights of the Round Table is definitely the weakest of the “Iron Jockstrap” trilogy as Robert Taylor referred to his medieval films. I loved Ivanhoe when I was a kid and still think it’s a great film (and yes, Liz is gorgeous in the film), but Knights did not resonate with me in the same way as I was not a fan of the deviations the film made from the mythology (particularly the removal of all the fantasy elements with the exception of the sword in the stone). I saw the third film of the trilogy, Quentin Durward, at a much later date on TCM and was pleasantly surprised by the more humorous approach to the material (I certainly wouldn’t mind a Blu-ray of that one).

 

[JoeDoakes]

Gee, Brad, it's not as bad as all that. Some contemporary reviews really liked it.

Mr. DeMille's 1952, 152 minute circus extravaganza, The Greatest Show on Earth finally arrives from Paramount, as one of the hold-out Best Pictures to hit Blu-ray as spine number 16.

It just doesn't stand that "test of time" everyone talks about.

Derived from a scan of the original negative(s), it looks just fine, Brad.

Peopled with actual circus performers, with a handful of SAG players thrown in for good measure, it comes of as being what it was back in 1952, a quasi-professional production, directed with all the verve that Cecil DeMille could throw at it.

As noted, people have been requesting this one for ages, and now they have it...

Fans of the circus should love it. I'm one of those who can still not figure out how it won Best Picture.

Image – 5

Audio – 5

Pass / Fail – Pass

Upgrade from DVD – Yes

RAH

I don’t know why you always rag on deMille. This is a better film and much more watchable than most of the Best Picture winners over the past 15 years, not to mention well photographed tripe like Dances with Wolves , even if High Noon or Quiet Man were much more deserving of the award in 1952.

 

[Will Krupp]

deleted

 

[bujaki]

I think you're confusing it with IVANHOE. Ava Gardner is the leading lady in KNIGHTS.

Ava is the shining light in knights.

 

[Will Krupp]

Ava is the shining light in knights.

I made a mistake and then deleted that post once I realized that I read the earlier post incorrectly.

 

[bujaki]

I made a mistake and then deleted that post once I realized that I read the earlier post incorrectly.

I know you meant something else. I just wanted to point out that Ava is the only reason to watch Knights, a movie I saw in Brooklyn, Summer of '55. It's a bit of a slough, the film. And since my grad work was on the Middle Ages and Arthurian lore, I even named my son Gareth, Gawain's brother, and Lancelot's best friend.

 

[Robert Harris]

I don’t know why you always rag on deMille. This is a better film and much more watchable than most of the Best Picture winners over the past 15 years, not to mention well photographed tripe like Dances with Wolves , even if High Noon or Quiet Man were much more deserving of the award in 1952.

I actually have a great deal of respect for Mr. De Mille and his work. My problems are generally with his use of dialogue, which much of the time seems stilted and stuck in the silent era. As to Greatest Show, once we know the lead characters name, it’s unnecessary for virtually every other character to repeat it.

”Morning, Brad, my baby gorilla has a cold.”

On top of that, some of his blocking never seemed to get beyond 1926. It’s just stiff and uncinematic.

But that’s an opinion from someone who does enjoy a few of his films.

 

[david hare]

Bizarrely that very static pictorialism with fixed blocking that is so characteristic of him was largely derived from Victorian and other formal painting modes. It's less apparent in the late silents I find, but it has become such a fixture in his best work it's almost Brechtian to me especially when he stages the actors in half twisted positions to deliver pages of dialogue without moving. I find it constantly fascinating. But I am a formalist and form can almost always triumph over substance for shallow people like me. I love the way he constructs these big long scenes with his actors and the astounding decor. There is not one minute of Ten Commandments in which I lose interest in the picture. IN some respects his nearest formal competitor is Ford who is also a student of high art, but Ford's mise-en-scene is always dynamic. A lot of cinephile sneer at de Mille, Not me.

 

[wranim8]

If the version on Paramount + (still seems to be the same ol' CBS All Access to me) is not the remastered version, it still looks pretty darn good. But I got to tell ya, if you really want some circus entertainment, this video is way more fun and interesting than most of greatest show. Tammy and Frosty rock!!

 

[lark144]

I also am fascinated by DeMlle's blocking and imagery. As David notes, some of his later silent films, such as "The Godless Girl" are incredibly dynamic and revelatory visually, but once sound comes in, DeMille seems to regress technically, and when we get to "Samson and Delilah" we're back to 1914. Very stiff and expository, and yet there are those images, which have so much going on in them. There's way more information and color and depth of field then needed to tell a story, for example, take Betty Hutton saying "Good morning Brad." You've got a high wire act behind her, elephants moving across a lot, figures in the distance, a woman trying on a frilly red dress, an acrobat doing handsprings, etc. There's so much activity and extraneous composition in the frame you don't know where to look. It's over-determined. The images remind one of Velazques' "Las Meninas", with all these figures of the Spanish court bowing to the King and Queen, who are seen in a mirror in the center, while the blocking is like a provincial church pageant. It's the contradiction between those painterly, overstuffed images and the two dimensional stories and dialogues that create this strange, almost alienating effect in a viewer that David identifies as "Brechtian". It really has nothing to do with Brecht. It's just DeMille's style. It's similar to the presentationalism in early Japanese silents taken from Bunraku that makes them resemble late Dreyer. DeMIlle was a showman, and he filled his frames with as many colors, events and dimensions as possible, to enchant and distract the eye, while his stagecraft came from David Belsaco, with their cardboard plots and stiff theatricality. But why analyze it when you can become exhilarated looking at those frames? I've always ignored the dialogue in DeMille sound films, treating them as titles in a silent, and focused on the images. Of course, that's just me, but clearly I'm not alone in this.

 

[Robert Harris]

I also am fascinated by DeMlle's blocking and imagery. As David notes, some of his later silent films, such as "The Godless Girl" are incredibly dynamic and revelatory visually, but once sound comes in, DeMille seems to regress technically, and when we get to "Samson and Delilah" we're back to 1914. Very stiff and expository, and yet there are those images, which have so much going on in them. There's way more information and color and depth of field then needed to tell a story, for example, take Betty Hutton saying "Good morning Brad." You've got a high wire act behind her, elephants moving across a lot, figures in the distance, a woman trying on a frilly red dress, an acrobat doing handsprings, etc. There's so much activity and extraneous composition in the frame you don't know where to look. It's over-determined. The images remind one of Velazques' "Las Meninas", with all these figures of the Spanish court bowing to the King and Queen, who are seen in a mirror in the center, while the blocking is like a provincial church pageant. It's the contradiction between those painterly, overstuffed images and the two dimensional stories and dialogues that create this strange, almost alienating effect in a viewer that David identifies as "Brechtian". It really has nothing to do with Brecht. It's just DeMille's style. It's similar to the presentationalism in early Japanese silents taken from Bunraku that makes them resemble late Dreyer. DeMIlle was a showman, and he filled his frames with as many colors, events and dimensions as possible, to enchant and distract the eye, while his stagecraft came from David Belsaco, with their cardboard plots and stiff theatricality. But why analyze it when you can become exhilarated looking at those frames? I've always ignored the dialogue in DeMille sound films, treating them as titles in a silent, and focused on the images. Of course, that's just me, but clearly I'm not alone in this.

One thing that Mr. DeMille had going for him were rather unrestrained budgets, especially in Technicolor productions such as Reap the Wild Wind.

But those tableaux don’t do it for me.

One must believe that at some point in the studio commissary there must have been discussions between he and Mr. Mamoulian. If there were, they were of little affect.

 

[Robert Crawford]

One thing that Mr. DeMille had going for him were rather unrestrained budgets, especially in Technicolor productions such as Reap the Wild Wind and Union Pacific.

But those tableaux don’t do it for me.

One must believe that at some point in the studio commissary there must have been discussions between he and Mr. Mamoulian. If there were, they were of little affect.

In case you're not kidding, Union Pacific is in black and white.

 

[Robert Harris]

In case you're not kidding, Union Pacific is in black and white.

You’re correct. I’ve always confused it with another film. But his ability to achieve huge productions was a plus.

 

[Colin Jacobson]

I actually have a great deal of respect for Mr. De Mille and his work. My problems are generally with his use of dialogue, which much of the time seems stilted and stuck in the silent era. As to Greatest Show, once we know the lead characters name, it’s unnecessary for virtually every other character to repeat it.

”Morning, Brad, my baby gorilla has a cold.”

On top of that, some of his blocking never seemed to get beyond 1926. It’s just stiff and uncinematic.

But that’s an opinion from someone who does enjoy a few of his films.

If you chugged a beer every time someone claimed Brad has "sawdust in his veins", you'd pass out drunk in about 30 minutes!

 

[JohnMor]

If you chugged a beer every time someone claimed Brad has "sawdust in his veins", you'd pass out drunk in about 30 minutes!

Well, that would certainly make the film more tolerable for some.