Babes in Toyland/March Of The Wooden Soldiers, Best Release from Legend!? (1 Viewer)

[jim_falconer]

On the new Legend's release 'John Wayne In Color', it appears that they have used the previously released colorized prints from the late 80s, and just re-did the opening and ending credits. The films have the same "dull" look that those colorized ones had.

Like someone else here stated, I wish Barry from Legends would post here, and tell me I'm wrong (or at least explain why Legends didn't do a full restore job on these films).

 

[John Hodson]

*oops*

 

[John Hodson]

Barry has been posting in a thread over at the DVD Talk forums, so I asked if he would respond on March of the Wooden Soldiers:

 

[Paul Penna]

While no longer state of the art, my Runco IDP 800 CRT front projector still does a fine job of reproducing a gray scale, and my evaluation was based on comparisons to other DVDs of b/w films of similar vintage and in particular to the tape in my collection. That's a 1994 SuperBeta 1S recording of a 35mm print shown on AMC.

FWIW, the majority of my viewing consists of b/w films from the 30s through the 50s, so I have a goodly amount of experience with how such material can, should and does look through my system.

For whatever reason, and going just by what my eyes tell me, the Legend DVD looks comparitively drab and flat. Not awful by any means, and as I said, it's fairly crisp. It just doesn't have the (to use subjective terms) punch, sheen and more subtle shading I see in so many other transfers of b/w material. Why that is, given the assurance this is a transfer from a real b/w element, I don't know. All I can go by is how it looks to me.

 

[Steve...O]

John, thanks for the link to Barry's comments.

I haven't watched every single minute of this disc, just sampled various parts. To me the opening credits look like an obvious job of turning the color off. However when the main movie starts and every scene I sampled looks like it very well could be genuine black and white. I wouldn't call it pristine and it does look a bit flat, but overall it's quite pleasing to my eye. It would have been nice if the color version had been scrapped in favor of a higher bit rate for the B&W version. That might have improved the look of the movie.

The ending credits again look like some color turned off job with a copyright date of 1991(??) listed. It appears that the credits may have been "lifted" from another source than the movie itself.

There are a number of bonus shorts. I found the vintage commercials to be quite fun.

 

[Robert Crawford]

I watched this dvd the other day and the only thing that really caught my eye in a negative way was the ending credits with the colorized copyright date. Otherwise, I'm happy with the dvd presentation. It's not perfect, but IMO, it looks better much better than previous video presentations.




Crawdaddy

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Being it's that time of the year, perhaps it's time to upgrade
my copy.

You folks seem to feel that the Legend (also shows up as GENIUS COMPANY)
version now up on Amazon is the way to go?

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Ron, out of all the dvd versions floating around this is the best. In fact, i just watched mine a couple days ago.

 

[Rob_Ray]

Actually, this probably more a function of the Hal Roach Studio's lighting design than anything else. The studio in general and Stan Laurel in particular, thought that hot, flat lighting worked better for comedy. According to photographer Art Lloyd's widow, Stan used to say, "Wipe me out, Artie!" meaning he didn't want any shadows on his face at all. This is the reason why Stan and Ollie seemed to age about twenty years when they moved over to Fox, where it's much more realistic lighting style showed Laurel and Hardy's true age.

 

[Todd Mattraw]

I thought the Legend B&W version looked fine save for 2 instances:

1) The Sandman sequence in Bogeyland is clearly from a different source, and looks to be a colorized sequence with the "color" turned off --- I compared it to the Goodtimes release and it appears to me that that sequence originates from the 1991 Goldwyn video master (is that all the Goodtimes version is, the old colorized video master?)

2) The very last scene, with Stannie's errant parting shot, as well as the final credits, with the Goldwyn 1991 copyright, also appear to be from the same source as the Goodtimes colorized version.

I know the Sandman sequence was chopped out of the film at some point in it's history and then restored in the 80's or early 90's, so I'm assuming that the print Legend was working with did not contain this part of the film, and they had to resort to using the old video master.

But that's all supposition --- in any event, even with these flaws, the Legend DVD is far superior to the awful Goodtimes disc.

Todd

 

[Barry Sandrew]

The entire Legend Films release was newly telecined in 1080P high definition from 35mm film under my supervision.

My original colorization of MOWS which was done by American Film Technologies in the 90's only existed on 1" video tape and cannot be legitimately uprezed to high definition.

 

[Chris Dugger]

Nuff' Said....

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

I fell in love with this film as a child and looked forward each year to its return to television. (I used to pester my mother to write the station to ask that they rerun, it, for feat that they might not think of doing that on their own. )

For some reason I've never looked into it on DVD, just haven't gotten around to it on my list, I suppose. Thanks to this thread I've ordered the Legend release from Amazon and look forward to watching it from beginning to end for the first time in many years.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to Young Frankenstein.

Regards,

Joe

 

[Todd Mattraw]

Barry

Very clearly the Sandman segment (58 minutes & 50 seconds in) is of a different quality than the rest of the film, in both versions --- is this part really from a 35mm print?

Todd

 

[Chris Dugger]

Keep in mind that the opening credits and the Sandman footage were all footage that were edited out of prints long ago to shorten up the runtime....

When this footage was cut, the shorter opening credits with the title "March Of The Wooden Soldiers" (eliminating the "Babes In Toyland" credits and the opening song performed by Mother Goose) where attached....

So, you will see different quality on these 2 pieces that were recovered 5 or 10 years ago....

I have a Super 8 Sound print of this film with out the Mother Goose Opening ("March" credits) and no sandman sequence... IMO the print quality is better than any of the current crop of Dvd's.

Dugger

 

[ScottR]

Why did they leave the 1991 copyright on the black and white version? Couldn't they have just digitally erased it?

 

[Ronald Epstein]

...and while the above question is being answered....

I just want to be certain before I order this that the
LEGEND and GENIUS PRODUCTS is the
same version? Pending which site you order from it lists
either of these two companies as the manufacturer.

 

[Barry Sandrew]

Ron - Genius is distributing the Legend Films version. Both Genius and Legend are the manufacturers.

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

From what I understand from other posts in this thread, both the color and black and white Legend DVDs are derived from the same MGM print which includes footage previously cut from the public domain version. This makes the MGM print a new "work" in copyright terms and enables them to secure a new copyright for their unique version of a work that was otherwise in the public domain. The copyright did not specifically cover colorized version of the print, but the restored print itself. Therefore it would properly appear on all DVDs derived from it.

Regards,

Joe

 

[RobertGr]

I bought the new release of Laurel and Hardy's classic BABES IN TOYLAND from Legend this past December. The best thing about the disc is the supplements. I found the transfer a bit annoying with the constant image flicker during the film.

I remember there was a thread at the time asking which was the best dvd of the titel in print. I have the dvd from Nostalgia Family Video they are located in Oregon. The dvd is the complete uncut print and the image quality is the best I have seen onm this title.


It is amazing that while the film was being shot there was total chaos between Laurel and Hal Roach. Yet today it is clearly the one Roach Production that gets continued exposure with a second runner being TOPPER. During the 1980's I had the extreme honor of corresponding with Mr. Roach and the man was still a genius regarding early film comedy and I was very priviledged to write to him a few times and talk about his films, yet he held a grudge against the BABES IN TOYLAND.