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DVD FILE confused reviews (1 Viewer)

Dan Rudolph

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If the IMDB doesn't accept something, post in the contribution help forum. They'll either explain why somethign wasn't accepted or get it in there.
 

Gordon McMurphy

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Hi, Bill.
In 1953, CinemaScope cameras originally utilised the large silent film aperture (1.33:1) creating a monstorous 2.66:1 ratio in projection. The sound was initially going to be on a seperate 35mm magnetic soundtrack which was going to consist of:

- Three channels behind the screen
- A forth channel for speakers on the side walls and back of the cinema.

But this was altered to include the 4 magnetic tracks on the the 'picture' film by reducing the width of the sprocket holes (CS-1870 perforation 35mm stock), which were thusly dubbed 'Fox-holes' (20th Century Fox was in control of CinemaScope exclusively at the intial stage).

So the ratio of the neg when stretched 2x was (and still is, if the negs still exist) 2.66:1, but the release prints were 2.55:1.

Realising this, the boffins altered the aperture of the CinemaScope cameras to make room for the mag tracks on the release prints; it would have been pointles to shoot in 2.66:1 if the release prints were going to be 2.55:1!

By '57, Fox had relented to the requests to use optical mono in additon to high-fidelity magnetic 4-track stereo and high-fidelity mono and as optical tracks are wider than magnetic strips, the aperture had to be reduced and the 2.35:1 ratio was born, and lasted until 1971 when the aperture reduced vertically in order to reduce screen flicker and the ratio changed to 2.39:1, although most people - myself included, refer to it as 2.40:1.

Originally, the lenses used for the 1953 CinemaScope films were the only usable Henri Chretien (the Frenchman who invented and developed the anamorphic lense) lenses, but Baush & Laumb created anamorphic lenses of a higher quality for later CinemaScope films.

By the late Fifties, Panavision were on the scene with their superior anamorphic lenses and although films were credited as being "In CinemaScope", they were actually filmed with Panavision lenses, but not given credit, but later were with "Lenses by Panavison" below the "In CinemaScope" credit. I'd have to check up to recall what the first film shot with Panavision lenses was, but the first film credited with "In CinemaScope - Lenses by Panavision" was the 1958 Frank Sinatra film, A Hole In The Head.

More info here: http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingcs1.htm

Great stuff! :emoji_thumbsup: :)
 

Douglas R

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Thanks -- and two cheers for mono, by the way, whether presented as two track or a single track; I'm certainly not in Woody Allen's "surround sound is distracting" camp, but a good, clean mono track can ... well, for lack of a better word, caress a film in a unique and rather beautiful way.
As much as I like stereo I agree that some mono sountracks sound superb. I'm thinking particularly of ROSEMARY'S BABY which is surely one of the finest mono tracks ever. It is so wonderfully clear, varied and subtle.
 

Gordon McMurphy

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As much as I like stereo I agree that some mono sountracks sound superb. I'm thinking particularly of ROSEMARY'S BABY which is surely one of the finest mono tracks ever. It is so wonderfully clear, varied and subtle.
Agreed. :emoji_thumbsup:

Altman's, McCabe & Mrs Miller mono mix is also superb.

And the original mono soundtrack of Jaws is real beauty, too. :) :emoji_thumbsup: But it's only on the DTS DVD version; I'd double-dip on a 2-disc version of Jaws in a heartbeat. A Carl Gottlieb commentary would be really something. Spielberg schmielberg! ;)


Gordy
 

Robert Harris

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An interesting book to check out, now out of print, is James Limbacher's Four Aspects of Film. It deals, historically, with color, wide screen, 3-D and multi-channel recording and is not a technical tome.

Copies are available via www.abebooks.com and range in price from about $15 to $40.

For the record, no matter how much information it contains, and no matter how serious the intent, the Carr/Hayes book is filled with mis-information and should not be considered a reference.

Stereo experiments go back quite far. Abel Gance created a stereo mix for his "sonorized" version of Napoleon, Napoleon Bonaparte, in 1934
 

Bill Burns

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Looking at the bottom of this page ...

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingcs4.htm

... I'm afraid my eyes fell out of my head. What sort of site is this, Gordon?!
htf_images_smilies_smiley_jawdrop.gif


Ha -- only joshin'. I adore Cyd Charisse (possibly the most elegant and beautiful dancer to grace a studio musical), so there are certainly no complaints here. And your post represents terrific information, Gordon -- thanks. In looking over the Widescreen Museum explanation, though, at the bottom of page two ...

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingcs2.htm

... and most specifically in these pages of the site's discussion of Superscope and Super35 ...

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingss2.htm

and

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingss4.htm

... what I'm seeing seems to buoy something we were discussing on The Recruit's thread regarding Super35 -- anamorphic widescreen processes have a much greater field of vision (horizontal) than do flat Academy Aperture processes, assuming the same cut in the lens, correct? (I should have been clearer about lenses, in that they, of course, determine both the depth and breadth of field one sees, which is why differing lenses are necessitated for close-ups than for long shots, and so forth; but assuming the same or equivalent mm length of lens is used, the anamorphic process captures a greater horizontal breadth of information, does it not)? Or do I have that wrong? (I'm at a disadvantage, having never used a motion picture camera first hand). It would seem that the amount of light and the degree of horizontal field of vision (horizontal "scope," heh) is significantly greater, which would be a big selling point of the technology*, and with Super35 using an Academy Aperture exposed film stock of roughly 1.37:1, its field of vision would be similar to the sepia-toned extraction seen in the center of the CinemaScope frame at the bottom of the above-linked page (the second link above, which covers CinemaScope, not Superscope), and of course very much like the center extraction used in a Superscope frame (though with framing alterations for both the ratio and the place in the frame from which it is typically extracted, I presume, if John Frankenheimer's comments about a hard top are correct). That's how it seems, anyway, but if I'm wrong, by all means correct me. If I'm right, and the anamorphic process (vista vis anamorphic lenses) captures a wider horizontal field of vision, then Super35 has a fundamental compositional flaw, and it makes perfect sense that James Cameron would, for instance, be happier with the 1.33:1 "full screen" version of The Abyss than the (almost mock) 2.35:1 version, and Roger Donaldson happy to show a bit more of The Recruit. Horizontal composition remaining constant, filming in 1.37:1 on such a system as Super35 compromises nothing horizontally, but gains compositional potential vertically.

Again, this is strictly a deduction devoid of any actual experience with the cameras in question, so if I'm barking up the wrong tree -- do please chop it down. This seems to follow from the available evidence, though.

Reading the Widescreen Museum's explanation (it's a great resource, by the way, and one I hadn't fully explored before -- the article they provide from cinematographer Arthur Edeson on the 70mm version of The Big Trail is also a great read**), I'm left with another question, and perhaps you might have some of this information at hand: is, as I've guessed, the discrepancy between 1.37:1 and 1.33:1 "full Academy aperture" photography strictly a matter of the presence, or absence, of soundtracks, or do these two only slightly divergent ratios owe their unique existence to some other anomaly? Widescreen Museum refers to the early silent film aperture as 1.33:1 (silent film, of course, experimented with many differing apertures and film stock sizes, but eventually normalized to a 35mm stock at around this aperture), but then refers to Academy Aperture as 1.37:1, and of course modern NTSC 4X3 televisions are 1.33:1, and most full screen home video product is credited as 1.33:1, yet "full screen" film sources are usually credited, throughout the sound era, as 1.37:1. I'm sure the two ratios are often misquoted, but why, exactly, are there two flat Academy ratios (the Academy Ratio now is 1.85:1, if I'm not mistaken, but speaking of such things before the advent of widescreen photography, it's either 1.37:1 or 1.33:1, depending on whom you ask! :)), and if it's strictly a soundtrack issue ... well, then, I suppose the P&S home video world, and standard NTSC television manufacturers, decided on 1.33:1 to avoid any vertical dead space on 1.37:1 product? It seems to me that overscan would have accomplished this without the need for the reduced ratio, just as it would provide against slivers of horizontal dead space on 1.33:1 product were NTSC televisions 1.37:1, so returning to a ratio out of use since the silent era ... well, it’s an odd choice.

The only reference I find at the Widescreen Museum is in their intro ...

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/intro.htm

... where they state the ratio of standard 35mm film projection was altered to 1.37:1 with the onset of sound-on-film technology, but this leaves me puzzled, as optical recording to the film stock would, presumably, narrow the ratio, not widen it. Early magnetic sound, if it affected the picture range at all (rather than remaining confined to the socket hole area), would presumably do the same (David Skal notably states, in his commentary for the disc, that the picture element used for Universal's now OOP DVD of Dracula {1931} is out of balance on some shots due to a soundtrack which had been printed to the film, narrowing the full aperture exposure, the demands of which I presume had thus been overlooked in the film's production, sound technology being something very new at the time).

These questions are open to all, of course, not just Gordon, but it seems to me they remain rather important -- the more we all understand precisely what we're watching, and how it came to pass that it looks the way it does, the better we can appreciate its place in our cultural and artistic heritage. And my thanks again to Gordon McMurphy and Robert Harris for their help.

* To expand on this a bit further, what I'm specifically assuming here is that the anamorphic squeeze (performed in capturing the image, rather than after the fact, as with Superscope) is capturing a breadth of visual information that simply couldn't be captured from the same "distance" (both practical, in camera placement, and apparent, in lens length) by flat Academy Aperture photography -- thus, if you wanted to capture a lemonade stand between two oak trees, with CinemaScope you might capture both trees and the stand in a medium shot, but to capture all of this in flat photography would require a much longer lens (Edit: actually a wider angle lens or "shorter" lens, if I'm reading the sample chapter from the American Cinematographer Manual correctly: see Robert Harris' post below) and therefore a shot of much greater apparent "distance" from the subject (a long shot). Is that about right? Super35 would then have this same drawback found in flat Academy Aperture photography (the most infamous drawback for scope photography remains its inability to achieve a proper tight close-up without chopping away much of the face, and is once again mentioned by Scorsese in the interview I referenced elsewhere).

** It was fascinating to note that one of my favorite musicals, Carousel, was actually filmed with an adapted Fox Grandeur camera, as were all CinemaScope 55 productions:

http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingcs6.htm

In Hollywood, as in life, what's old is often, eventually, new again. As another example, this statement from page seven of their website ...

"As for Caprice ... it was the final film to be released as a 20th Century-Fox CinemaScope Picture"

... is, with Down With Love, no longer true. How lovely that title card looks on a theatre screen once again. Does anyone know if the film itself is truly CinemaScope, or if Panavision lenses were used?
 

Gordon McMurphy

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Phew, Bill - big post there! :D

Anamorphic lense 35mm camera systems can indeed capture a greater width of information, but spherical lense camera systems cropped to 2.35/40:1 can also obtain the same information, but the camera would have to be further back - with Panavision, you can get in close; close-ups in Panavision look better than Super 35.
To expand on this a bit further, what I'm specifically assuming here is that the anamorphic squeeze (performed in capturing the image, rather than after the fact, as with Superscope) is capturing a breadth of visual information that simply couldn't be captured from the same "distance" (both practical, in camera placement, and apparent, in lens length) by flat Academy Aperture photography -- thus, if you wanted to capture a lemonade stand between two oak trees, with CinemaScope you might capture both trees and the stand in a medium shot, but to capture all of this in flat photography would require a much longer lens and therefore a shot of much greater apparent "distance" from the subject (a long shot). Is that about right?
Precisely!

For Down With Love to be a 'true' CinemaScope film, for me, it would have to have been filmed with original Chretien lenses or original Bausch & Laumb lenses. I doubt that Panavision would have allowed the film to be released as being filmed "In CinemaScope", but maybe they have a sense of humour! :D I think it's a great touch. I don't recall what the most recent film was that had "Filmed In Panavision" in the opening credits.

Great stuff. :D


Gordy
 

Joe Caps

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The Widescreen Museum site referred to has a poster of Silk Stockings and says the film was only in perspecta stereo- no true stereo. This is baloney. Silk Stockings was released in four channel stereo with a perspecta back up track. MGm used this as did Columbia and Warner Bros. the perspecta is, of course, a mono optical track. This was used as a back up in case the theaters stero sytem pooped out.
 

Ali B

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For those in the UK at a large university with an AV section, you should be able to find the BFI's Monthly Film Bulletin which includes about as much information on subjects such as this as could be hoped for. Now if only the BFI had the money to put the whole thing online.

Unfortunately this archive only applies to films with a UK release (excluding festival screenings). As far as I'm aware (and please correct me!) it goes back to the 1950s...
 

Bill Burns

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Good stuff, guys -- thanks to Gordon for the confirmation on scope vs. Super35, and to Robert Harris for the link to the American Cinematographer Manual -- a resource I'd wager would prove a great addition to any home theater, if only to better illustrate how and why the films we watch look as they do. The sample chapter I've just read on their site provides many terrific, very straightforward explanations of film technology, including a highly recommended summation of precisely how black and white and color photography functions photochemically.

Thanks also to Joe Caps for the heads up on Silk Stockings, which I've just watched on DVD and will likely return to again soon -- the transfer feels a touch bright to me, but that's a minor matter, and the disc is one I would very highly recommend, graced with beautiful fine detail and lovely sound (the Stereophonic Sound number is a hoot and a half). If Rouben Mamoulian, as stated in one of the disc’s supplements, truly hated the CinemaScope frame, it doesn't readily show -- the film is beautiful. It's also one I'd quickly shuffle the way of fellow Bob Hope fans, as the included Paree, Paree "Broadway Brevity" short, from 1934, is more enjoyable and energetic than many feature films I've dragged myself to the theatre to see of late. Picture quality on that short isn't going to bowl anyone over (it's confined to a rather flat grayscale and obscuring blacks that lack detail, though the picture has a nice overall level of detail and a refreshing lack of contrast "blooming," so common among the discs derived from surviving prints of this era), but for its age I'd call the elements used here "good," filmlike, and the transfer from those elements, while appearing too dark, with whites that are too gray and the aforementioned lack of detail in shadows (odd that the feature would strike me as a bit bright, the short a bit dark -- maybe I'm just going blind :)), still pleasing. The soundtrack suffers the most, but it hasn't deteriorated to the point of obscuring dialogue or music beyond recognition.

For purposes of comparison, one might place Paree, Paree's image quality somewhere on par with or just below Criterion's presentation of the picture Trouble in Paradise, a feature from two years earlier, and better (particularly in detail and grain structure, and for my money better in contrast as well, though that might be a more contentious claim) than Kino's presentation of Counsellor At Law, from 1933. Those looking for the nitrate glow and excellent image detail of Criterion's grainy (and perhaps somewhat "bloomy"? I'm unsure; I'll have to review the disc again), but lovely, The Scarlet Empress, or WB's superlative (in fact, simply ideal) The Thin Man, won't find them here, but Paree, Paree remains a wonderful bonus. In "short": I'm thrilled to own it, and it is a perfect accompaniment (for its joyful nature) to the feature*.

* While a bit OT, I'd also like to congratulate WB for including radio spots on their gorgeous disc of High Society. Period radio programming has always fascinated (and endlessly entertained) me, a fact which often draws my heart (and wallet) to Criterion's discs of American and British output of the 30's and 40's, where Lux Radio Theatre programming may occasionally be found. The inclusion of such period broadcast history is a tremendous added value, and as such the radio spots on High Society (in which Bing is prominently and extensively featured; Frank and Grace only have brief segments), while advertisements in nature and purpose and not a separate storytelling effort, as with Lux, are nevertheless a terrific supplement. My congratulations once again to Warner Bros..
 

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