HTF REVIEW: "A Hard Day's Night" (with screenshots) (1 Viewer)

[Patrick McCart]

The Running Jumping Standing Still Film seems to be a lost film now.

MPI's Help! DVD has a pitiful condition print which has a decomposed soundtrack, totally incomprehensible image, and color to make you puke. The color is so bad....and the film is supposed to be B&W!

We can only pray that the negative even exists.

 

[Randy_M]

Patrick,

You're not saying that Help! is supposed to have been in B&W, are you? Or did I just misunderstand your post?

Randy

 

[Robert Harris]

While Running, Jumping... is not a lost film, AHDN might not have been too far from that state.

Like Help!, it was raped and plundered over the years, with nary a bit high quality preservation material produced.

As examples of our cheap, disposable pop culture, they were considered close to disposable.

An example of HDN's treatment or mis-treatment can easily be viewed in this new DVD.

Virtual bookends to the film in quality are the first and final reels (1 and 10) -- the intial cut qualitywise takes place in the middle of the train sequence at which point the image quality goes from fourth or fifth generation back to third.

What occurred was that at some time in the past, the original negative was released to someone doing a documentary, with permissions to use what they needed -- obviously meaning "make a dupe at a proper laboratory."

Rather than doing as one might assume or presume, a more simple route was taken.

The first and last rolls of the original negative were cut up, and the desired footage removed.

Nice.

There is a lesson here for the owner's of film.

Never, every allow your original elements to go into the hands of someone who doesn't know what they're doing, if at all.

 

[Rob Tomlin]

That's unbelievable! Under those circumstances we are lucky to have anything.

I have this DVD on order. I am very curious to watch it considering all the video issues, and, to an even further extent, the issues with the 5.1 sound re-mix!

 

[Patrick McCart]

Randy, I was referring to the version of The Running Jumping Standing Still Film on the DVD.

It looks like a 3rd generation Super-8mm print which has faded for some reason. I guess the print had the B&W image printed on color film, which would explain why it looks faded.

The clips in the short Richard Lester interview before it are in B&W and look fantastic.

Robert, what are your opinons on the Help! restoration?

 

[Randy_M]

Patrick,

Ahh, gotcha...I saw Help! when it first came out in the theaters, and really liked it (of course, I was only 15)...

Sure would like to see it restored - I do own the MPI version and watch it occasionally.

AHDN is a better film, though

 

[Rob Gardiner]

Mr. Harris,

Thank you for your comments. May I ask your opinion of the 5.1 track, particularly during the final concert sequence?

Respectfully,
Rob Gardiner

 

[Robert Harris]

I'm afraid that I can't give an opinion on this as I have no direct reference for the original version.

 

[Patrick McCart]

Sure would like to see it restored - I do own the MPI version and watch it occasionally.

Help! WAS restored. It was in worse condition than AHDN, which was nearly lost.

Sadly, all the opticlals suffer extreme print damage due to being cheaply done in 1965. However, except for a handful of scenes, most of the original negative scenes are amazingly vivid and crisp.

A Hard Day's Night has the same problem, but it's hidden because the only opticals are in the credits and the dissolves. The B&W image hides a lot of this. Help! features opticals in the opening and closing credits, transitions, and overlaid text. It's a real pity since the non-optical scenes look wonderful.

All this despite the film having around 16 tears in the negative and the negative being faded.

Paul Rutan Jr. did the restoration for both, BTW. He deserves credit, like all film restorers, for keeping two more films from being lost.

 

[ScottR]

1. Why does the volume waiver in Can't Buy Me Love?
2. Has the film always been out of sync during the songs?
3. The final concert sounds horrible...why is the music so low?

 

[Ken_McAlinden]

A lot of the audio problems are a result of the Beatles music scenes being mono re-processed for 5.1 (i.e. "Fake Stereo"). In the case of the concert scenes, they combined the fake stereo with various sound effects that were panned about. As odd as the mix sounds, screaming teenagers drowning out the music may be more authentic than the original mix.
Some of the songs will also be pitched low versus the mono album tracks in theaters and on the NTSC video because of the scenes showing video screens being shot at 25 fps to avoid artifacts. On the PAL video, these songs will actually be pitched correctly.
Rutan did a good job restoring the film including preserving the mono track. Miramax (or someone) did not see fit to grace us with it, though. The unprocessed bits of the soundtrack sound better than they ever have. Sadly, they decided they had to "improve" the scenes with Beatles music. :rolleyes
Regards,