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Our Gang Collection, 80 shorts, Oct. 28 (1 Viewer)

dana martin

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hopefully Maltin will show up then, i just hope they are in order, i think WB has some serious competition this year in best studio, FOX, Sony, UNi, now RHI/Genius, pretty good year form everyone.
 

Keith Paynter

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The remaining Roach shorts did make it to VHS before the demise of Cabin Fever, although they were of course available on la$erdi$c (which is where most of those ebay DVD's came from).

This is uber-ossum! I haven't seen Wild Poses in ages!
 

stewprime

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Ok, here's what I know about the original Cabin Fever releases. The original sets were released on VHS and went all the way to Vol. 21, with 4 shorts per tape. That makes 84; each tape had a quick intro by Leonard Maltin, talking trivia, shooting locations etc.

Cabin Fever then began to release them on DVD, with 2 volumes per DVD, ie. Vol 1 & 2 on DVD 1, Vol. 3 & 4 on DVD 2, etc. I've got the 6 DVD's which they released covering all the same shorts, in the same order as the VHS, up to Vol 12. Unfortunately (I believe) this is when Cabin Fever went out of business. They never produced any other DVD sets to take care of the remaining 11 volumes (through to 21).

Now, still having the tapes, I met a friend a few years ago who had a VCR/DVD appliance and was able to get the VHS tapes transferred to DVD. This was great because several of the tapes were only watched once, some not at all as I hadn't gotten around to it. So the only loss was attributed to how dirty his tape heads were and the compression that the deck used. Regardless, I've got all 21 volumes safely stowed away on DVD, 6 "official" and the remaining 11 "unofficial"

Glad to see that they are releasing the set. Don't quote me on this but I have a feeling that the Our Gang set (being only 80 shorts) will comprise the entire talky period between the times Hal Roach started making talkies to when the gang moved on to MGM. The original VHS tapes did have about 4 shorts that were from the silent era....maybe 6, spread across the entire 21 volumes set. I'd have to go home and look. Regardless, the Laughsmith will probably take care of all the original silent shorts, while this new set will cover all the talkies. But again, don't quote me.

Hope this helps.
 

Joe Karlosi

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This almost sounds too good to be true. These are some of my most wanted on my personal wish list!!

I'm wondering... is there any chance that all the Hal Roach Laurel and Hardy shorts could be released in the same way? I thought L&H and Our Gang were BOTH owned by Hallmark? And if this company is now able to release Our Gang, could it be they have acquired Laurel & Hardy too??
 

Ethan Riley

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The Laughingsmith collection so far is only going to have 26 shorts--not nearly all the silents--but they're still working very hard on it. And who's to say that it will be the only collection. And best of all, it's going to include films that have been "lost" for years...
 

ColbyCo82

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I noticed that the Laughsmith collection only has 2 Our Gang shorts that were originally distributed by MGM. (Roach's films were distibuted by Pathe until 1927, and then by MGM until the late 1930s). Pathe shorts have been showing up on public domain VHS and DVDs for years, but the MGM shorts have been few and far between. Does anyone know if many of the MGM shorts are lost or if they are held back by some legal issue? I personally consider Hal Roach studio's "golden age" is from 1928 to 1934, so I would really like to see more of the MGM silents.
 

David Weicker

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I am looking forward to this set. I purchased the six-disc Cabin Fever set (containing vols 1-12). I also had the four LD sets. I hope that Leonard Maltin can contribute to this set (I'm sure he would be glad to, considering his passion for these).

I did some research using the Maltin book as a reference, for the 80 Roach/MGM talkies, there was 1 three-reeler, 57 two-reelers, and 22 one-reelers, for a total of 139 reels or 1390 minutes of content. This works out to be 23 hours, 10 minutes. With no extras, this would fit onto 6 discs

David
 

Steve...O

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This is EXCELLENT news and I'm overjoyed. A poster on the classic horror board indicated there would be extras; we'll have to wait to see what they are if indeed there are any.

I may be wrong but I do believe earlier news accounts indicated that L&H is now owned by RHI and not Lionsgate. This Our Gang release bodes very well for a L&H collection in my opinion. Mr. Maltin should be involved in both.

Warners owns (I think) 52 Our Gang shorts most if not all of which are 1 reel. This could easily be a single collection. The films are not highly regarded but would appeal to collectors. Unfortunately WHV has not chosen to release dedicated collections of their short subjects.

Many thanks to Genius for releasing this.
 

Mark Y

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My understanding is that all of the Pathe-released material is public domain. For the most part, M-G-M filed copyrights for all the Hal Roach films they released, which were reassigned to Hal Roach's company in the 1940s/1950s (some ended up reverting back to M-G-M, such as General Spanky and the Laurel & Hardy features The Devil's Brother and Bonnie Scotland, which is why those were released as part of TCM's Laurel & Hardy Collection DVD set). This library has changed hands a few times over the years and is currently owned by RHI.

Apart from still being under copyright, the other major issue with the MGM-period silent shorts is that several had gone missing over the years. In the 1950s, when the first Little Rascals TV package was put together, 13 early silent films were included (16mm TV prints of these still circulate) -- and apparently, these were the only Hal Roach/MGM Our Gang silent shorts that were still known to exist at that time. (There were 22 Hal Roach/MGM Our Gang silent shorts; I believe more of them have been found since then. Maybe someone else out there has more definitive information.) But these are the titles that were known to be extant in the 1950s:

DOG HEAVEN
RAINY DAYS
OLD GRAY HOSS
CRAZY HOUSE
SPOOK SPOOFING
ELECTION DAY
NOISY NOISES
WIGGLE YOUR EARS
BARNUM AND RINGLING INC.
LITTLE MOTHER
FAST FREIGHT
CAT, DOG AND COMPANY
SATURDAY'S LESSON

As far as I know, these (and the other nine Roach/MGM silents) belong to RHI. It would be cool to see them show up as extras. What was confusing to me was how RHI included four silent shorts as part of the original 21 VHS tapes, only one of which (Cat, Dog And Company) was from the above list (another, Dog Heaven, later showed up on a separate dog-themed tape along with some previously-released talkie shorts). The other three silent shorts issued in the RHI/Cabin Fever set were public domain Pathe silents.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to this set and am hopeful to see a similar Laurel & Hardy collection down the road!
 

Radioman970

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That is such great news! I love the silent years and the first of the soundies.

I'm adding these near the top of my list. Very excited. CAN'T WAIT!

I'll be preordering as soon as I can. When available, amazon.com links to each of these would be great.

If all this wasn't virtual, I'd buy this thread a pizza. :P
 

Charles Ellis

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Having never seen any of the silent ones, I would love to see the ones with Mickey Daniels, Sunshine Sammy Morrison, Mary Kormann, Joe Cobb and others. I grew up on the 1929-38 talkies, and as for the later MGM ones- YECCHH!!!! The problem with those later shorts it was basically MGM's idea of how children should behave, a sanitized, overly cute version of what Hal Roach had created years before. You might as well have dropped off Spanky & company in Andy Hardy's town of Carvel! Worse yet, you could tell that this was no longer a series that reflected the "everyday life' of kids, but what what the adults expected out of kids. Sure, some people want the later MGM shorts on DVD to complete the collection, but count me out!

It's rather surprising to learn that only half of the Cabin Fever VHS collection made it to DVD. So, it looks as if I'll be buying the new set, but I still hope they'll keep the Maltin intros, or better yet, have him (or Robert Osborne) do new ones. With the passage of time, I bet there's even more behind-the-scenes info that has come to light.
 

Dan1

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Hallmark/Artisan released a 1-disc collection Of 5 Laurel & Hardy films (Sons of The Desert, The Music Box, Another Fine Mess, Busy Bodies and County Hospital) in 2003. It's upc# 70772914334500. If you ever come across it in a store, DO NOT BUY IT!

Despite the box claiming "Digitally Remastered" the films are awful low-rent transfers from what apparently were broadcast videotapes. IIRC there are even breaks where commercials were inserted.

My VHS copies taped off of TCM are of a higher quality than the Hallmark DVD.
 

Corey3rd

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You really shouldn't buy it now that it's been discontinued. I didn't mind the TV print since the DVD was less than $10 and I wanted to show The Music Box to pals. But there's no way it's worth $100 used. They also killed part II. Perhaps this is a signal that lionsgate is doing something better with Laurel and Hardy titles.
 

Jack Theakston

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The Roach material has reverted back to RHI, which is why this set is coming out, presumably. Lionsgate is not handling the L&H material anymore, as far as I know.
 

Keith Paynter

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If you can still get them on ebay from time to time, the 3M L&H laserdiscs were very good, and rarely suffer from rot. The only issue of course is that the side breaks for the features are fades, not abrupt cuts. They even had the MGM front ends.

Actually, I thought Way Out West was a pretty decent transfer on the vol II set, but I agree that the effort put forth by Hallmark was lackluster at best. Oh well, there's still the UK R2 discs...

Personally, I'm happiest having several 16mm prints in my library, especially now since Shepard is no longer making new prints.
 

Steve...O

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Agreed. Lionsgate is (thankfully) no longer associated with the Roach library. The disc that Dan1 refers to is a contender for "worst DVD ever" in my opinion. The Music Box short even has a rolling screen in one spot that is clearly a video based defect.

One recalls Steve Beeks' infamous quote that the only B&W films that sell are John Wayne films. That was his justification for largely ignoring the Roach library.

I have an e-mail into the publisher of the L&H magazine to see if he's heard any rumblings of a R1 release of the sound L&H shorts and Roach features.

Does anyone know if HD transfers exist for the Roach material? Ideally the Genius set for Our Gang (and potentially L&H) will be sourced from new transfers and not recycled transfers used for prior VHS releases. After watching the Stooge shorts in all their restored glory one hopes the legendary Roach comics will get similar treatment.

Steve

PS: I'll make Genius a deal: if they follow up this wonderful Our Gang collection with a high quality L&H complete sound shorts collection by the end of the year (with a promise of features to follow), I'll vote for them as "Studio of the Year" in the annual HTF poll :D
 

WadeM

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Fantastic!! After reading the pages for both sets, I have no doubt both collections will be excellent.
 

Mark Y

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What L&H need is an advocate like a Leonard Maltin, Jerry Beck, George Feldtenstein (sp?) etc., who would advise the studio and actually be listened to. I think it's no coinidence that Maltin was involved in the previous Little Rascals Cabin Fever series. What had me banging my head against the wall was: the same company (RHI, through Cabin Fever and later Hallmark) then released a series of L&H shorts on VHS, from colorized TV masters (some edited) with one short to a tape. D'oh! (Hey, let's be authentic: D'ooooooooooooohh!!)

Assuming a comparable L&H set eventually comes to pass: I wonder if it would be possible/feasible for them to use the masters used for the Region 2 DVD releases. This stuff was great, as crystal clear as we're likely to ever see. And the majority of the films had the original titles and original M-G-M logos and fanfares...did you know that the original version of Block-Heads has an opening fanfare over the M-G-M lion that continues into the title theme? I'd never heard it before I got the German DVD version.

A few things: I believe Michael Agee (the same guy who has been working on the mythical silent L&H set) worked on the transfers/restorations of the sound L&H films back in the 1980s, and I believe I have read remarks from him to the effect that whatever other versions have become available since then -- home video, TV, etc., all started out with his masters as source material. For instance, his version of Sons Of The Desert got a 1980s "Hal Roach Studios" intro plastered onto it in place of the original M-G-M logo, had background music dubbed onto it, and depending on which version (for TV or home video), had video fades to black inserted for commercial breaks...but the source was the original master done by Agee in the 1980s, altered by someone else later on. I have read rumors that those original tapes were erased/recycled some years back, but if the above is true, it would seem that the European DVDs seem to originate from these copies too, somewhere down the line. Now, of course, different entities officially own the US rights for the silent and sound films. But the work has already been done...though the PAL/NTSC speed difference would be another issue. (I can deal with that, it's better than what Hallmark gave us.)

I was very happy to see (1) original title sequences restored for the majority of the films where possible on the German DVDs, and (2) in cases where they couldn't actually restore them, they left them alone with the "Film Classics" reissue titles and didn't try to "fake" them by using bits and pieces of the FC titles cut together with the original opening from some other short, with the end result not being authentic anyway. (This was done for the TV versions of several shorts, as aired on The Laurel & Hardy Show and later on AMC.)

A couple things to look out for: The German (Kinowelt) DVD issue of "The Chimp" has the authentic original titles with the circus motif. I'm told the UK version has the Film Classics titles...if the original titles didn't exist, I'd prefer the FC titles over a fake approximation. But I wonder what happened there. (On top of it, the two "intro text title cards" are reversed on the FC reissue version, so they don't really make sense...and for the 1980s "fake restoration," they left them that way.)

Also, I remember reading that some time between the mid-1980s (when the syndicated Laurel & Hardy Show was put together) and the DVD era, when the European restorations came out, the third reel of "The Music Box" somehow got lost, so they had to dupe it from some past video transfer, and it is very contrasty compared to the rest of the film. (The best version of this short I've seen in recent years is the one that's been shown on TCM.) Of course, this also would suggest that the European releases did not necessarily originate solely from Michael Agee's 1980s versions.

Anyway...I'd love to see a good L&H set in the US, and I am definitely looking forward to this Little Rascals collection! I would bet that the Rascals are coming out first because they have good masters already done for previous releases, all set to go.
 

Brent S

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Amazon is now taking preorders.

Note: Amazon's listed release date is Tuesday Oct. 28. Most likely correct, since the earlier information (Oct. 20) is a Monday.
 

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