Roger Ebert says Criterion is preparing a release of Cabiria (1914) (1 Viewer)

[Brandon Conway]

Great Movies review of the film.

The statement appears at the bottom:

The Criterion Collection is preparing a DVD edition of "Cabiria."

Very cool. Saw this film in a film history class about 3 years ago and thought it was quite spectacular for its day.

 

[Simon Howson]

Scorsese will be happy, he raves about it constantly.

 

[Haggai]

The National Gallery of Art in Washington DC is showing the US premiere of the restoration about three weeks from now. I'm planning on going, so I'll report back here about the print quality.

 

[David Jay]

Awesome news. I read about the film in the book, Making Pictures: A Century of European Cinematography and have wanted to see it ever since. But, the current DVD doesn't have the color tinting, so I've been trying to avoid it. I'm glad I have a chance to see it now, with the tinting intact.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

This is exciting news indeed. I remember when I went to film school, in my first semester a professor shows us this. It was from a VHS tape and the quality left a lot to be desired, but despite those limitations, the incredible epic scale of the filmmaking came through loud and clear. I'd love to have an opportunity to watch this film again closer to its original version, and if there are the usual quality Criterion supplements, all the better.

 

[Mark Zimmer]

I wonder if this is a different restoration than the Kino version (which was the 1990 NYU restoration)? That looked pretty nice, though it did have a few problem areas. See my review at http://www.digitallyobsessed.com/showreview.php3?ID=649 for further details.

EDIT:

Ah, now that I've RTFA, I see that this version runs nearly an hour longer (while such measures are dodgy when talking about variable-speed silent films, there's obviously a lot added back in).

 

[Haggai]

I saw the restored print of Cabiria this past weekend, at the National Gallery of Art. Some of it is still taken from lesser elements, occasionally even fluctuating within the same shot between higher and lower quality. But there isn't too much that's lower quality, just a few short stretches here and there. Most if it looked very, very good, strikingly so for a nearly 100-year-old movie. I can't say that I thought much of the film itself; although it had some effective moments of spectacle, I could barely follow the story, and I didn't get much narrative sense at all from the visuals. But, for those who are fans, the good news is that the new restoration looks great.