Konstantinos
Senior HTF Member
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- Konstantinos
Hoping we find out something soon...
well, if you're anxious:
https://www.amazon.co.jp/The-Cotton-Club-Blu-ray/dp/B0718XWRJ1
Hoping we find out something soon...
Just arrived. Thanks Will for the heads up.
View attachment 22081
It's not that much of a stretch to call a film with duds as lead characters a dud.
The problem wasn't that he was non violent. It's that he couldn't act his way out of a paper bag in that movie. Neither could Diane Lane. It left a huge hole right in the middle. The supporting cast was great, but not enough to carry the whole film on their own. Every time I've watched the film I always think that I could be cleaning my refrigerator or doing my laundry when Gere and Lane are on the screen.
Even by Telluride standards, though, 2017 opened with a stunner: the world premiere of a new masterpiece directed by Francis Ford Coppola. OK, maybe I’m cheating a little to call it “new”; the premiere was of The Cotton Club Encore, a 2017 restoration and reconstruction of Coppola’s gangster musical from 1984. Yet the changes Coppola has made to his film, both major and minor, cumulatively alter the impact and meaning of The Cotton Club so significantly that it is essentially a new movie – one with the audacity, resonance and ambition of its era’s most important films. To discover The Cotton Club in this form is to come across a lost masterpiece that stands alongside Raging Bull, The Right Stuff and Once Upon a Time in America as one of the great American epics of the early 1980s.
Coppola archivist James Mockoski explained this morning that Coppola removed about 13 minutes of footage for the original 127-minute version, which took it down to 114 minutes or thereabouts. Roughly 25 minutes of new footage was added for a grand total of 139 minutes.
So why isn’t The Cotton Club Encore playing at the Toronto Film Festival or the forthcoming New York Film Festival? You’re not going to believe this, but the reason is MGM CEO Gary Barber, the same obstinate asshole who has blocked Robert Harris‘s long-hoped-for restoration of John Wayne‘s The Alamo.
MGM is the Cotton Club rights-holder, you see, and Barber, true to form, has not only objected to the film being shown in any kind of commercial venue (such as TIFF or NYFF) but is also uninterested in distributing or streaming Coppola’s expanded version, even though Coppola has paid for the whole thing.
Barber could theoretically (a) allow for a brief theatrical re-release of The Cotton Club Encore or (b) issue it on Bluray or via Amazon/iTunes streaming or (c) at least sub-license the home video rights to Criterion or some other dedicated, film-loving outfit. But the South African-born executive reportedly has no interest, just as he’s refused to even discuss the Alamo situation with Harris.
Telluride honcho Tom Luddy was able to show The Cotton Club Encore last weekend by slipping it in quietly and not promoting it prior to the start of the festival.
http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2017...g-screenings-coppolas-139-minute-cotton-club/
I like the idea that it's an entirely rethought cut of the movie. They didn't just put the majority of the deleted scenes back in. The gave thought to the whole thing.Hmmm...
well, if you're anxious:
https://www.amazon.co.jp/The-Cotton-Club-Blu-ray/dp/B0718XWRJ1
Hmmm...
I'm worried about the 'cuts'.
What if some of the moments I liked or remembered are now on the floor - excised.
If they release a disc, I hope it has both versions
One of the greatest dance classics in the history of cinema? Seriously, only a moron could write that.
I believe the release prints in 1984 ran 127 minutes. That would mean 12 minutes have been actually added, and probably a whole bunch of things were moved around and re-edited, which I hope will add more coherence to the dance numbers. I am actually thrilled about this screening, and can't wait for the subsequent Blu-ray.