lzcutter
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Posts posted by lzcutter
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Moira,
--Had a built-in, loyal audience at that time, much of it outside of urban areas and on the fringes of American culture, and were usually profitable because of this.>>
One of the things we tend to forget because it seems so long ago (though it's really not), is that it wasn't until after the Depression and in some respects, after WW2 that America began the turn away from a rural society to an urban majority.
Would you like to suggest some of those Westerns that you thought succeeded or failed in achieving more complexity?>>
Great question!
I don't know that Ford would have made The Searchers had it not been for WW2 and the maturing of films and film goers in the years after the war..
The film certainly could not have been made in the 1930s or 1940s Hollywood. Ethan is a very different character than the ones usually found in Ford westerns. The final shot of Wayne in the doorway and the family inside that he can not be a part of suggests, I think, that Ford himself saw some things during the war that stayed with him for years afterwards.
The Searchers is, in many ways, his darkest western.
Liberty Valance on the other hand, is a film that on first glance could have been made had America and the film industry not been interrupted by WW2. Ford explores the theme of myth and truth in Fort Apache and brings it full circle twenty years later with Liberty.
But, in truth, Liberty Valance was a product of Ford's maturing as well. Tom Donaphin is one of Ford's and Wayne's most complex characters. A man, who in the beginning, is content with his life and where it is going.
All that changes when Ranse Stoddard comes to town. Donaphin ends up sacrificing all he cares about for the woman he loves without saying a word, knowing that it will change her life and his forever.
There the usual story of westward expansion and the settling of the frontier that is a part of all of Ford's westerns. But this one is much darker at its center than Ford's pre War westerns. While Donaphin is not as dark a character as Ethan Edwards, they are, in many flawed ways, from the same family tree. Also on the family tree would be Tom Dunson from Hawks'Red River.
Hawks had served in WW1.
I don't know that George Stevens could have directed Shane with as much nuance had it not been for his WW2 service.
There is a distinct difference in the material that Stevens chose to direct before going off to war and those films he directed after he returned to Hollywood.
As for the Oxbow Incident, its message still rings true and we see instantances of mob behavior everywhere from a media feeding frenzy to one of the threads on this board last summer.
Its message is universal and timeless and should not be forgotten.
Wild Bill Wellman, WW1 vet, rocks!
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This trend towards tabloid started back in the 1950s with the finale of the studio system and magazines like Confidential.
When the studio system was in charge of a star's publicity, they often dictated what the star would wear and what the star would look like for photo shoots. These photo shoots often took hours. The stars families were not immune from it either. They were often included in both print and film shorts. Everyone was dressed to the nines and no one had a hair out of place because it was all finely orchestrated.
A night on the town was just as finely tuned. PR guys would decide that Joan Crawford (or anyone else on the A-list of the studio) needed to be seen in the swanky nightclub. Forget your plans for going home, Joanie, relaxing in your jammies and playing with the kids.
Been working all day, go home, get made up, here's some clothes to wear. I'll be at your house at 8:30 sharp to take you to the Trocadero. One of our good looking actors will be joining us. Make it look like you are dating him. I'll have you home by 1:00 am. Don't forget you have to be in make-up at 5:30. No, you're not getting paid extra. It's part of your job.
Then the PR guy would call the various gossip columnists and tell them that Joan was going out. The papers would all send photographers. But it was as carefully orchestrated as everything else.
After the death knell began to sound for the studio system, the actors had more freedom to be photographed in more life likesituations instead of the often, over the top, happily ever after shots that rarely had much to do with the actors real personas or their real life at home.
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But, in theory, it is possible that there would be a scenario where the cost would be more than made up by keeping the lion's share of the classic movie market on cable channels, and the ability to cross-market DVD releases. >>
But isn't that what TCM already is doing?
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There was a new poster here a few weeks ago that purposed a Classic Sci-Fi Film Channel and Cinesage Jr posted to that thread about the costs of start up for such a venture.
While original programming would cost more because of the labor and talent involved. It is not cheap to start a new channel in today's world.
TCM is the only channel that shows films uncut, uninterrupted and most importantly, for the channels you mentioned, in their original aspect ratio.
Encore Westerns will sometimes show a film in letterbox but it is few and far between.
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Given the high costs of start-up on a new channel, I don't know that it would be economically possible right now for Time Warner to have two separate classic film channels.
While the Warner Library has over 6,000 titles, many of those are not yet available on a digital format that TCM can show. Each year, more titles are transfered to digital but even the crew at Warners says it is going to take many more years before they have the library transferred.
Sony has only recently seen the light in their vault and is now undertaking the transfer to digital of many of the Columbia titles but, while not as big as the Warners library, it will take time.
Each transfer costs money and Home Video at each studio likely has a yearly budget to transfer x number of films. At studios like Warners, they try to get the maximum number of films transferred each year that the budget will allow. While Paramount, chooses to concentrate on their recent films and television shows instead.
So, I don't know that we would have more films to see with two channels. I think the costs of starting up a new channel (new logos, personnel, wrap arounds, sets, etc) would ultimately hinder both channels.
TCM has spent over ten years building its audience. Splitting the viewership would split its profits until the second channel got its sea legs which could cause the Accounting
Dept to think that commercials are a great way to stop the flow of red ink.
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Respect,
This is one of those rare films that you carry with you always. Some of us can remember where we were when we first saw it. Others can quote dialogue.
It is one of those movies that lives in our collective memory and grows fonder with each viewing.
Over the years since it's release we have learned that Dill was based on Harper Lee's childhood friend, Truman Capote and for me and others, finding that out 30+ years ago before Capote slipped into the madness that would overtake him, was special because it wasn't widely known.
Harper Lee, upon meeting Gregory Peck, told him that he had a paunch (stomach) just like her daddy. Lee would give Peck her daddy's watch and chain that he carried with him until it was stolen years later.
Horton Foote, who adapted the book for the screen, had seen an unknown actor on the stage in New York and remembered him when they had a hard time finding the right actor to play Boo. His name: Robert Duvall. Duvall and Foote would become life long friends. Foote would write Tender Mercies for Duvall and Duvall would win a Best Actor Oscar for that lead role.
But those bits pale in comparision when placed beside the film. It was one of those quirks of fate that brings the right group of film makers and talent together. No one knows it is destined to be a classic while making the film but the experience is special enough that all those who worked on it carry that memory with them from that point on.
The story hits us in a primal way; the overt racism that was still very palatable and on the Evening News when the film was released in 1962. While the story and film are set in during the Depression, the story has that timeless feel that connected with audiences in the midst of the Civil Rights movement. Since that era, we connect it to because of the injustice and society, in the film, turning a blind eye to that injustice. Though the sad truth is, it would be another thirty years from the story's era before African Americans overcame the Jim Crow laws and bigotry.
The children, Jem and Scout, are growing up motherless and trying to cope with families around them that have both parents. They, like Tom Robinson, are alienated despite the best efforts of Atticus and Miss Maudie. Dill, poor child, is all but abandoned (despite his bravado and claims to the opposite) by his parents and shuttled between well meaning relatives.
Boo, himself , is the ultimate outcast. Growing up in a family that hid their secrets behind closed doors, Boo is sentenced to a life of solitary confinement down in the basement, inside the house of secrets that all the townsfolk seem to know. He becomes the unseen bogeyman of every child's nightmare and the mockingbird of the title. All of us of a certain age, grew up with a scary, deserted house that held dark secrets.
The book is much more detailed about that long summer (in fact, if I remember correctly, it takes Boo more than one year and a half to come out and there is much more back story and disagreement between Atticus and his late wife's family) but Horton Foote found the elements in the story that mattered most and worked his screen writing magic on it.
We all want to be Jem and Scout in the upper balcony of the courtroom. We all want to have a father who others will stand up and honor. We all want Boo to save us when our childhood demons become too real. We all want to be able able to diffuse an ugly crowd by talking about Cecil Jacobs and shaming the crowd instead. We all want a sheriff as wise as Heck Tate.
In many ways, it is a story that could only happen in a book or in the movies but its impact on us as moviegoers, if we embrace the story, makes us better people for having seen the film and embraced its message.
"And thus began our longest journey together".
"Why there he is, Mr. Tate. He can tell you his name... Hey, Boo".
"Miss Jean Louis, Mr. Arthur Radley. I believe he already knows you."
"Neighbors bring food with death, and flowers with sickness, and little things in between. Boo was our neighbor. He gave us two soap dolls, a broken watch and chain, a knife, and our lives."
" One time Atticus said you never really knew a man until you stood in his shoes and walked around in them; just standin' on the Radley porch was enough. The summer that had begun so long ago had ended, and another summer had taken its place, and a fall, and Boo Radley had come out".
"I was to think of these days many times. Of Jem, and Dill, and Boo Radley, and Tom Robinson, and Atticus. He would be in Jem's room all night, and he would be there when Jem waked up in the morning."
Message was edited by:
lzcutter for clarification
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Gagman,
Wanted to let you know that this restoration was done by David Shepard's Film Preservation Associates. Shepard has said that it will be released by Image Entertainment this fall, probably in November.
There will be extras on the disc.
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Movies, as a whole, began maturing in Post-war America because the country was maturing. Having lived through the war and rationing for all those years, many films were of the kick up your heels, let's go to the movies for fun variety.
However, there were those directors who had been touched personally by the war and the films they made after the war have a different feeling and style. Film Noir was very popular in post war America especially those with an anti-hero at the heart. As the 1950s grew closer, thanks to the Cold War, there was a sense of dread and uneasiness starting to be felt around the country.
As Anne pointed out, westerns went through the maturation process as well. In some ways it was more evident because westerns as a genre were so successful. Everybody made westerns in large numbers from the big studios to poverty row.
It wasn't unusual to have two or more new Westerns released each month so to many people, the first real sense that they had that movies were maturing were in the Westerns.
Westerns rode a popularity wave for almost thirty five years from the beginning of the thirties until the middle of the sixties. There were more western shows on television during the late 1950s, than any other genre.
So, films began maturing in post-War America and one of the genres it was most evident in was the Western.
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It's the companion book to the series that he did for WNET back in the mid-1970s. The book contains interviews with:
Howard Hawks, Alfred Hitchcock, Vincente Minnelli, George Cukor, Raoul Walsh, King Vidor, Frank Capra and William "Wild Bill" Wellman.
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I have 3 people wanting to pump my brains about another Pola Negri book and one on Lana Turner and one on Martha Raye. Too bad bozo's, but no way......>>
Larry,
I would love to read those books if you contributed stories to them.
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I have asked my cousin (the computer nerd) to help me post some pictures of Nell and me and some of her husbands.
I have a couple of my 65th birthday last month. So, you can peruse the ruin I've become.
Also, I may revive the Russia thread and post pictures of the people and places I was in.
If anyone's interested that is....>>
Raising my hand!
Count me as very interested!
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I am not disputing what the NYTimes reviewer said regarding the original elements. Here is a copy of my post about the DVD from the General Discussion forum a few weeks ago:
Here's my post:
According to a film archivists group that I belong to the situation is not quite as dire as the story paints.
There was a CRI (color reversal interneg) that was made in the 1970s from the original nitrate elements. Most everyone is in agreement that the CRI is badly faded.
However, four IB prints were made during this same time. Two are in private hands. Of these two, one is in better shape than the other. The one in better shape, as I understand it, has been screened at the Egyptian in Hollywood and at the Film Forum in NYC. Fox decided not to use this IB print (though it was offered) when they authored the DVD for "Gang". This print is legitimately in private hands because in the 1970s, this gentleman legally licensed the film back in the 1970s for reissue.
The other privately held print was a mint, unprojected print that was finally screened. When it was finally screened, it was damaged. I would hope that someone would have noticed the damage being done and hopefully it was limited to only one reel (and hopefully not the entire reel).
Of the other two prints, both belong to Fox. One is thought to have been junked and the other is what was used for the DVD.
The better of the two prints in private hands was offered to Fox for the box set but Fox declined.
Many of the archivists have viewed the screen captures on the dvd beaver site and some are of the opinion that perhaps the problem was that colorist went for a more 'modern' look instead of the saturated technicolor look and that is why the color seems off in the film.
Either way, the good news is that a good IB print of the film in all its saturated color does exist.
Fox just chose, for unknown reasons at this point, not to use it.
There is no need for the reviewer to post a correction because no one is disputing the facts about the loss of the original elements.
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Cinemascope,
I understand your disappointment with the DVD and I am not defending Fox's choice of using the lesser elements.
However, you posted:
Curse you, Fox Video, for ruining this great Busby
> Berkeley musical!>>
Which, I was afraid, some might construe as Fox ruined the film for good.
I know that was not your intent but many people are not as industry savvy as you. Preservation work is hard enough on the best of days. I would hate for posters to think that the film was ruined for good.
but your post sure sounds like you want to defend Fox. You don't happen to have any conflict of interest there, do you? All I know is you work in the industry.... >>
I'm not trying to defend Fox but at least trying to make sure that the facts behind this DVD are known to posters on this board.
And for the record, I am not on Fox's payroll. But thanks for asking.
How about you? Any conflicts of interest?
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Except for Birth of a Nation. That only served to further the "cause" of racism>>
It's hard for us in the 21st Century to realize how groundbreaking Birth of a Nation was when it was initially released. People stood in line for hours to see the film.
Birth of a Nation was one of the first groundbreaking films in that it was long form storytelling with effects to show the passage of time and the intercutting of more than one story line. The intercutting also was used to heighten the tension of the audience
The majority of silent films up to then were one or two reelers. Birth of a Nation was epic film making. Many credit it with creating the language of film that film makers.
It altered the way silent films were made and marketed and its technical influences are still being used today.
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Pktrek,
The author of Silent Traces has also done a book on Buster Keaton silent film locations.
It's quite good.
Jon,
Glad to see you back here! Excellent choice of "Parade". I think I have almost worn my copy out.
I would add Richard Schickel's The Men Who Made the Movies. It's out of print but can sometimes be found via abebook.s com
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No, it was more than empty claims.
He was lauded in the press and by the Preservation community for his efforts to restore Ben Hur and Greed.
This was back in the early 1990s, but you might be able to find articles regarding it if you use the Wayback Machine.
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Well, at any rate, if they merchandise colorized versions of their movies, that's their privilege. But I think many of us would still greatly prefer that TCM show only the original, unaltered versions of classic movies.>>
The point I was making was when Turner owned the then MGM library. As has been stated here repeatedly, Turner no longer owns that library and WBros is not actively promoting colorized versions of their library.
I am not advocating that TCM run colorized versions of the film.
I was just pointing out that the money Ted Turner made from colorizing films, he put back into film preservation and restoration.
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I agree with you, completely! I'm sure even the laserdisc must look better than this hideous DVD!!! Curse you, Fox Video, for ruining this great Busby Berkeley musical!>>
While the transfer may not be up to par, they have not ruined the film. As stated in this thread and others, there is are better elements available. Fox, for whatever reason, chose not to use them.
I would hate to have posters here thinking that Fox ruined the existing elements to make this transfer.
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Hello, I'm looking for ideas on how silent films attributed to the maturation of our nation and its population>>
Collegestudent,
Silent films were accessible not only to the rich but to the poor and middle class as well. They could all sit in the darkened theater and share the experience. With silent film you didn't have to be able to read to follow the story, though it likely helped and helped a largely immigrant population to learn to read.
It was one of the truly democratic art forms. No longer was art reserved only for those who could afford to buy it or view it in a museum.
This was art for the people of all ages, of all nationalities, of all income brackets.
Silent films made great works of literature accessible. Stories such as The Phantom of the Opera, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Black Pirate, Robin Hood, The Three Musketeers.
They also tackled social problems of the era and didn't shirk from shining a kleig light or three on unwanted pregnancy, racism, bigotry, violence against women, poverty and many more.
Silent films continued the idea of America as a great melting pot, your dream could come true if you were willing to work hard enough.
Silent films became an art form and over the ensuing years, the talent in Hollywood and in New York tended to overshadow the films made outside of America.
When talkies finally came along, it spurred the creation of one very American art form: the Musical and continued the making of another: the Western.
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One of the things we should probably keep in mind though the majority of us don't like colorization films is when Turner owned the then MGM library (pre-1986 MGM films, pre-1949 WBros and all RKO films) the money he made from colorizing films bankrolled the silent and studio era films he began to restore.
Turner was the one who restored the silent Ben-Hur as well as Greed thanks to the profits from the films he offered as colorized.
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It is subpar; just viewed it.>>
Bronxgirl,
Have you seen the previous versions?
Because this one looked much better than the ones I have seen in the past. Also, looked like there was new footage found?
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Anne,
The 1950s were very interesting for westerns. They started to mature. Douglas and Lancaster would start to make westerns but they were the more traditional good guy vs bad guy.
The studio era stars were looking for stories with a little more teeth.
In the movies Jame Stewart did with Anthony Mann you have the feeling that Stewart's characters have an anger that is always just below the surface. He has usually be wronged in some way and is seeking revenge for that wrong.
Joel McCrea more often than not, found himself in predicaments because he was standing up for others and was willing to take the heat.
Wayne during the 1950s made a handful of westerns. Some of them like Rio Bravo filled with the usual good guys vs bad guys with great dialogue (thank you Leigh Brackett) and more adult fare like Hondo and The Searchers. Bravo is probably the one that best captures the myth of the West and Wayne as a hero. The Searchers asks us to put aside what we know and feel about Wayne and look at him through a very dark glass.
During this same era, Randolph Scott, especially in the Boetticher films, was different. He was very often a man who had suffered a great loss, dealt with it privately and never expected to find a replacement for that loss. He had his own sense of honor and a code (like the others) and he the situations he found himself in were similiar to the situations that Stewart and other Western stars found themselves in during the 1950s but with a Randolph Scott movie, it was more about living by his own code, getting the girl was never the reason but unexpected and sometimes appreciated.
I think that's one reason he is so wonderful in Ride the High Country because he is playing against the heroic, stoic character that many had come to expect. In that film, that role goes to Joel McCrea.
It was great casting on Peckinpah's part because I don't know if the movie would work as well as it does if the roles were reversed.
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Yes, it's possible but given how Paramount Home Video treats its silent library (we are still waiting for Wings to come to DVD and it was an Oscar winner), we have to keep in mind that posters on this board sometimes have a better idea of what silent films are in the Paramount Film Library than the folks in PHV.
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The bad news on more of her silents being screened on TCM is that the majority of her surviving silent movies were produced by Paramount.
Seven Men from Now - Randolph Scott
in Westerns
Posted
Chris,
I think the westerns on television helped a number of film makers such as Sam Peckinpah, writers such as Walon Green and actors like Warren Oates, Ben Johnson,Strother Martin and LQ Jones all find their voices.
Television westerns gave them a chance to flesh out morality plays in either 30 or 60 or 90 (The Virginian) minutes (time out for commercials, not withstanding). A television season back then was much longer than it is today. Today, a season lasts 22-24 weeks. Back when we were young, a television season lasted over 30 weeks.
The Virginian may have been so popular with classic era stars because of its longer format. Gave them more time to develop their characters and many of the roles were very, very good. As I recall, even tv westerns back when we were young were still very adult.
On Gunsmoke in its very early black and white years, Miss Kitty has more than just a hotel upstairs and my folks remember that vividly. I remember when Gunsmoke was on Saturday nights at 10:00 and Matt Dillion shot the guy in the credits.
The Virginian, especially, billed itself as an adult western. Bonanza and The Big Valley often dealt with adult themes.
The Rifleman, in some ways reminiscent of To Kill a Mockingbird, uses a widower and his son to tell a larger story but never forgets that at the center of the show is the love between father and son.
Actors today who could be western stars if the genre was still going strong;
Scott Glenn, Robert Duvall (who even James Woods says was robbed of the Emmy for Lonesome Dove. Woods won that year for My Name is Bill W ),
Tommy Lee Jones,
Kevin Costner: much more believable in westerns than modern day or Robin Hood movies.
Amy Madigan: that face was meant for westerns.
Gene Hackman: if he was still making movies, and speaking of Hackman where has he gone? ,
Dennis Quaid: heart breakingly wonderful in Wyatt Earp,
Sam Elliott (who would have been a major star had the western genre not faded away in the 1970s). He is great in the Louis L'Armour stories that TNT adapted back in the early 1990s.
Tom Selleck: a modern day actor who is home on the range.
Morgan Freeman
Kurt Russell
The cast of Deadwood
Powers Booth
Ian McShane: wonderful as Al Swearingen
Timothy Olyphant: great as Seth Bullock
Gerald McRainey: see him as George Hearst (Willy Randolph Hearst's father) the last season of Deadwood. He is magnificent. Emmy winning performance if there is a God.
Robin Weigert
Dayton Callie
Jim Beaver
Earl Brown
Molly Parker
Paula Malcomson
Anna Gunn
Great lived in faces and some of the best dialogue David Milch has ever written. Once you get past all the swearing. Let's you realize what a good actor Brad Dourif can be when not being the voice of Chucky, the killer doll.