Movies you can’t find on DVD

[Richard Kimble]

Three NY Post articles from the last couple of months listing movies not available on home video:

 

http://nypost.com/2014/06/18/64-clips-of-movies-you-cant-find-on-dvd/

 

http://nypost.com/2014/06/26/even-more-clips-70-in-fact-of-flicks-you-cant-find-on-dvd/

 

http://nypost.com/2014/07/30/over-100-more-movies-that-really-ought-to-be-on-dvd/

 

Would love the chance to see The Road Back, The Senator Was Indiscreet, Father Brown Detective ('34), So Red The Rose, and The '29 Virginian, among others. Don't tell anyone, but I even have a bizarre curiosity for The View From Pompey's Head. (Has Zoo In Budapest ever been on home video/TCM?)

 

Although this writer makes some mistakes (Desert Fury has definitely been on US TV) I still like him, if only because he refers to Alan Ladd as "perhaps the definitive Jay Gatsby".

[hamradio]

Three NY Post articles from the last couple of months listing movies not available on home video:

 

http://nypost.com/2014/06/18/64-clips-of-movies-you-cant-find-on-dvd/

 

http://nypost.com/2014/06/26/even-more-clips-70-in-fact-of-flicks-you-cant-find-on-dvd/

 

http://nypost.com/2014/07/30/over-100-more-movies-that-really-ought-to-be-on-dvd/

 

Would love the chance to see The Road Back, The Senator Was Indiscreet, Father Brown Detective ('34), So Red The Rose, and The '29 Virginian, among others. Don't tell anyone, but I even have a bizarre curiosity for The View From Pompey's Head. (Has Zoo In Budapest ever been on home video/TCM?)

 

Although this writer makes some mistakes (Desert Fury has definitely been on US TV) I still like him, if only because he refers to Alan Ladd as "perhaps the definitive Jay Gatsby".

 

Most of Sybil Jason films can't be found at all.  Regarding "Poor Little Rich Girl". there was an excellent release on VHS under Playhouse video.  Razor sharp and in simulated stereo.  It is not colorized thank goodness.

[Sepiatone]

Nothing considered major by anyone in here, but the Canadian film THE SILENT PARTNER w/Eliot Gould and Christopher Plummer to my knowledge hasn't had a DVD transfer done yet.

 

I have trouble finding a copy of WOODSTOCK that informs me if it's "widescreen" or not.  I'd like to know that before buying it, getting it sent only to discover it's a DVD transfer of the older VHS copy that wasn't widescreen and had lost a lot of information at the sides.  Maybe I'm being too cautious.

 

I haven't looked yet, but do any of you know if there IS a DVD copy of ACE IN THE HOLE w/Kirk Douglas?

 

Sepiatone

[slaytonf]

 

I haven't looked yet, but do any of you know if there IS a DVD copy of ACE IN THE HOLE w/Kirk Douglas?

 

Sepiatone

 

http://www.amazon.com/Ace-Hole-The-Criterion-Collection/dp/B000PKG6OE

[kingrat]

Far too many movies never made the switch from VHS to DVD, including quite a few foreign films. For instance:

 

--The Mother and the ****, which Cahiers du Cinema called the best film of the 1970s

--Alain Jessua's excellent 1960s films, Life Upside Down and The Killing Game (Jeu de massacre). Every year at Comic-Con time I'm reminded of how timely The Killing Game is (about a wacko rich guy who tries to act out the adventures of a comic book hero).

--Satyajit Ray's Days and Nights in the Forest

--Experience Preferred, But Not Essential (a funny British comedy from 1982)

--This Special Friendship (Les amities particulieres), which is like Dangerous Liaisons in a French boarding school for boys

--Vittorio De Seta's Bandits of Orgosolo, which was highly praised by 1960s critics

 

George Sanders fans would love to have The Private Affairs of Bel Ami on DVD. This Albert Lewin film has never been shown on TCM.

 

Whistle Down the Wind has never been released as a Region 1 DVD.

[SansFin]

I wish very much that: Visit to a Small Planet (1960) would be available as an inexpensive Region 1 DVD. It is currently available only as Region 2 DVD and the price for even that is outrageous.

[fredbaetz]

Just off the top of my head:

 

"Beau Geste"  Ronald Colman and William Powell's 1926 silent version. Many consider it the best..

 

"Swiss Family Robinson"  The RKO 1940 version with Thomas Mitchell. Disney bought the rights when it did their 1960 version and have kept it from the public since, and the  RKO film is a much more faithful adaptation of the book. It's also the introduction of Orson Wells to the public, he is not seen but heard as the narrator, before "Citizen Kane".

 

"American Hot Wax"  the start of Rock and Roll with a all star line up. Great fun..

 

"The Covered Wagon"  James Cruze Grand daddy of epic westerns..

 

"The Big Sky"  Howard Hawks beautiful film and one of Kirk Douglas's best. A restoration is needed, but it would be worth it.

 

"The Great Gatsby"  Alan Ladd.. Already mentioned..

 

And  of course "The Song of the South"  Come on Disney, it's on DVD in Europe....

 

There are many many more that should see the light of day and whole new audiences....... 

[Richard Kimble]

http://www.empireonline.com/features/films-not-on-DVD
   

Plenty of films have yet to make the hi-res journey to Blu-ray, but there are hundreds that never even made it to DVD. Empire has been digging, and we've exhumed these 25 movies never officially pressed onto a small, silver disc... to date. If you feel inclined, suggest your own lost treasures in the comments.

    The rules, then. Availability in some regions but not others doesn’t count – these are films that, as far as we can ascertain, have never been released on DVD anywhere. Likewise, things that have been available but are now out of print do not make the cut. And we’ve kept it to films with either reasonably recognisable directors or cast.

 

Song Of The South (1946)

Directors: Wilfred Jackson, Harve Foster

Starring: Ruth Warwick, Bobby Driscoll, James Baskett

What’s the story? Seven-year-old Johnny goes to live on a Georgia plantation with his mother and grandmother after the American Civil War, while his father’s away working in Atlanta. There he befriends the kindly Uncle Remus, and his live-action real life is interspersed with animated sequences as Remus recounts the various adventures of the trickster Br’er Rabbit.

What’s the problem? Children of the ‘80s could reliably watch clips of the Br’er Rabbit stories on bank holiday episodes of Disney Time. The whole film was occasionally on TV too, but has dropped off the radar in recent years due to its contentious racial stereotyping. Uncle Remus isn’t a slave, but he is an Uncle Tom, and as of 2010, Disney’s line (via CEO Bob Iger) was that the film is “antiquated” and “fairly offensive”. Any future release would need copious extra features engaging with its historical context. A set like that isn’t on the cards yet, although it remains the subject of discussion within the Mouse House.

 

Considering all the political grandstanding now being done over the Stars and Bars, Confederate monuments, et al... I wouldn't count on Disney willingly getting involved in a hullabaloo over this

 

The Road Back (1937)

Director: James Whale

Starring: John ‘Dusty’ King, Slim Summerville, Andy Devine, Dwight Frye

What’s the story? Whale was best known for his Universal horrors (Frankenstein, The Bride of Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, The Old Dark House), but he intended this sequel to All Quiet On The Western Front to be the crowning glory of his career. Its story sees the soldiers of the 2nd Company returning home and struggling to readjust to civilian life after the horrors of World War I. But its anti-war and anti-German stance made Universal nervous, and it was drastically cut to dull its message. Whale later cited it as the worst job he ever had.

What’s the problem? All Quiet On The Western Front is these days lauded as culturally and historically significant, but The Road Back remains a footnote to that story. Neutering the film to appease the Nazi regime (or “cultivate the good will of Germany” as it was worded) is not Universal’s finest hour. Without the materials to reassemble Whale’s director’s cut and put the mistake right, it’s an episode they would likely prefer stays in the vaults.

 

So Red The Rose (1935)

Director: King Vidor

Starring: Randolph Scott, Margaret Sullavan, Walter Connolly

What’s the story? A romance from the director of Duel In The Sun, set during the American Civil War. Sullavan plays a Southern plantation owner whose world gets turned upside down by the conflict between the Confederacy and the Union. But even in her darkest hours, she has her love for Randolph Scott to sustain her. Aww. It wasn’t a great success, to the extent that studios were wary of Civil War films for a few years afterwards, until the juggernaut hit Gone With The Wind cheered them up again in 1939.

What’s the problem? Probably rights. It was made by Paramount but sold to Universal in the ‘50s for television distribution. DVD rights would presumably need a new negotiation between those two parties, and they’ve both got much higher priorities.

 

I saw this on YT recently. It's mostly rather stagy (a surprise, coming from Vidor) with the cast mint julipin' and Ah-Do-Declarin' all over the place. However it does have one great, gutsy scene, where Sullavan confronts the soon-to-be-emancipated slaves. If SRTR were better known (it was such a box office flop it was nicknamed So Red The Ink) this scene would be as controversial as Song Of The South.
 

The Great Gatsby (1949)

Director: Elliott Nugent

Starring: Alan Ladd, Betty Field, Ruth Hussey, Shelley Winters

What’s the story? The second film adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, and the first sound version (sadly the silent one is lost). Ladd is Gatsby, and had planned to direct until he fell out with studio Paramount over the rest of the casting. Richard Maibaum, who went on to pen loads of the James Bond films, wrote the screenplay.

What’s the problem? The 1974 Robert Redford version got a bit of a revival in the wake of Baz Luhrmann’s recent film, but nobody much talked about this one. It plays pretty fast and loose with the book, which has irked some viewers, and Paramount actually withdrew it when the Redford version happened. It occasionally surfaces on YouTube, with some presuming it might now be in the public domain. A spiffy new “preservation print” was created for a Film Noir festival in 2012, so there is a decent new copy out there, but there are still no plans to release it widely.

 

This is my favorite version of TGG (I've never seen the silent of course, or the 1958 Playhouse 90 with Robert Ryan, which may or may not exist). It takes some liberties with the story, and your appreciation of it may depend on whether you can accept the story filtered through the framework of film noir (an approach used the same year with All The King's Men). Alan Ladd is the best screen Gatsby, convincing  as both gangster and social climber (admittedly he has trouble with the steadfast lover bit -- but who wouldn't?). IMHO this is Ladd's best ever role, taking advantage of his usually hidden vulnerability even more than Shane.

[LonesomePolecat]

Alan Ladd as Gatsby? This exists? I have got to see that! That sounds like perfect casting to me.

 

The main one I thought of was WHAT'S SO BAD ABOUT FEELING GOOD? I can only find a VHS transfer version on youtube with commercial breaks.

[Movie Collector OH]

Three NY Post articles from the last couple of months listing movies not available on home video:

 

http://nypost.com/2014/06/18/64-clips-of-movies-you-cant-find-on-dvd/

 

http://nypost.com/2014/06/26/even-more-clips-70-in-fact-of-flicks-you-cant-find-on-dvd/

 

http://nypost.com/2014/07/30/over-100-more-movies-that-really-ought-to-be-on-dvd/

 

Would love the chance to see The Road Back, The Senator Was Indiscreet, Father Brown Detective ('34), So Red The Rose, and The '29 Virginian, among others. Don't tell anyone, but I even have a bizarre curiosity for The View From Pompey's Head. (Has Zoo In Budapest ever been on home video/TCM?)

 

Although this writer makes some mistakes (Desert Fury has definitely been on US TV) I still like him, if only because he refers to Alan Ladd as "perhaps the definitive Jay Gatsby".

 

I have a rubbish PD version of The Senator Was Indiscreet, so that probably means it is/was listed on "archive.org".  Also TCM scheduled Zoo in Budapest at least once (back in Dec 2010).

[Richard Kimble]

I have a rubbish PD version of The Senator Was Indiscreet, so that probably means it is/was listed on "archive.org".  Also TCM scheduled Zoo in Budapest at least once (back in Dec 2010).

 

I've been able to obtain ZIB (as well as So Red The Rose and the '29 Virginian) since I started the thread last year

[Movie Collector OH]

http://www.empireonline.com/features/films-not-on-DVD

   

 

 

Considering all the political grandstanding now being done over the Stars and Bars, Confederate monuments, et al... I wouldn't count on Disney willingly getting involved in a hullabaloo over this

 

 

 

I saw this on YT recently. It's mostly rather stagy (a surprise, coming from Vidor) with the cast mint julipin' and Ah-Do-Declarin' all over the place. However it does have one great, gutsy scene, where Sullavan confronts the soon-to-be-emancipated slaves. If SRTR were better known (it was such a box office flop it was nicknamed So Red The Ink) this scene would be as controversial as Song Of The South.

 

 

This is my favorite version of TGG (I've never seen the silent of course, or the 1958 Playhouse 90 with Robert Ryan, which may or may not exist). It takes some liberties with the story, and your appreciation of it may depend on whether you can accept the story filtered through the framework of film noir (an approach used the same year with All The King's Men). Alan Ladd is the best screen Gatsby, convincing  as both gangster and social climber (admittedly he has trouble with the steadfast lover bit -- but who wouldn't?). IMHO this is Ladd's best ever role, taking advantage of his usually hidden vulnerability even more than Shane.

 

It appears that TCM had TGG (1926) on their schedule once back in 2004.

[Richard Kimble]

The main one I thought of was WHAT'S SO BAD ABOUT FEELING GOOD? I can only find a VHS transfer version on youtube with commercial breaks.

 

 

Like WSBAFG these are '60s Universals that have fallen into obscurity and seem to have been unaired for decades, along with:

 

The Bofors Gun -- great Nicol Williamson performance

 

Work Is A Four Letter Word

 

The Adding Machine

 

Angel In My Pocket -- Somebody requested this awhile back

 

I'll Never Forget What's'is Name -- the best Richard Lester movie Richard Lester never made

 

Banning -- the greatest golf movie in history, if that means anything

 

Don't Just Stand There -- has this been show anywhere in the past 25+ years? It seems to have utterly vanished -- not just from TV but also the public consciousness.

 

The Harper-imitation P.J. with George Peppard also has something of a following.

 

Some of these films have been uploaded to YouTube (and then quickly disappeared)

[Richard Kimble]

It appears that TCM had TGG (1926) on their schedule once back in 2004.

 

Huh? The silent Gatsby is a lost film.

 

All that survives is the trailer:

The trailer calls it a "record selling novel". Actually the novel flopped -- it was the success of the stage version (directed by George Cukor) that got Hollywood interested.

[Movie Collector OH]

Huh? The silent Gatsby is a lost film.

 

All that survives is the trailer:

The trailer calls it a "record selling novel". Actually the novel flopped -- it was the success of the stage version (directed by George Cukor) that got Hollywood interested.

 

Okay, then that is probably what they showed.  Interesting background though.

[skimpole]

Looking at theyshootpictures.com top 1000 movies, the following are the highest rating missing on DVD:

 

A Brighter Summer Day

The Mother and the ------

The Travelling Players

Celine and Julie Go Boating

 

Then there are all the movies that were on New Yorker DVD when that company went bankrupt.  Good to see that The Confession is now on DVD.

[Bogie56]

Looking at theyshootpictures.com top 1000 movies, the following are the highest rating missing on DVD:

 

A Brighter Summer Day

The Mother and the ------

The Travelling Players

Celine and Julie Go Boating

 

Then there are all the movies that were on New Yorker DVD when that company went bankrupt.  Good to see that The Confession is now on DVD.

If you are okay with European dvd's I think you can get all of these quite easily.

I bought Travelling Players ant Mother ... in the BFI shop right off the shelf.

[HoldenIsHere]

BLUE DENIM

 

This movie has never been released on video.

I don't think it's ever aired on TCM either since there is no TCM article about it.

 

 

 

 

[slaytonf]

BLUE DENIM

 

This movie has never been released on video.

I don't think it's ever aired on TCM either since there is no TCM article about it.

 

 

That's a good indication is hasn't.

 

Like WSBAFG these are '60s Universals that have fallen into obscurity and seem to have been unaired for decades, along with:

 

The Bofors Gun -- great Nicol Williamson performance

 

Work Is A Four Letter Word

 

The Adding Machine

 

Angel In My Pocket -- Somebody requested this awhile back

 

I'll Never Forget What's'is Name -- the best Richard Lester movie Richard Lester never made

 

Banning -- the greatest golf movie in history, if that means anything

 

Don't Just Stand There -- has this been show anywhere in the past 25+ years? It seems to have utterly vanished -- not just from TV but also the public consciousness.

 

The Harper-imitation P.J. with George Peppard also has something of a following.

 

Some of these films have been uploaded to YouTube (and then quickly disappeared)

 

I had a chance to see Don't Just Stand There before it disappeared.  P. J. is wuthless, so it don't matter.  At least What a Way to Go! sticks around, so you can enjoy Shirley MacLaine, Paul Newman, Dean Martin, Dick Van Dyke, Robert Mitchum, and Gene Kelly.  

[mockingbird66]

Tobacco Road is listed on Amazon for region 2 only and on a bootleg site (I think). Other than that I can't seem to find it.

[zzfredzz]

I'd like to see these on DVD;

 

Tovarich (1937) Claudette Colbert, Charles Boyer
History Is Made At Night (1937) Charles Boyer, Jean Arthur
Love With The Proper Stranger (1963) Steve McQueen, Natalie Wood
Alias Nick Beal (1949)  Ray Milland, Thomas Mitchell
The Web (1937) Edmond O'Brien, Vincent Price
The Dark At The Top Of The Stairs (1960) Robert Preston, Dorothy McGuire
All The Way Home (1963) Robert Preston, Jean Simmons
Margie (1946) Jeanne Crain
Bolero (1934) George Raft, Carole Lombard
The Glass Key (1935) George Raft, Edward Arnold
Come Fill The Cup (1950) James Cagney
The Jokers (1967) Oliver Reed, Michael Crawford
The Mouthpiece (1932) Warren William
Something For Everyone (1970) Angela Lansbury, Michael York

[cigarjoe]

I check Amazon first, then Ebay for titles.

 

Before I had a region free DVD player I found a free program where you could open the DVD and change the settings, the aspect ratio, the Region coding, and the PAL to NTSC. It was pretty simple to do. 

 

Just do a search on your browser to find out how to do it.

 

 

[JonasEB]

Tobacco Road is listed on Amazon for region 2 only and on a bootleg site (I think). Other than that I can't seem to find it.

 

That is available in the U.S. but only as part of the gigantic Ford at Fox box set. It's one of a couple of exclusives that were not issued in the smaller themed sets ("Comedies," "Classics," "Silents," etc.)

 

Some biggies...

 

The Crowd, The Wind, Greed, etc. - The big silents Warner owns the rights to. I have a feeling at least one of these is due to be announced for the end of the year...at least I hope so, I dutifully bought The Big Parade and I want the others. Hopefully when they do Greed they place the focus on the genuine theatrical release and not the reconstruction; Greed was already one of the five best films of the 1920s, the film that impacted a good number of great filmmakers, and the reconstruction is more a paean to what could have been, not a whole film experience in itself. 

[skimpole]

I'd like to see these on DVD;

 

Tovarich (1937) Claudette Colbert, Charles Boyer

History Is Made At Night (1937) Charles Boyer, Jean Arthur

Love With The Proper Stranger (1963) Steve McQueen, Natalie Wood

Alias Nick Beal (1949)  Ray Milland, Thomas Mitchell

The Web (1937) Edmond O'Brien, Vincent Price

The Dark At The Top Of The Stairs (1960) Robert Preston, Dorothy McGuire

All The Way Home (1963) Robert Preston, Jean Simmons

Margie (1946) Jeanne Crain

Bolero (1934) George Raft, Carole Lombard

The Glass Key (1935) George Raft, Edward Arnold

Come Fill The Cup (1950) James Cagney

The Jokers (1967) Oliver Reed, Michael Crawford

The Mouthpiece (1932) Warren William

Something For Everyone (1970) Angela Lansbury, Michael York

I wonder if the rights issues that prevent History is Made at Night from being shown in Canada also prevent it from being on DVD.

[johnm001]

HOME SWEET HOMICIDE appears to have been destroyed by Fox.  Not only isn't it on DVD, but it never is shown, anywhere.