End Of An Era

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Why is a Bluray upgrade of From Here to Eternity that was supervised by Sony's Grover Crisp in '09 still without a firm release date (sometime in early '12 is the best guess so far)? Why does Paramount refuse to even talk about producing a mint-condition Bluray of the breathtakingly beautiful Shane, one of the jewels in the Paramount crown? Why did it take personal pressuring by Steven Spielberg before Paramount honcho Brad Grey agreed to fund the full-boat restoration of the three Godfather films?

And why right now are there only three Hollywood-based, studio-berthed restoration guys who are serious Movie Catholics and plugging away at trying to bring out tip-top Bluays from the cream of their libraries -- Paramount's Ron Smith, 20th Century Fox's Schawn Belston and Sony's Crisp?

I'll tell you why. Because the classic-film Bluray market is withering and perhaps even drawing to a close. (I'm not saying "dead" because it thankfully hasn't come to that...yet.) High-def classics will return, I suspect, when and if high-speed digital download technology improves. But Bluray is almost certainly down for the count. This is nothing short of an earthquake-level development, and one worth pondering just before the start of Hollywood's TCM Classic Film Festival (4.28 through 5.1), which is probably the most important celebration of classic films going on right now in this country.

For the last 25 years or so the elite film-buff culture has had a relatively steady stream of classic films being restored, remastered and replicated out on the most advanced format of a given time -- laser discs from the late '80s to the late '90s, DVDs from '97 until three or four years ago, and Blurays ever since. But these days classic titles aren't selling like they used to (Warner Home Video's Gone With The Wind and Wizard of Oz Bluray restorations costs mllions and failed, I'm told, to turn a profit), and those in positions of power in the Bluray distribution business aren't about to risk their jobs by pushing for restored Bluray titles that might financially fizzle. And those who get occasional work from these same people are loath to say anything for fear of being blacklisted...omerta.

The result is that potential first-rate Bluray upgrades of many fine classic films are either being ignored or on hold, in large part because they cost too much to restore and/or remaster and market and distribute. Fewer and fewer classic titles are likely to appear until -- this is key -- digital home delivery becomes fast and fibre-optic enough that 1080p films can be downloaded in a short period of time, and then classic titles can be sold without heavy marketing, manufacturing and physical distribution costs.

But when and if this happens (five years from now? ten?) you can forget about savoring making-of docs and commentary tracks and in fact owning several of these films and holding them in your hands. Physical ownership of great films has been a fact of my life since the mid to late '80s and now it's coming to an end. That whole tradition is (for the time being at least) winding down, and speaking as a Movie Catholic and one who has savored high-end restorations and remasterings for 20 or 25 years I feel personally devastated and appalled.

As one post-production and restoration veteran says, "The situation's not so bad...a lot of these films are going to look great on an iPhone."

Don't kid yourself -- this is nothing short of a tragic development in terms of the soul and necessary spiritual replenishing of the film industry.

Why? Because the truly great Hollywood classics need to be remastered and represented to the public in the finest possible way in order to keep the faith going and the religion of film kept as a vital cause. I'm talking about maintaining a ritual that, in its own realm, is no less necessary or important than ministers and priests keeping alive the memory of a certain Judean wanderer and preacher through Holy Communion.

Those who believe in the transformative power of film need to pay tribute to the legacy of classic films and keep alive visions of the best that Hollywood has produced over the last several decades, and they need to support those who know how to restore and remaster classic films in order to remind everyone how good Hollywood films of the '20s, '30s, '40s, '50s and '60s used to look and sound in state-of-the-art first-run theatrical engagements...before they were downgraded by inferior home-video transfers.

And this needs to be done -- are you listening, Brad Grey? -- even if it doesn't bring in a sizable profit, or even if the endeavor merely breaks even. Because we're talking about religion here. Spiritual sustenance. The faith of it.

Obviously scores of classic films have been restored and remastered for Bluray over the last few years, and let's all breathe a sigh of relief for the expensive and time-consuming work that's been done (or is being done) on any number of big-studio properties, especially on the large-format films of the '50s and early '60s. Ron Smith's The Ten Commandments Bluray was terrific. Warner Home Video's forthcoming Ben-Hur Bluray will hopefully be a knockout. A Bluray of Lawrence of Arabia is coming out next year from Sony.

But truly choice titles are few and far between on the Bluray market, and many great films (particularly those shot on large-format processes in the '50s and early '60s) are yellowing and rotting on the vine, and many of those that are making it into the Bluray realm are being visually misrepresented -- i.e., made to look shiny and video-gamey.

One upside develpment, I'm told, is that a remastered, more celluloid-looking Bluray version of Franklin Schaffner's Patton (i.e., a 40th anniversay re-release) is coming out on May 10th. Certain large-screen Bluray connoisseurs felt that the earlier version was DNR'd (digital noise reduction'ed) to death and given overly smooth video-game textures. The "bad" Patton was created by HTV Illuminate, a San Fernando Valley-based company that could be called the ground zero of shiny Bluray makeovers.

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Posted by Jeffrey Wells on April 23, 2011 at 12:17 PM

comment #1

Rashad says ...

Are you sure it's a new Patton remastering? I thought I read it was the same transfer, but packaged as a digibook

Posted by Rashad at April 23, 2011 3:07 PM

comment #2

Edward says ...

I'm no fan of SHANE, but I'm with you on this Jeffrey. Seeing films as they weren't meant to be seen is important. Art, not just the art of cinema, is religion, it is one of the things that makes us human. Art gives us a glimpse of the divine, of eternity. Art classes should be a requirement at every level of education; whether it be film appreciation, art, sculpture, ceramics, quilting, writng. Art is as important as math and science.

Posted by Edward at April 23, 2011 3:35 PM

comment #3

Zach says ...

I wonder how effective advertising might be in generating more interest for these titles. You always see those commercials - "coming Tuesday on Blu-ray and DVD..." - for films fresh out of theaters, but where were the ads for the Gone With The Wind/Casablanca/The Godfather restorations?

Posted by Zach at April 23, 2011 3:59 PM

comment #4

erniesouchak says ...

I'm a "movie Catholic" but I never saw the point of Bluray except for maybe animated films. Not sure you can say Bluray has withered; I don't think it took off the way the industry thought it would, probably because a lot of consumers feel the way I do. My standard-def DVDs look great on my HDTV. I can wait for 1080p downloads. Bluray is just a pointless in-between. I think another reason you haven't seen a lot of classics on Bluray is that the format isn't kind to film grain, and classics are nothing without film grain.

Posted by erniesouchak at April 23, 2011 4:19 PM

comment #5

Joe Leydon says ...

Maybe folks (like me) who have bought Beta, VHS, videodisc and DVD editions of the same classic film now feel a bit wary of investing in yet another edition?

Posted by Joe Leydon at April 23, 2011 4:23 PM

comment #6

Jeffrey Wells says ...

Wells to Erniesouchak: I don't know what to tell you except once you've been to Paree, you can't go back to the farm. Bluray and a 50" plasma is most definitely Paree right now.

Wells to Leydon: What are you saying...? Stop kvetching, buy a 50" LED and a Bluray player, and get with the program. Technology will never stop changing & evolving.

Posted by Jeffrey Wells at April 23, 2011 4:50 PM

comment #7

Rashad says ...

Blu ray is the end all be all to me. I dont see quality getting better than it, and if it does, it will be only negligible. Give me a blu ray over a stream any day of the week.

Posted by Rashad at April 23, 2011 4:56 PM

comment #8

Joe Leydon says ...

But the changes may not be for the better. I have the Blu Ray player, I have the big-screen TV -- but why should I buy a Blu Ray of All the President's Men when the DVD looks good?

Posted by Joe Leydon at April 23, 2011 5:00 PM

comment #9

The Thing says ...

You stated the problem right in your post - they're expensive and don't guarantee a profit. As nice as it would be to see these remastered classics in glorious 1080p on a 50" LED display with 7.1 surround sound, it's just too expensive of a process to do, and, as you also said, it doesn't always satisfy. It's better to just wait until digital downloads become a move viable option. By that point, your TV will also be your home computer, and you'll download your 1080p version of Shane on a stable, high speed Wi Fi connection, right to your TV, all without a hassle.

Studios already are trying to figure out ways to keep the money flowing in like it used to; they can't afford to be dumping millions of dollars into a project just so a few thousand Movie Catholics can jerk off to it. It's not a good business model to take. When art is commercialized, some things will be lost. And in this case, it's a better-looking version of an amazing film. It's unfortunate, but tough shit. These studios need to make money, and that's that.

Posted by The Thing at April 23, 2011 5:11 PM

comment #10

Robert Cashill says ...

Blu-rays are the laserdiscs of DVD--fantastic (and they are) but niche. A further issue is that few new supplements are created; they're just ported right over from the existing DVDs (and sometimes in part, rather than in full, or, frustratingly, with the actual DVD enclosed) so it's like paying full price for half a package if you own the prior standard-def version.

Still I'm glad I got into it, as I did with LDs. I still own about 150 of those and have a working player. And I like buying titles like A MAN ESCAPED that may never show up here in versions as good as Gaumont's, which is a region-free Blu.

Posted by Robert Cashill at April 23, 2011 5:56 PM

comment #11

Robert Cashill says ...

That said, while BDs of classics already on DVD are welcome, the real action for Movie Catholics is in the Manufactured-on-Demand discs put out by Warner, Sony, Fox/MGM and Universal, which on a weekly basis are bringing to light quirky, unsung, or somehow overlooked films that never made it onto VHS, much less DVD.

Posted by Robert Cashill at April 23, 2011 7:38 PM

comment #12

Jeff and/or Danny Is Always Wrong says ...

Why did it take personal pressuring by Steven Spielberg before Paramount honcho Brad Grey agreed to fund the full-boat restoration of the three Godfather films?

Wait, I thought Spielberg was the bad guy?

Are we at war with Eurasia again? Why am I always the last to know??

Posted by Jeff and/or Danny Is Always Wrong at April 23, 2011 9:21 PM

comment #13

LexG says ...

A very legit question I ALWAYS have on the subject of transfers and classic movies. Jeff says:

"...they need to support those who know how to restore and remaster classic films in order to remind everyone how good Hollywood films of the '20s, '30s, '40s, '50s and '60s used to look and sound in state-of-the-art first-run theatrical engagements..."

Okay, but DID the movies ever look like this? If you saw DIRTY HARRY or ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN or ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 on *opening day* back in the '70s... wouldn't it have been grainy and scratched to shit and wan colors? Even in the BEST theaters in New York and L.A., did '60s, 70s, even 80s movies have that pristine digital projection AMC-Arclight look?

Granted I was a kid in the sticks and not on the coasts, but my foggy memory of seeing stuff like JAWS 2 and EMPIRE STRIKES BACK and GREMLINS and MOONRAKER back as a kid, was that they looked about two steps above Movie Day in class on an old projector. When Jeff or some DVD site critic says, "Klute looks as crisp on this disc as it must have on opening day in 1971," I always think, "BullSHIT, it was probably in muddy color and warbly sound and grainier than a home movie on opening day in 1971."

So were there EVER really "state of the art" theaters going back into the 50s, 40s, 30s that had these pristine, scratchless, grain-less sheened presentations of these movies? Isn't the collective memory of "older" and "classic" movies essentially born of seeing them on the late show or in revival houses where they looked like shit?

Man, I was SO used to seeing things like Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Halloween and French Connection and Dirty Harry IN terrible colors and muddy transfers and panned-and-scanned for decades, they almost looked "too good" even on DVD, it took some of the enjoyable disrepute out of the film.

But that's off on a tangent... I basically just wanna know if movies even DID look "good" in theaters prior to say the early to mid 90s. I always just remember dim presentations and scratches. Nothing EVER looked like DVD on opening day way back when.

Posted by LexG at April 23, 2011 9:54 PM

comment #14

cyanic says ...

Blu ray is the end all be all to me. I dont see quality getting better than it, and if it does, it will be only negligible.

Bullshit -- 2k, 4k and beyond, but it may not mean much if a colorist's job is to make every cartoon like.

Posted by cyanic at April 23, 2011 10:17 PM

comment #15

cyanic says ...

*to make everything cartoon like.

Posted by cyanic at April 23, 2011 10:17 PM

comment #16

Jeffrey Wells says ...

Wells to LexG: If there was any way for exhibitors in the ' 60s, '70s and '80s to make a film look worse than it should have, they managed to do this. Exhibitors post-1948-consent-decree were the worst, lowest, most cheap-minded link in the chain,and they definitely showed scratchy, under-lighted, shitty-looking prints in non-first-run theatres, and may they roast in hell on a turning spit for all eternity as a portion of their deserved punishment.

But in serious first-run houses in big cities, new films looked & sounded decent or better-than-decent, and virgin prints sure as shit looked somewhat better in screening rooms. Then again this is what I love about perfectly mastered, mint-condition Blurays -- they might look and sound BETTER than what their directors, producers and distributors saw in elite screening rooms back in the day.

Posted by Jeffrey Wells at April 23, 2011 10:35 PM

comment #17

Dan Revill says ...

Honestly, I don't feel the need to upgrade my entire DVD collection to Blu-ray, but there are some titles that I have definitely double dipped on but many others that I bought for the first time (Taxi Driver and The Exorcist for example).

I do agree that not every film needs to be owned or watched on blu-ray. I love the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre, but I wonder if my blu-ray version is really the be all, end all. Somehow I think a crappy video transfer is how that particular movie should always be seen...but that's just me.

Posted by Dan Revill at April 23, 2011 11:58 PM

comment #18

Rashad says ...

"Bullshit -- 2k, 4k and beyond,"

And if you saw it on the same tvs it wouldn't be that big of a difference. I have no need to see beyond the resolution blu ray on a tv or laptop.

Posted by Rashad at April 24, 2011 12:07 AM

comment #19

Bob Violence says ...

Bullshit -- 2k, 4k and beyond

the difference between BD and 2K is negligible (1920x1080 vs. 2048x1080)

Posted by Bob Violence at April 24, 2011 12:26 AM

comment #20

bluefugue says ...

>If you saw DIRTY HARRY or ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN or ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 on *opening day* back in the '70s... wouldn't it have been grainy and scratched to shit and wan colors?

Why would a new print be "scratched to shit"?

You seem, like so many, to fall into the fallacy of assuming everyone in the past was incompetent at everything and that all old technology was crude and shitty. Dirty Harry was the product of some 90 years' constant refinement of a sophisticated analogue technology. Prints didn't last (particularly if they were one-strip color from that era), but they didn't start out looking like crap.

Agree with Wells @ ernie. Film grain doesn't invalidate Blu Ray. 35mm is much better resolution than standard def DVD, and always has been. Tasteful cleanup of older prints matters, but look at a Blu of "Sweet Smell of Success" or "Wizard of Oz" and tell me with a straight face "only animated films" should get the treatment.

Lawrence on DVD is an absurdity; can't wait for the Blu of that. Kane, too, will be a day 1 purchase.

Posted by bluefugue at April 24, 2011 1:10 AM

comment #21

Kakihara says ...

Kind of surprised they're not doing a "download to own" for movies on Blu-Ray.

Posted by Kakihara at April 24, 2011 2:28 AM

comment #22

wildphantom says ...

People are always going to demand physical media. Bluray is going to be around for a long, long time, it was never going to explode like DVD did. Digital Bits wrote a great piece about this last week. Bluray is doing just fine.

If anything, restoring classic films is no more likely to make more bank than releasing them on bluray? I don't see what you mean here? I'd say the lack of drive in getting these classics restored says more about the studios, than it does about the bluray format.

Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't the new Harry Potter sell 46% of its first week's mammoth total on bluray? Really struggling format I think not.

Posted by wildphantom at April 24, 2011 3:33 AM

comment #23

wildphantom says ...

"If anything, restoring classic films is no more likely to make more bank than releasing them on bluray"

That sentence should have included putting them out on download. No more likely to be more successful on download than on physical media.

Posted by wildphantom at April 24, 2011 3:36 AM

comment #24

Chase Kahn says ...

Tron: Legacy just shattered the Blu-ray market share record with 68% on it's first week. New releases are consistently $24.99 or cheaper at large retailers...

Classic films may be falling on their face (which is sad), but Blu-ray as a whole is just fine for right now.

And TCM's HD channel is loads better than the SD was. I know they technically don't broadcast "true HD" (it looks more like an upscaled 480), but watching stuff in CinemaScope looks fantastic - certainly better than a DVD would - and it's now properly formatted to your screen rather than having to stretch it out to fit your 56" TV like I used to.

Watched Fire Down Below ('57) the other day and I was really taken aback by how good it looked.

Posted by Chase Kahn at April 24, 2011 6:04 AM

comment #25

djiggs says ...

One of the best columns that you have ever written, Mr. Wells. In going with the Easter theme, this column should be a film believer's Nicene Creed about the higher calling of films. Just awesome.

Posted by djiggs at April 24, 2011 6:49 AM

comment #26

TimDG says ...

The Digital Bits is a bunch of Sony stooges. I'll make a prediction: Within 3 years Sony will release a new line of Super Blu-Ray discs, with a price point 20% higher than regular Blu-Ray, and The Digital Bits will dutifully hype it, because if people have only seen Hollow Man and Charlie's Angels on regular Blu-Ray, why, they just haven't seen those films the way they were meant to be seen.

Posted by TimDG at April 24, 2011 9:20 AM

comment #27

Kakihara says ...

wildphantom: Digital Bits is totally wrong on Blu-Ray, though, and actually tried to suggest it's doing better than it is while acknowledging the penetration of streaming media.

"Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't the new Harry Potter sell 46% of its first week's mammoth total on bluray? Really struggling format I think not. "

Given the popularity of the franchise and where DVD was five years into its release, that's actually kind of small.

TimDG: They've had a feud with the ZDNet guys who actually tell it like it is about the viability of the format.

Posted by Kakihara at April 24, 2011 2:52 PM

comment #28

Mr. Palmer says ...

So, I guess there ain't gonna be a MCCABE & MRS. MILLER getting on BD anytime soon? Fanfrickintastic.

Posted by Mr. Palmer at April 24, 2011 5:27 PM

comment #29

JLC says ...

Digital Bits are Sony stooges in part because without physical media, Digital Bits has little or no reason to exist.

I'm a little late to the party, but I would observe that WHV didn't do itself any favors with the GWTW and Wizard of Oz Blurays by only releasing them in super-expensive collectors' editions, at least at first.

It sounds trite, but Bluray is evolutionary, while DVD was revolutionary. Why would someone pony up $75 for the Wizard Bluray, when the regular DVD goes for less than $10? The format war, and the lack of a truly revolutionary next step, insured that Bluray would never be anything but a niche format. They need to tailor their business plan accordingly.

Posted by JLC at April 25, 2011 6:17 AM

comment #30

Krillian says ...

Who would have guessed the typewriter would outlast VHS?

Posted by Krillian at April 25, 2011 4:42 PM

comment #31

chad_pole says ...

Robert Cashill --

Cute comments and all, but do you even follow the sales? 46% of all sales of Harry Potter 7 were for blu-ray - that's almost a 1 to 1 ratio do DVD. Blu-ray numbers for TRON; Legacy were 68% of the total market share - if you can't do math, that's over 2/3 of total sales.

So in no way is blu-ray a "niche." But you're welcome to keep dreaming.

Posted by chad_pole at April 27, 2011 12:34 PM

comment #32

Bob Violence says ...

Digital Bits is reporting that the May Patton anniversary edition is the same disc as before, the remaster is coming later this year -- dick move on Fox's part if true

Posted by Bob Violence at April 28, 2011 5:14 AM

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comment #34

Dieta Para Adelgazar says ...

So, I guess there ain't gonna be a MCCABE & MRS. MILLER getting on BD anytime soon? Fanfrickintastic.

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