“The Immortal Story” on DVD

Discuss Welles's other European films.
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Jeff Wilson
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Postby Jeff Wilson » Sat May 24, 2003 1:00 am

I finally received my copy of THE IMMORTAL STORY DVD from Italy, and it's a stunner, compared to the bootlegs I have. The forced Italian subtitles on the English and French versions (a licensing issue, I assume) are a bit annoying, but the jump in picture quality is so dramatic that it's a small price to pay.

As fantomas noted, the disc has three different versions of the film, each in a different language. The disc includes a short feature wherein you can see the differences in selected scenes, with all three pictures onscreen at once, which makes it a bit hard to follow, but interesting nonetheless. What I found interesting in looking at my bootleg versions is that there also appear to be two different English versions; the opening sequence is different between the bootleg I have and the version on this disc, with dialogue cut from the conversation with Fernando Rey and his pals. I haven't watched the rest of the new DVD yet, but I'll cover any other discrepancies when I review the disc on the site. See below for comparisons between by bootleg copy and the new disc. You'll note that the new disc is anamorphically enhanced widescreen.

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Peter Tonguette
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Postby Peter Tonguette » Sat May 24, 2003 1:09 am

Jeff,

Wow! Thanks for posting these screencaps. I think my eye must have adjusted to the poor quality of the bootleg after all these years. Stunning.

Time to get that region free player...

Peter

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Lance Morrison
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Postby Lance Morrison » Sat Aug 30, 2003 4:22 pm

Well I just got a bootleg VHS, and while the video quality was of course awful, I loved the movie very much. Yet even though the picture wasnt very clear, I loved the bizarre colours that this poor copy had, I mean there were such oranges and yellows...Jeff, do you have any other screencaps so I could see what the colours of other scenes look like? Because if they are too different from the copy I have, then I cant watch it anymore or else I'll get too attached to the colours :)

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Lance Morrison
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Postby Lance Morrison » Fri Sep 05, 2003 1:28 am

sorry Jeff, I hadnt realized that you had a more detailed review of the Immortal Story under the news, but that basically shows how many of the other scenes look, which is what I was wanting! Curious why it is in widescreen though! I guess I might have to keep saving up for a multiregion player...

I've been reading Blixen's stories, and it is so understandable why he adored her work

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Sir Bygber Brown
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Postby Sir Bygber Brown » Sun Jan 25, 2004 11:12 pm

Hi

Guess what? I've just been to Italy on vacation, and it was a great opportunity to ask around about Orson Welles. I asked in every DVD store i could find (which was few in total - the DVD capital of Italy is Rome i found), and every time they said Immortal Story wasn't availble on DVD in Italy! They told me there used to be a VHS sold in england and that's it! Bastards!

Now i've come home and looked on the dvd.it website again, and tried to order it, and they're telling me its gonna cost me 42 Euros to ship it to Australia (plus the 14 euros the dvd costs)! Can you believe this? Its a scandal!

Can someone urgently tell me if there's anywhere else that sells it online? Is there a particular online auction house it has been known to appear in? Help - fan in need! fan in need!
You may remember me from such sites as imdb, amazon and criterionforum as Ben Cheshire.

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Postby colwood » Mon Jan 26, 2004 12:32 am

Check out dvd.it or dvdland.it. You could also google search it. Haven't seen it on Ebay before except for the one copy I auctioned off back in November.

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Jeff Wilson
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Postby Jeff Wilson » Mon Jan 26, 2004 12:49 am

You can try dvdland.it, which is where I got my copy from. It took them a while, but it was fairly cheap, and if I'm reading their shipping info correctly, it appears that shipping to everywhere outside Europe is 5 euros for one disc.



Edited By Jeff Wilson on Jan. 26 2004 at 02:10

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Sir Bygber Brown
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Postby Sir Bygber Brown » Mon Jan 26, 2004 1:00 am

Thanks, Jeff. I will follow your advice. Much appreciated. About how long is a while?
You may remember me from such sites as imdb, amazon and criterionforum as Ben Cheshire.

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Jeff Wilson
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Postby Jeff Wilson » Mon Jan 26, 2004 2:11 am

It was about six weeks from ordering to receiving it, although part of that was before the disc was released.

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Sir Bygber Brown
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Postby Sir Bygber Brown » Mon Jan 26, 2004 6:22 am

How annoying. I can't order it till 12th Feb on dvdland.it! Out of stock till the 12th. But i want to see it NOW!
You may remember me from such sites as imdb, amazon and criterionforum as Ben Cheshire.

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Postby DexyMan » Mon Jan 26, 2004 8:06 pm

My copy of the Italian DVD has a bit of a synching problem with the diaglogue and I'm wondering if (like a couple other Welles films) this is just the way it was made. If it isn't then are all of the DVDs this way or did I get a bad copy?

Thanks alot for any info.

Jeffrey

Flint
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Postby Flint » Fri Jan 30, 2004 6:10 pm

For those interested-
FilmThreat.com just posted an article about the state of "Immortal Story" on video. Nothing there that we've not heard before, but great that they're covering an obscure Welles piece none-the-less.

-Flint.

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Postby colwood » Sat Jan 31, 2004 1:51 am

Flint, thanks for the link. Great article.

When I first got my dvd, I noticed right away that the voices were out of sync. Being a Welles film, I thought that this was the way it was released and, it seems now, the article Flint mentions verifies this.

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Le Chiffre
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Postby Le Chiffre » Sat Jan 31, 2004 1:30 pm

It is a good article, but there actually is something in it that I had never heard before, and that I think is incorrect: that Welles himself dubbed the voice of Levinsky for the English language version. I watched a few minutes of it last night after reading the article, and Levinsky's voice did not sound like Welles. Not even Welles doing an accent.

The fact that the film has never been given an American video release may have something to do with Beatrice, who may think she owns the film, or at least the American distribution rights. It would be nice to see the dubbing corrected, which is apparently what they're trying to do for CHIMES right now.

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R Kadin
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Postby R Kadin » Wed Apr 21, 2004 10:35 am

I just received and viewed my copy yesterday, after several weeks' wait. I think I'll hold my overall opinion until taking it in a few more times; however I'm sure that such patience will do nothing to change my mind with respect to the lighting of the interiors. With few exceptions, it was so unworthy. Hotspots and backlight halos, closed rooms that were uniformly and brightly illuminated. What happened?


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