New TOUCH OF EVIL DVD set?

[Alan Brody]

Hey Tony, I changed my mind on that bet. If I don't buy it you'll have to buy it for me!
Seriously, the extras do sound tempting, but I think I can wait to see if cheaper used copies become available on Amazon.

[Tony]

But you WILL get it, right? Every Wellesian MUST have the 3 TOEs on DVD plus Rosenbaum, Naremore et. al. commenting, plus Heston and Leigh plus....all this for less than 20 bucks on Amazon!

C'mon, if you don't, you'll be eaten alive by remorse!! (and our resident 'security" Wellesians, Todd and Glenn, will, shall we say, pay a little visit to your home and make you an offer you can't refuse.)

[tonyw]

Although I have the last version and the British documentary, I am obligated to acquire this new version.

[ToddBaesen]

Side stepping the issue of the correct aspect ratio, I know that I have not seen the original TOUCH OF EVIL cut - the 93min. theatrical version - for at least 30 years!

So I'll second Tony's point...

How could anyone who likes TOUCH OF EVIL resist buying the film, with all those extras, for less than $20.00!

[Alan Brody]

Yes, that is a very good price. Isn't it curious though, that they are selling such a fabulously loaded set for less then $20? Could that possibly have something to do with some expected backlash over the AR issue?

Speaking of Tony's "offer you can't refuse", weren't the Godfather movies shot full frame too? And orginally realeased on video that way?

[mido505]

Godfather was shot full-frame but composed for 1.85:1. Cinematographer Gordon Willis was mindful of future television showings, so the full frame compositions do not contain intrusive elements like microphones, lighting equipment, etc. Godfather was presented full frame on television and on videotape (the widescreen version was available on tape too, and evidently both were available on LD at some point). DVD versions are 1.85:1. Information and screen grabs here: http://www.thegodfathertrilogy.com/widescreen.html

[Alan Brody]

Thanks Mido. Sounds like a very similar case to Touch of Evil, and it looks to me from those screen caps that The Godfather is better full frame too. I'm even starting to wonder about The Trial and Chimes at Midnight.

[mido505]

You know, I am coming around on this one a bit. The longer "preview" cut of TOE was never given an official theatrical release. That version, which was the one most frequently seen before the "restoration", was usually viewed full screen, whether on video, on tv, or at revival screenings. So it makes sense to put the "preview" version out at 1.33:1, which is the aspect ratio of that particular cut almost all of us are familiar with, while matting the "theatrical" version and the "restoration" at 1.85:1. That for me would make an almost perfect DVD. Any takers?

[Roger Ryan]

I'd certainly go for the "preview" cut being in 1.33:1 ratio just to keep it different from the "reconstructed" version which it closely resembles (both have nearly 20 minutes of additional footage over the theatrical release). Of course, we're too late for that now as all three versions in the set will apparently be 1.78:1 anamorphic.

I'm curious where the New York Times writer got the info that the "preview" cut was the version shown in the Brussels competition; I had always assumed it was the 93 min. cut. Did I miss something or is this a newly-uncovered factoid? Or, perhaps, the Times article is simply wrong?

[mido505]

Roger, I think the Times guy has his facts wrong.

The 108 minute "preview" version of Touch of Evil was shown once, at the Pacific Palisades, in late January 1958. The truncated 93 minute "studio" version was released in the U.S. on 23 April 1958; in France on 8 June 1958; and in Germany on 5 September 1958. The 1958 Brussels World Fair ran from April 17 to October 19; the Third International Brussels Film Festival, part of the larger World Fair, ran from May 30 to June 14. Godard and Truffault were on the jury.

According to Jonathan Rosenbaum, Welles described the cuts to his film to Charles Bitsch and Andre Bazin in Cahiers du Cinema no. 87 soon after the Brussels screening. In that interview Bazin specifically expresses confusion at Quinlan's "Pete, that's the second bullet I've taken for you" line; the 93 minute version does not contain the Keller shot scene where Menzies explains to Susan Vargas that Quinlan had once stopped a bullet meant for him. This would indicate that the shorter version was shown at Brussels. Had Godard and Truffault seen a different, longer version at Brussels, Bazin surely would have known about it.

[ToddBaesen]

I don't know who STEPHANIE ZACHAREK is, who wrote the preview DVD article, but based on the N.Y. Times recent history, she should be FIRED immediately, before she makes up the kind of facts that will really embarrass the fading newspaper.

To my mind, it's a sad day when anyone on Wellesnet can question a piece in the New York Times, as so badly FLAWED and INCORRECT!

After all, these are people who are being paid for their shoddy work! But we know more about the facts then they do! It reminds me of the N.Y. Times reports by Charles Higham, that asinine writer who actually made up stories about THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND that were printed as "factual" in the New York Times!

My God, are there actually any editors or fact checkers left at the N.Y. TIMES? I guess not. Due to budget cutbacks, they must be getting their info these days from Wikepedia!

In any case, I'd say they should fire this fuck-up of a writer, STEPHANIE ZACHAREK. Can't she even read a simple press release from Universal Studios?

[Glenn Anders]

Todd: Stephanie Zacharek is the Senior and Lead Movie Reviewer for Salon.com, and as such is supposed to represent the hip, latest attitudes toward movies, especially from a feminist point of view. I read her work quite often, and try to avoid a more and more popular pastime of reviewing reviewers, but she often gets roasted for her opinions. For instance, probably a majority of 115 respondents to her review of BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN would share your opinion:

http://dir.salon.com/story/ent/movies/r ... index.html

Glenn

[mido505]

I can't stand Stephanie Zacharek as a movie critic; she is one of the reasons I stopped reading Salon. A Paulette of the worst sort; with her, convoluted metaphors, pompous ideological rhetoric, and a patently false "sensuous" response to the medium take the place of any serious, insightful analysis of the film. She writes term papers (undergraduate level), not movie reviews. If she could manage to put down the Noam Chomsky Reader and her dog-eared copy of The Second Sex long enough to read a film history or two, she might be a better critic. Once again, The New York Times should be ashamed.

[ToddBaesen]

Just saw the new movie RIGHTEOUS KILL, a police thriller, with just a touch of Orson's EVIL in it.

The pairing of Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino as longtime police detectives would seem very promising, but proves to be a real non-starter, due to the terrible script. They are old veterans of the NYPD who aren't above "framing" their suspects.

Now, that's not exactly a new concept, is it? Nor is the idea of one of them taking a bullet for the other in the line of duty. This is not really giving anything away, as you find this out in the first scenes in the movie, but then there are supposed to be all these big twists and turns in the plot (which I won't give away), except they are all extremely contrived, and really don't work. It seemed to me to be a real by the numbers re-hash of what Welles and Hitchcock had both done far better in their prime years of 1958 to 1962.

There's even a "homage" to Hitchcock, featuring a ridiculous attack by a "Surprise" assailant in a shower... thankfully, the water isn't running, but the female victim still manages to pull down the shower curtain, just like Janet Leigh did... it even seems like editor Paul Hirsch copied the cuts from PSYCHO... which he probably did, as he worked as Brian DePalma's editor, but at least when they were "borrowing" from Hitchcock in SISTERS, they had a brilliant new score by Bernard Herrmann to mask the similarities. Here there's just extremely bad camerawork!

[mido505]

Todd:

De Niro and Pacino were recently pilloried in the L.A. Times for the wretched quality of their recent work, blaming their choices of bad parts in worse films on vanity and greed. The impetus for the article was the release of Pacino's last stinker, 88 Minutes, a horrendous embarassment produced and directed by the same bargain basement team that has now given us Righteous Kill. Here is the link, it makes for instructive reading: http://articles.latimes.com/2008/apr/22 ... oldstein22

De Niro was also the subject of a scathing email by an anonymous CAA agent that was sent all over town when De Niro ended his relationship with that agency. Here is the link: http://weblogs.variety.com/thompsononho ... its-f.html

Question for you, Todd - is Righteous Kill in the "so bad it's good" category, or should I skip it altogether?

Question for the members of Wellesnet: Orson Welles acted in a lot of tripe for the money, but poured the funds back into the work that he cared about. Actors like Pacino and De Niro, already loaded, act in a lot of tripe for the money and put the money into restaurants and hotels, instead of funding interesting, low budget work. Why is Orson still considered by most of the public to have been a self-destructive failure, who produced one great film and then became a dissipated international joke, while these guys are lauded?