1337 The Right Stuff

[domino harvey]

An awe-inspiring salute to human achievement and the wonder of the unknown, this monumental account of the space race celebrates the pioneering pilots who took mankind beyond the bounds of Earth. From the quest that test pilot Chuck Yeager (Sam Shepard) undertakes to break the sound barrier to the epochal voyages of the seven Mercury astronauts, including Alan Shepard (Scott Glenn) and John Glenn (Ed Harris), The Right Stuff vividly details the triumphs, setbacks, and clashes of personality in America’s burgeoning space program. Fusing astonishing practical effects with NASA archival footage to yield images of cosmic majesty, director Philip Kaufman reveals the combination of courage, competition, and fallibility behind America’s launch into orbit.

DIRECTOR-APPROVED 4K UHD SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES
New 4K digital restoration, supervised and approved by director of photography Caleb Deschanel, with 70 mm 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack
Alternate 2.0 surround and 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks
One 4K UHD disc of the film presented in Dolby Vision HDR and one Blu-ray with the special features
Archival interview excerpts with director Philip Kaufman from the Academy Film Archive’s Visual History program
New programs on the film’s visual effects, sound design, and editing
Archival programs Realizing “The Right Stuff,” T-20 Years and Counting, and The Real Men with “The Right Stuff”
Selected-scene commentaries featuring Kaufman and members of the cast and crew
Deleted scenes
Trailer
English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
PLUS: An essay by critic Michael Sragow

New cover by Gregory Manchess

[tolbs1010]

In the Collection where it belongs. Kaufman’s best and one of the best of the 80’s. Maybe a sign that Unbearable upgrade is next?

[ryannichols7]

In the Collection where it belongs. Kaufman’s best and one of the best of the 80’s. Maybe a sign that Unbearable upgrade is next?

trying not to rain on anyone excited by this announcement (not seen here so far, but I trust the Warner Archive facebook group is going nuts) but yeah, I'm very excited about Unbearable hopefully coming, I've asked for it many times on here!

[jwd5275]

Apparently there are a number of NASA inside jokes in this film. My wife's family has NASA people on both sides including my father in law. She talks about watching this with him several times, and remarks how he always will bust out laughing in the most seemly random places because it was something specifically tailored for people on the inside of NASA

[Beloved Aunt]

No Annette Insdorf or Tom Charity on this release...oh well.

[flyonthewall2983]

This makes the third film in the collection (I know of anyway) that uses Debussy’s “Claire de Lune”. The Game and The Darjeeling Limited uses them rather briefly but is featured more in that great scene at the end when the guys are watching the dancer, crosscutting with Yeager breaking the sound barrier.

Still I think I prefer how Wes Anderson used it when Owen Wilson’s character declares to his brothers that they should get high.

[domino harvey]

Here’s an article on its use in films, including those and here’s a Letterboxd list of films it’s been featured in (with And the Ship Sailed On being the only other title from Criterion to use it, unless I missed one)

[hearthesilence]

FWIW, I had the original DVD for a while, and it was probably one of the best packages ever put together by a major studio in terms of extras. Pamela Reed's recollections in particular were wonderful, and they even got Levon Helm to narrate one of the features. I'm sure the new features will be nice, but in a lot of ways most of the work was already done for them. A feature-length commentary might've been an improvement, but in light of the interviews already done, it's hard to imagine bringing in the same people and coming up with something that wasn't repetitive and stretched out.

[beamish14]

FWIW, I had the original DVD for a while, and it was probably one of the best packages ever put together by a major studio in terms of extras. Pamela Reed's recollections in particular were wonderful, and they even got Levon Helm to narrate one of the features. I'm sure the new features will be nice, but in a lot of ways most of the work was already done for them. A feature-length commentary might've been an improvement, but in light of the interviews already done, it's hard to imagine bringing in the same people and coming up with something that wasn't repetitive and stretched out.

It would’ve been nice to have an appreciation of Tom Wolfe and a new commentary

[domino harvey]

This is an incredible film but thankfully I still have my OOP WB Blu-ray as I’m not seeing much to entice me to upgrade. Still, if you haven’t seen this, you might be surprised at how cynical and unreverential it is of the subject matter

[Lowry_Sam]

I'm very excited about Unbearable hopefully coming, I've asked for it many times on here!

BAMPFA just screened their own 35mm print of Unbearable Lightness Of Being last week. The conversation with the post-production film & sound editors was quite informative (and was recorded). I hadn't noticed how effective the editing (particularly the sound) was when I first saw it in an arthouse theater upon release, but this time around it was quite noticeable. I also hadn't noticed how skillfully the archival footage is worked into the film. I was more impressed with it the second time around to the point of now preferring it over Henry & June (my former favorite Kaufman), but I'm embarassed to say I have yet to see this one but will be glad to first pick it up on UHD.

[hearthesilence]

This may sound like a strange comparison, but some years ago I was talking to someone about the Mickey Mantle/Roger Maris movie Billy Crystal made, and as a baseball fan they loved it, but for me (as someone who used to love baseball more than anything else), I was underwhelmed, partly because I thought it was a missed opportunity. I always thought there was a lot of rich material to mine out of that story if you wanted to make THE ultimate baseball movie, specifically baseball's place in the culture (at least at that time in history) and what that could say about the country. I brought up The Right Stuff for comparison because it looks at American mythology in terms of what we see in our cultural heroes and why, and how that's tied into how our heroes are created (which can be the source of great cynicism). I always thought Kaufman had a nice balance examining those elements without being didactic about it, it just reveals itself in the film's story about how the space program comes together.

EDIT: It probably occurred to me back then too, but both stories more or less take place during the Kennedy era/Camelot, which says a lot as well. In the case of the Yankees' real-life story, you even have figures like Marilyn Monroe popping up (she attended spring training in 1961, right before the famous home run chase season), and just having these photogenic, mythical icons somewhere in this story would give a writer or director more promising material to work with.

[LastMinit]

My top performance in it has gotta be John P. Ryan as the program's PR guy. Maybe the most vilified character, but he cracks me up.

[The Curious Sofa]

In a film full of outstanding performances, Veronica Cartwright's portrayal of the disillusioned Betty Grissom is the one that has stayed with me the most. The scene in which she vents her anger at being put up in a cheap motel should have earned her an instant Oscar nomination. The film is certainly one of the top ten greatest American movies of the '80s for me.