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Out of the Blue should also be released in the US and UK later this year. I think the producers have been pushing for a theatrical release from distributors prior to home video, hence why it has been continually delayed past the initial aim of the 40th anniversary last year.

Update: Secret Défense will have French subtitles only: https://store.potemkine.fr/dvd/35450200 ... t-defense/ and Haut bas fragile either none at all or Potemkine's product page has been badly maintained: https://store.potemkine.fr/dvd/35450200 ... s-fragile/

Not sure this is an update, per se – please correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t these the exact same product pages that were up when you posted a couple of weeks ago?

Update: I just received the Potemkine Blurays of Haut bas fragile and Secret Defense and may tell that they DO HAVE english subtitles (as well as some nice extras). The picture and sound quality is excellent. All in all, two splendid releases.

I definitely need to send a reminder to Potemkine if people are getting their copies before me getting my review discs !

Stefan -- Do you know whether other releases in this Rivette series have English subs?

Michael - No, the other two Rivette release by Potemkine so far, "Le Pont du Nord" and "Jeanne la Pucelle", only have French subs. The same goes for "Duelle", Noroit" and "Merry-Go-Round" by Carlotta.

The 3 movies released in France by Carlotta were released by Arrow in the UK and the US, so that's where you'll find English subs.

Looks like at present , the shipping cost to the USA is about equal to the cost of these 2 blurays...

Stefan wrote: Thu May 27, 2021 2:12 pm Update: I just received the Potemkine Blurays of Haut bas fragile and Secret Defense and may tell that they DO HAVE english subtitles (as well as some nice extras). The picture and sound quality is excellent. All in all, two splendid releases.

Great to know! These arrived in the mail today, but I haven't had time to look at them yet. I'm very gratified they included the English subs, and that the quality is good.

Divertimento was restored in 2017 by Hiventy:
https://www.hiventy.com/?portfolio=la-b ... lang=en017:
https://www.filmprojection21.org/a-35mm ... ertimento/
https://www.cinematheque.fr/article/975.html

Also:
https://aestheticsforbirds.com/2017/12/ ... s-rivette/

Keep in mind that I haven't rewatched the whole film, but I've just sampled the Secret Défense blu and it no longer features the "fade to black -> cut to next shot" at the end of each day, as well as one instance of "cut to black -> fade in" once Bonnaire's character knows (part of the) truth. The fade to black that precedes the last shot is no longer there neither.
Now I wonder about the Histoire de Marie et Julien restoration, a film that also has a fade to black at the end of each of the 13 days the film encompases.

dave1 wrote: Sun Jun 20, 2021 7:16 am Keep in mind that I haven't rewatched the whole film, but I've just sampled the Secret Défense blu and it no longer features the "fade to black -> cut to next shot" at the end of each day, as well as one instance of "cut to black -> fade in" once Bonnaire's character knows (part of the) truth. The fade to black that precedes the last shot is no longer there neither.
Now I wonder about the Histoire de Marie et Julien restoration, a film that also has a fade to black at the end of each of the 13 days the film encompases.

So what is there instead? Just straight cuts?

Yes, now they're all straight cuts.

Strange. I wonder why they did this?

...

Is it possible for dissolves to be added in some print-making stage, and that they didn't replicate them here because the elements they used did not have the dissolves? For example, if the dissolves were made for the IP but not in the OCN. It's not conventional to do dissolves that way, but if a scenario for that is possible and feasible (albeit unorthodox), I could see that being the reason.

My understanding is that dissolves can be made at a later editing stage and thus not present on the original OCN. As such, when doing a restoration from such an OCN, they have to be digitally recreated. See for instance what happened with Eraserhead (and probably Elephant Man).
However, my understanding is also that if there was supposed to be a dissolve, well there should be one in the restoration except if someone technically related to the movie expressly requested not to. As such, it should then be considered a mistake (eg again Eraserhead and its Criterion disc which had to be replaced).

If the final product released to the public had dissolves, it would seem that the final restoration product should have them as well. I find it rather shocking how careless "restorers" seem to have become.

I don't think they became careless but rather that it's overall easier to spread the info when a mistak is caught.

This is unfortunate, I think the dissolves add a lot to the lyrical rhythm of the film's mystification. Perhaps they'll be corrected on the inevitable Cohen disc?

My feeling is that the fades weren't in the OCN, since the movie's length now is the same. Having said that, I believe they were intended to be added afterwards, seeing how the film now ends with a weird jump cut.

@ Dave1
Your observation about the missing "fade outs" is splendid. I myself must have watched "Secret Defense" some 15 times since its release in 1998 (my goodness, how long ago that is) and did not notice that (all but negligible) detail on the Potemkin release. Shame on me, hats off to you.

Thank you, Stefan! But I only realized because the ending fade was missing. Then I checked back and others were missing too.
(I guess I was just alert after the India Song blu, but that's for another topic.)

There are issues on India Song's new BD outside the muffled soundtrack ?