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Ribs wrote:BR.com's forums say Cohen confirmed that a UK label will be doing versions of Howard's End that fix some of the problems on that release - question becomes whether or not it's Arrow or MoC, right?

It will be the BFI.
And it seems the Cohen replacement discs with the proper AR suffers from an incorrect color range encode...

kcota17 wrote:The Cameraman and Spite Marriage?

Right, I believe the article should have specified that Cohen owns all but two of Keaton's silent films which would be the ones quoted above. These two were produced through MGM and are now owned by Turner/Warner Brothers (although a licensing to Criterion seems likely). I don't know if Cohen has acquired any of Keaton's sound films, most of which were produced through MGM, Columbia, and the poverty-row Educational Pictures, with the occasional outlier like the French-produced Le Roi des Champs-Élysées, but I doubt it. That said, the company could certainly license clips from the later work to flesh out the documentary.

tenia wrote:

Ribs wrote:BR.com's forums say Cohen confirmed that a UK label will be doing versions of Howard's End that fix some of the problems on that release - question becomes whether or not it's Arrow or MoC, right?

It will be the BFI.
And it seems the Cohen replacement discs with the proper AR suffers from an incorrect color range encode...

what do you mean exactly?
By the way, looking at the initial screenshots I wasn't very happy with the general encoding either.
I hope BFI does it better.

Maurice coming in September

domino harvey wrote:Maurice coming in September

2 things for me:
1) hope it includes deleted scenes (although i fear it won't since Criterion released them)
2) i assume they will be careful about the AR, so I hope it has a better encoding than Howards End which wasn't anywhere near the high standards of other blurays

Specs for Maurice have been announced:

• NEW 4K restoration of the film
  NEW on-stage Q&A session with James Ivory and cinematographer Piere Lhomme
  NEW conversation between James Ivory and director Tom McCarthy
  James Ivory and cinematographer Piere Lhomme on the making of Maurice
  The Story of Maurice (this is the same documentary from the Criterion/HVE DVD)
  Conversation with the Filmmakers (also from the Criterion/HVE DVD)
  Deleted scenes and alternate takes with commentary by director James Ivory (also from the Criterion/HVE DVD)
  Original theatrical trailer
  New restoration trailer
  Optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature

I recently revisited Maurice and the other Merchant-Ivory adaptations of Forster novels. In the documentary on the Criterion/HVE DVD of Maurice, Rupert Graves talks about being embarrassed by his performance in A Room with a View and promising James Ivory that he would give a much better performance as Alec Scudder in Maurice. The irony of that is that he is perfectly fine in Room, his first film role—completely believable as Lucy's happy-go-lucky younger brother—whereas he nearly ruins Maurice with a broad, almost burlesque characterization totally at odds with James Wilby's far more subtle performance.

So I have been sitting on my hands for a while. I always knew I would get around to buying Cohen's Jamaica Inn and Thief of Bagdad but neither was a high priority for me, but now it looks as if both are out of print and going for insane prices on Amazon and eBay. What happened there? Was there a rights issue? Is Cohen going to rerelease these titles or should I try to snap them up if I see an opportunity?

Looks like Cohen will be releasing the new restoration of James Whale's The Old Dark House, based on their Facebook post today.

The Old Dark House

^ Excellent news!

The Old Dark House has a street date per B&N. Oct 24
and here
bluray.com

I just got back from holidays and saw some screenshots at bluray.com for Maurice - one of my most anticipated releases ever!

I understand these are jpegs, but they remind me the bad encoding days of Criterion!
look at the sky: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/screensho ... position=3" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
or the coat on the left: http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/screensho ... position=9" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

personally, I'll wait for a European bluray in case it's better.

Cohen will be releasing Howards End themselves in the UK. Totally within their power but I've felt their partnerships with the UK labels have been very fruitful at producing the best versions of their titles and hope this doesn't mean that they'll be doing the same for the Rivette titles or even other Merchant Ivory restorations.

Ribs wrote:Cohen will be releasing Howards End themselves in the UK. Totally within their power but I've felt their partnerships with the UK labels have been very fruitful at producing the best versions of their titles and hope this doesn't mean that they'll be doing the same for the Rivette titles or even other Merchant Ivory restorations.

I saw it and was disappointed.
I didn't know Cohen can release in UK too like Criterion.
I was hoping someone else picks this up, because I really don't like their encoding.
Let alone the issues with Howards end (wrong gamma in the fixed disc).

Unlike Howard's End, the Rivette films aren't Cohen restorations so I'd be surprised if they released them in the UK.

Ribs wrote:Cohen will be releasing Howards End themselves in the UK. Totally within their power but I've felt their partnerships with the UK labels have been very fruitful at producing the best versions of their titles and hope this doesn't mean that they'll be doing the same for the Rivette titles or even other Merchant Ivory restorations.

Reckon they might just do Merchant Ivory, since they still have at least one active deal with a UK label (Eureka have The Old Dark House and King of Hearts coming up in the New Year). I imagine Arrow will have one or two more Cohen-sourced titles too. I'd be surprised if Cohen just tried to release whatever they could over here, Criterion UK-style.

Seems the BFI failed to secure Howards End; I could've sworn they had confirmed a Dual Format release in a press release somewhere. Maybe they requested to port over all the Cohen extras, and Cohen responded by deciding to just port over the entire release? Either that or Sony weighed in and weren't willing to work with the BFI. Who knows...

Just got The Old Dark House. The restoration looks fantastic, but there's one strange thing with the audio - at 57:20, some loud hiss kicks in on the soundtrack. Eventually it goes away, but it's strange - I'm not sure if it was noise introduced into the soundtrack or if it's inherent in the soundtrack and they actually just processed everything else with heavy noise reduction. (The latter is very possible because it does sound like it was cleaned up quite a bit.)

Sorry if this has already been addressed, but I didn't find anything about it here. Does anyone know if Cohen's 75th Anniversary release of Hitchcock's Jamaica Inn is out of print? I was an idiot and didn't get around to buying it when It was released and now every merchant says it's out of stock and it's going to ridiculous prices on eBay ($100+) A different forum I found online said they are just being slow to reprint it and that it's NOT out of print, but that was from last summer. I sent them an email a week ago and contacted them on Facebook and haven't gotten any response back yet. Just curious if any of you are in the know about this.

Thanks.

Can't help you with the Cohen release, but can confirm the Arrow version still exists if you're Region-B capable.

What is the status of "King of Hearts"?

kekid wrote:What is the status of "King of Hearts"?

It's currently playing at the Quad in NYC so a Blu-ray will surely follow later this year.

Discussion of La belle noiseuse split off here

The Official Story coming in November

Cohen Media have two Blu Rays coming soon:

Jacques Doillon's Rodin (October 2)
Jean Cocteau's Les Parents Terribles (October 30)

Both are up for pre-order on Amazon.

This isn't new news, but it just crossed my radar and I can't find any mention of it on these forums, so: Cohen is handling U.S. distribution for the restoration of Peppermint Soda, finally confirming after nearly twenty years that Criterion won't be releasing this after all. But who knows, maybe they can still do Cocktail Molotov.