criterionforum.org

Just a quick note to say Bravo on this disc's production. Me and the Missus watched it from soup to nuts last night. Probably the first time ever we have watched the entire contents of a disc in a single sitting. The compendium of the Stock company was the icing on the cake.
4 thumbs up.

NABOB OF NOWHERE wrote:The compendium of the Stock company was the icing on the cake.

Thanks for that - believe it or not, that was originally conceived as a four-page booklet feature with each person getting a framegrab and a sketchy biography. And then my executive producer suggested doing it on video instead, and I thought "why not?".

Mondo Digital:

When Paramount shoveled most of its catalog titles before the mid-'60s over to Universal, a lot of prime, valuable film elements turned out to have been lost over the years. Fortunately this one has fared better than most and still survives in mint condition, a fact borne out by the visually stunning Blu-ray release in 2014 from Arrow that sparkles like a new print. As of this writing, it's the only really worthwhile release on the market in the world.

I have no doubt this is an amazing package, but it is stupidly hyperbolic to call it the only worthwhile release of the film

domino harvey wrote:I have no doubt this is an amazing package, but it is stupidly hyperbolic to call it the only worthwhile release of the film

He seems to think that the Criterion edition is out of print, although that doesn't appear to be the case.

Strange Things Are Happening.

Thank you to Michael, David, Francesco and everyone else involved in this release. The film is not among my absolute favourite Sturges pictures but the presentation is top notch and all the extras I've watched (everything except the Jones commentary and the short film) were fun and informative. Here's hoping it's selling so well that The Lady Eve, The Palm Beach Story, Miracle on Morgan's Creek etc will follow.

Finch wrote: Here's hoping it's selling so well that The Lady Eve, The Palm Beach Story, Miracle on Morgan's Creek etc will follow.

Unless Arrow can license it separately from Paramount, they won't be able to include Morgan's Creek, as it was never sold to MCA/Universal like the others.

DVD Beaver has just voted Sullivan's Travels Blu-ray of the Month.

DVD Savant.

Well, I've only gone through the feature film at this point, but it certainly exceeded my wildest expectations. A beautiful transfer, and a really great film. Everybody telling me I'd fall for Sturges was right.

I loved the homages to silent film, with the early car chase and the seemingly 5-minute section of Sullivan and the girl (who remains nameless!) hanging around the poor places. There's a visual delight to it and absolutely no need for dialogue. Even in parts of the film that are dialogue heavy, you'd think that Sturges characters have so much emotion and expressiveness, they'd work with title cards, too. From his butler poo-pooing his actions to the film executives going nuts about his idea, dialogue isn't exactly necessary, and so it being used so effectively (rather than lame puns, there are double-takes and sentences which overlap and confuse)is that much more rewarding. The pacing was also great, and I loved that we get three distinct sections of the story, including a serious one!

Really a great film. And it's funny, but I know exactly how Sullivan feels with his revelation about comedy. When I was getting into film, I couldn't get more than a few minutes past a Clair or Lubitsch DVD I remember early on. I just wasn't interested in it. It took me a while to learn how to appreciate comedy in cinema. To realize that rather than being old, out-dated jokes, that many of these greats' antics are just as hysterical today as I'm sure they were back then. The craft of a great comedy is just as impressive as the craft of a Renoir, Bergman, or Bresson. And this film surely falls into that camp.

Arrow have said that "sales on Sullivan's [Travels] haven't been quite as high as we expected, so we'll wait a little longer before making a decision on the [Sturges] boxed-set." If you haven't bought a copy yet, what are you waiting for?

It's too bad they haven't given the green light for this yet. I cannot foresee a situation where 2,000 copies of a limited edition box set doesn't sell out within a year or two, but maybe that still wouldn't be enough to turn a profit?

A Sturges box would be Release of the Year material, so more people better start spending money on Sully, here.

That's surprising. It's actually not my favorite Sturges film - that would be The Palm Beach Story and I would also prefer The Lady Eve, Christmas in July and probably Unfaithfully Yours over Sullivan's Travels - but it really gets the most attention out of all of them, at least in the States, and everyone from Lawrence Kasdan to the Coen brothers seem to love it.

I'd guess that some are waiting to see what Criterion has in store for Sturges titles. The lack of blu-rays of his films becomes more glaring in their catalog with every passing year, and the fact that they haven't already announced this may mean that a box set is in the works to remedy this situation.

Sullivan's Travels and The Lady Eve are probably the two most popular Sturges films, so if the former hasn't sold well in such a great release from Arrow, that's really troubling news. I guess relatively few Blu-ray buyers are paying attention to 1940s films.

I wonder if being on Arrow has negatively affected sales, in that, people who browse in stores might not notice this label has released this film? I get the impression that they remain mostly known for the Horror stuff. In addition, their reputation as a knockout label who you can safely blind-buy from, while well-deserved, is still relatively recent, right? I consider myself a newly loyal Arrow customer, and I'm sure more attuned to boutique DVD labels than the average Joe!

This is the first I'm hearing of a collection - has Arrow given any indication as to its contents?

I picked up the Sullivan's disc and it is STUNNING.

rwaits wrote:This is the first I'm hearing of a collection - has Arrow given any indication as to its contents?

Earlier in this thread. It would be a six film box set containing The Lady Eve, The Palm Beach Story, Hail the Conquering Hero, The Great McGinty, Christmas in July and The Great Moment

I took advantage of Arrow's sale this weekend and ordered it super cheap for £7.99. Between this beautiful edition and Criterion's already stacked DVD (which I own), I can't imagine Criterion adding much more on their eventual Blu release. If they do, well then how spoiled are we?

Feego wrote:Between this beautiful edition and Criterion's already stacked DVD (which I own), I can't imagine Criterion adding much more on their eventual Blu release. If they do, well then how spoiled are we?

My dilemma is that I already own the Criterion DVD (and the Preston Sturges Collection set), and this is not one of my favorite Sturges films. Still, I want to support an Arrow release like this. If I do, and then Criterion releases a Sturges set including it, then I'll own four releases of a film that I don't really connect with (and if they don't release such a set, then only three). But when the next Arrow sale comes along, if Criterion still hasn't done anything, then I'll probably upgrade to the Arrow.

Drucker wrote:I wonder if being on Arrow has negatively affected sales, in that, people who browse in stores might not notice this label has released this film? I get the impression that they remain mostly known for the Horror stuff.

I think that's wildly unlikely. I doubt casual browsers are too bothered about the releasing label - and if they are attuned to such things, they'll see that it's Arrow Academy and not Arrow Video. They'll also be able to see the massive specs list on the back, which makes it clear that it's the polar opposite of a cheapo rush job.

I suspect the problem was neatly summed up by Gregory above - comparatively few people see the point of buying Blu-ray only editions of "old movies", especially if much cheaper DVD editions are available. And in the case of Sullivan's Travels...



It's a real headache, because although the Arrow is clearly a superior edition (understatement), is the average Joe willing to pay three times the price? If he just wants to watch the film - and the DVD edition also has the Terry Jones commentary, so it's not barebones - the answer may well be "probably not".

The really annoying thing is that Arrow didn't put a foot wrong - their marketing was spot on, and reviews were not only ecstatic but prominent: it got lead spots in Empire and Sight & Sound and was voted DVD Beaver's Blu-ray of the Month. But you can't ignore the voice of the marketplace - at least not if you want to stay in business. (Same goes for knocking the price down to make it directly competitive with the DVD - given what are still vastly greater Blu-ray manufacturing costs, that's an even more certain way of losing money.)

Does the barebones Sturges box set with the same contents as the putatitive Arrow set exist in the UK? It seems as though using Sullivan's Travels as a trial balloon might not make perfect sense if not- it's facing competition the box set wouldn't.

matrixschmatrix wrote:Does the barebones Sturges box set with the same contents as the putatitive Arrow set exist in the UK? It seems as though using Sullivan's Travels as a trial balloon might not make perfect sense if not- it's facing competition the box set wouldn't.

There was a seven-disc Sturges DVD set here, which seems to have been deleted... but except for one possible deletion all the films are still available singly for £4-5, even The Great Moment!

MichaelB wrote:I suspect the problem was neatly summed up by Gregory above - comparatively few people see the point of buying Blu-ray only editions of "old movies", especially if much cheaper DVD editions are available. And in the case of Sullivan's Travels...

The Blu-ray/DVD marketplace at the moment seems to be a right bitch. Amazon UK have killed of most of their competition (Play, HMV etc) and no longer price match as much as they used to. I have a wish-list of about 75 UK titles, which was down to about 20 a year and a bit ago, but everything is so expensive on Amazon and I'm not willing to pay those prices. I just wait for publishers' individual sales and the big price drop offers on the likes zavvi, Moviemail and Base. I'm buying little domestically as a result.