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s.j. bagley wrote:any word on a possible blu ray release of this?

I hope so, but MGM seem to be pretty idle when it comes to Blu-Rays of older films. In fact aren't A Bridge Too Far and Battle of Britain the first classic films on Blu-Ray they have released in AGES? I know that Fox owns MGM now, but the home video department of MGM is still going and handles the DVD releases of the MGM library. The Magnificent Seven came out under fully under Sony's home video team, though, I believe. But to state the obvious, the 'classics on Blu-Ray' boom has yet to start. The studios/companies have merely tested the waters over the last two years.

Person wrote:I know that Fox owns MGM now,

Uh--no. MGM is owned by a consortium made up of Sony, Comcast and various companies that put up financing to buy it. When MGM was unhappy with Sony's distribution of its product, it dumped them as distributor and talked to various companies to take over that work. Fox made the best offer. So they are distributor only; they "own" no part of MGM.

As for NIGHT OF THE HUNTER on Blu-Ray . . . considering that BD is still a relatively small market, and NIGHT has never been a big seller on home video, I'd say a Blu-Ray release at this time is pretty unlikely.

I believe fox is also doing their mastering, since all discs have the Fox logo introduction and look better than ever. MGM 1.66 films, like the recent 12 Angry Men edition, are also anamorphic.

Fox does the disc authoring, and they do some of those stereo remixes of older mono films, but MGM does the film transfers; Fox isn't allowed to directly access the film elements.

Oh goddamit.

keriminny...

Maybe they realized people were expecting actual supplements and not just the aforementioned Richard Chamberlain remake. This can only be a good sign.

Maybe they're creating a Richard Chamberlain - What Were You Thinking? featurette.

But seriously, I wouldn't mind this becoming a 3-disc set that also includes the soundtrack.

On a side note, Night of the Hunter is available for instant viewing on Netflix until the end of the month, in case anyone is interested.

I've never streamed a film from Netflix. What's the quality like?

I dunno, it doesn't work on Macs {|=

Probably doesn't work with Ubuntu then, either. Bummer.

Antoine Doinel wrote:Maybe they're creating a Richard Chamberlain - What Were You Thinking? featurette.

Ha ha! That's one remake I would never, ever look at - not a single frame. What's really odd about the 1991 TV movie, is that the great DP of the original, Stanley Cortez, came out of retirement to do the lighting for it. Why? How could you ever hope to improve on the striking, unforgettable original?

kaujot wrote:I've never streamed a film from Netflix. What's the quality like?

I just watched it last night. It looks about the same as a standard DVD. Maybe slightly lower quality. Definitely watchable though. Unless your internet connection is too slow and it constantly has to stop to buffer.

OliverB wrote:postponed

Maybe they're trying to line up interviews with some of the actors that were in it...wait a minute, they're all dead! Except for maybe Peter Graves and the 2 kids, that is...

Too bad. I was really looking forward to replacing my fullscreen DVD of this one sooner rather than later.

Perhaps they are clearing right to include Charles Laughton Directs The Night of the Hunter

I hope the delay is for good reason, and I pray this edition gets the copious study materials available for extras that any blind child knows are out there-- because once this is released, we know that'll probably be the last home video word on the film (especially if a blu is included) for close to ten yrs..

Unless of course some small Facets or Kino type company comes out with their own doc (like "John Huston and the Dubliners") entirely seperate from the film itself. Either making use of the reams of outtake/test film to create a new doc.. or license their own presentation of the above film composed of all those rushes.

I just rewatched the film about a week ago and never bought the DVD because of the laughable lack of anything extra. An extraordinary film and more a testament to Stanley Cortez than anyone else. Great all around and probably the best work of James Agee as well. Mitchum can be slightly over the top at parts (he was the reason I wasn't too wild about it the first time I saw it), but the film is an essential and I'm glad that a more proper DVD is being released. With any luck there'll be a commentary from a knowledgeable source and not some surviving cast character whose just going to talk about the weather on the set that day. Although MGM's DVD of Personna had arguably the worst "expert" commentary I've ever sat through.

wpqx wrote:I. An extraordinary film and more a testament to Stanley Cortez than anyone else. With any luck there'll be a commentary from a knowledgeable source and not some surviving cast character whose just going to talk about the weather on the set that day..

I'm not sure that the primary contribution to this film is Cortez', but to each his own. The film is sooooooo much more than "nice shots".

And I'd rather hear a cast member with firsthand knowledge of the film say the right things, than another "Louise Brooks The Gaze" Expert Commentary re Symbols & Meaning of the Fillm anyday. The latter just bores me to tears nowadays.

After the insanely boring Roger Deakins commentary on Fargo I'm very suspicious of cast and crew commentaries, although directors can add some great information, often they get wrapped up in the watching of the film. The commentaries on Universal's horror films were all extremely informative and well put together. There is a lot to admire in NOTH, perhaps I gravitate to cinematography above anything else due to my photography background and I just realize how damn hard it is to properly light anything. Cortez did some great work but other than this and The Magnificent Ambersons he seemed underutilized throughout much of his career. It is bold and over simplified to say it is Cortez the genius and no one else, but I think one of the trademarks of a great director is to surround him/herself with a great crew, especially a first time director, and Laughton could scarcely have picked anyone better to photograph the film. So many shots in the film can just take your breath away and above anything else the cinematography stands out the most in the picture to me anyways.

No news on the DVD but for those in the Los Angeles area UCLA preservation officer Robert Gitt will be presenting CHARLES LAUGHTON DIRECTS THE NIGHT OF THE HUNTER at the Billy Wilder Theater in Westwood on August 9th.

Any news on this? I'm contemplating buying the current version but I want to wait for something better.

I just watched some of "Night of the Hunter" on MGM HD and it looked great. I think it's scheduled to be on again in the next week or so. Obviously it won't be as high a bitrate as a Blu-ray, but still very nice quality.

domino harvey wrote:I dunno, it doesn't work on Macs {|=

Now you can opt in to beta test on Macs.

I've tested it a little the last few days. Quality varies based on your speed (and I heard that the new Starz titles are lower quality at top quality), but if you have a good connection it's close to DVD quality. There were some glitches in the picture, but this might be unique to the new Silverlight player and/or the Mac. Hopefully they'll soon be eliminated.

nsps wrote:I just watched some of "Night of the Hunter" on MGM HD and it looked great. I think it's scheduled to be on again in the next week or so. Obviously it won't be as high a bitrate as a Blu-ray, but still very nice quality.

I just tried to watch this off my dvr from the recent MGM HD showing, and, it may LOOK good (although the 1:85 ratio bothers me), but what really bothered me was the sound, which was a complete disaster! Every musical cue and sound effect has been given some bizarre kind of echo effect, kind of like a really bad phony stereo hatched job, but then folded back to mono. So, every musical attack is heard twice in rapid succession. I surely HOPE this is not a sign of what the eventual DVD/BD remaster will be like. Yet another MGM HD disaster.....they recently aired "The Red Shoes" in a 1:85 cropped version. Will someone please step up and broadcast the major studios' "classic" film library in HD? Bad as the "Voom" channels were (which Dish told us we didn't really want, rather than urge them to improve), nothing has stepped up to give us non-mainstream film in HD.