Warner Brothers Archive Collection (DVDs only)

[fdm]

Tried to watch The Swan on my Oppo 983h (region free) dvd player, but was getting all kinds of playback errors, primarily was getting color misregistrations (kind of flickery randomy from time to time during movement) and some apparent interlacing issues. Wonder if I mucked something up by doing a player reset a while back, couldn't quite come up with anything to make it play any differently though. Thought I'd noticed similar things going on with a few other discs too (not necessarily (just?) WA titles, but don't recall which). Played okay on my Panasonic blu-ray player (phew, starting to run out of options).

Anybody know how to deal with interlacing problems on an Oppo?

Also ended up with a re-wrapped, obviously somebody's returned dvd-r, in this last shipment. Big scratches, many fingerprints and quite a bit of dust.

Come to think of it there was a pause for a second or two during The Swan. Must have been a layer change (funny how my computer's dvd drive won't even load the disc (thought it had dual layer capability), but its blu-ray drive will). Perhaps that's what's going on with your The Great Garrick, Titus, a layer change.

[HypnoHelioStaticStasis]

A note to the curious: Wbshop.com is now selling the Columbia Classics by Request line in the archive section.

Good thing, since the Sony website was kinda ungainly and had no way organizing things by release date.

[Perkins Cobb]

A note to the curious: Wbshop.com is now selling the Columbia Classics by Request line in the archive section.

Wonder if those will be eligible for the annual 10 for $100 sales.

[domino harvey]

Warners just sent out an email: Former purchasers can upgrade to the new I Love Melvin for $4.99 plus shipping

[Perkins Cobb]

Did the e-mail say anything about people who rented it from Classicflix and ripped it? Can I get a portion of my monthly fee back?

[Frankinho007]

New today:

Remastered:
Hold On! (1966)
Mrs. Brown You've Got a Lovely Daughter (1968)
The Fastest Guitar Alive (1967)
Get Yourself a College Girl (1964)

Normal:
The Squall (1929)
The Great Divide (1929)
New Morals for Old (1932)
The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933)
Third Finger, Left Hand (1940)
So Goes My Love (1946)

[myrnaloyisdope]

The Squall (1929)
The Great Divide (1929)
New Morals for Old (1932)
The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933)


Figured I'd weigh in on the Myrna Loy titles I've seen. The Squall is objectively pretty bad, but not as stiff or stodgy as I was expecting for a 1929 talkie. It's got a very young Loretta Young and Myrna as a gypsy. It's fun in part because Myrna gets a lot of screen time and you can tell she's having a lot of fun heeling it up as the slutty villain of the piece. The Great Divide is a decent 1929 western, with some solid outdoor photography and Myrna in another foreigner role, this time as a Mexican trollop. New Morals for Old is a pretty mundane callow youth drama about the stodgy older generation keeping all the young ones down. Myrna has a very small part and I don't think she even has a line, though I get the sense her part was hacked to bit by the censors, she is playing a French courtesan afterall. Finally The Prizefighter and the Lady which has about a billion directors including Hawks and Van Dyke and even Von Sternberg reportedly was scheduled to work on it. It's a fun bxoing melodrama, with Max Baer doing a really fine job as a non-actor in the lead and Myrna getting a lot of screen time in one of her earliest romantic leads. Walter Huston is his usual dependable self and it's very watchable, though pretty light.

Here's hoping Under A Texas Moon is just around the corner! One of my holy grails, in spite of the horrible presence of Frank Fay.

[fdm]

Tried to watch The Swan on my Oppo 983h (region free) dvd player, but was getting all kinds of playback errors, primarily was getting color misregistrations (kind of flickery randomy from time to time during movement) and some apparent interlacing issues. Wonder if I mucked something up by doing a player reset a while back, couldn't quite come up with anything to make it play any differently though. Thought I'd noticed similar things going on with a few other discs too (not necessarily (just?) WA titles, but don't recall which). Played okay on my Panasonic blu-ray player (phew, starting to run out of options).

Anybody know how to deal with interlacing problems on an Oppo?

Well putzed around a little bit with this today, reverted from the last beta firmware to the last non-beta firmware and that seemed to clear things up. May try going back to the beta again later, but for now will let it go for a while.

Think what may have happened is that its memory got corrupted when I had an issue with another WA title and the player reset only cleared out the problem somewhat (it was Carny - recall playing it, something or other unexpected happened, unloaded/reloaded the disc, same thing happened, reset the player, seemed to clear the issue but didn't quite).

One of the key things I was seeing though was some really gnarly interlacing whenever I did a reverse or a fast forward. That seems to no longer be happening, and a quick looksee of The Swan seemed to be much better as well. Yay. Time to do some further checking.

[Frankinho007]

New today:

Remastered:

Marlowe (1969)
Mister Buddwing (1966)
The Wheeler Dealers (1963)

Also available as a value pak for $ 40.

TV/Animation:

Frankenstein Jr. and the Impossibles: The Complete Series

[Frankinho007]

Last week:

Kongo (1932)
Strictly Dynamite (1934)
Mexican Spitfire Complete 8-Movie Collection


TV-movies:

Probe (1972)
Dummy (1979)
Smile Jenny, You're Dead (1974)
Children of the Night (1985)

TV-Series:

The Yellow Rose: The Complete Series

This Week:

Remastered:
Flight Command (1940)
Toward the Unknown (1956)
Advance to the Rear (1964)
The Honeymoon Machine (1961)
Don't Go Near the Water (1957)
The Horizontal Lieutenant (1962)

Standard:
Bombardier (1943)
See Here, Private Hargrove (1944)
PT 109 (1963)

TV:
Mister T: The Complete First Season

[Gregory]

Lupe Velez Mexican Spitfire Collection is 8 films on 4 discs for $40 -- nice deal. Now if they could package more of these discs at that kind of price point, I might be able to get behind this whole thing a little more.

[Frankinho007]

New titles today:


Remastered:

The Prize (1963)
The Rack (1956)
Until They Sail (1957)
Four Daughters (1938)*
Daughters Courageous (1939)*

Standard:

Four Wives (1939)*
Four Mothers (1941)*

*Also available as a Four Daughters Movie Series Collection (not a value pak)
The three Newman movies are available as a value pak

TV/Animation:

Challenge of The Gobots: The Original Mini-Series

[Frankinho007]

New titles today:

Remastered:
Dark of the Sun (1968)
Hearts of the West (1975)

Standard:
The Great Caruso (1951)
Kona Coast (1968)
The Double Man (1967)
Assignment to Kill (1969)
24 Hours to Kill (1965)
Once Before I Die (1965)
Avalanche Express (1979)

[Cold Bishop]

Dark of the Sun (1968)

#-o

[colinr0380]

New titles today:

Hearts of the West (1975)

aka Hollywood Cowboy in the UK.

[justeleblanc]

I'm quite excited about THE WOMAN ON THE BEACH (1947, Jean Renoir). It's such a bizarre film stylistically. It's a semi-noir with an unconventional sound design, and at times it resembles TAKE THE 5:10 TO DREAMLAND.

Though the Warner website is incorrect, the studio didn't re-cut the film. In the summer of 1946 there was a disastrous test screening, but Renoir was allowed final cut over the re-writes, re-shoots, and re-edits. The strange film is entirely a product of Renoir, and even more awesome is that there's evidence that Renoir intended for the film to be stylistically nutty before the test screening. Janet Bergstrom wrote a nice article on the film's production history about a decade ago in FILM HISTORY called "Oneiric Cinema." Both the film and this article are worth tracking down for sure.

Also, some of you might be interested to know that the film began as a Val Lewton project.

[Frankinho007]

New today:

Tortilla Flat: Remastered
The Breaking Point #-o

Herculoids: The Complete Animated Series
The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones

[Cold Bishop]

#-o indeed

[Frankinho007]

New today:

Remastered:
The Woman on the Beach (1947)

Standard:
In Name Only (1939)
A Damsel in Distress (1937) - will be released in the UK by Odeon on July 18th
The Letter (1929)
The Sin of Madelon Claudet (1931)
Symphony of Six Million (1932)
If I Were Free (1933)
Day of Reckoning (1933)
Vigil in the Night (1940)
The George Sanders Saint Movie Collection (The Saint Strikes Back [1939], The Saint in London [1939], The Saint's Double Trouble [1940], The Saint Takes Over [1940], The Saint in Palm Springs[1941]) - some are also available from Odeon in the UK

[justeleblanc]

I highly recommend blind buying the Renoir if you haven't yet seen it.

[PillowRock]

The George Sanders Saint Movie Collection (The Saint Strikes Back [1939], The Saint in London [1939], The Saint's Double Trouble [1940], The Saint Takes Over [1940], The Saint in Palm Springs[1941] - some are also available from Odeon in the UK

I haven't seen it and so can't comment on quality etc., but there is also a French coffret of 8 Saint movies on 4 DVDs for about 41 euros.

[Ashirg]

There is also Spanish and Finnish box sets.... But Warner transfers are usually better than what Éditions Montparnasse (France) or Manga Films (Spain) have to work with. Odeon's transfers are usually as good as Warner's...

[Jonathan S]

Odeon's transfers are usually as good as Warner's...

Their prints may be, but at least some of Odeon's RKO transfers are bad NTSC-PAL conversions. I just bought Blood on the Moon which has all the tell-tale signs: soft image, boosted contrast, combing artifacts - no PAL speed-up but I'd rather have that. The Digital Fix reported the same with Berlin Express and Rachel and the Stranger, the only ones I've seen officially reviewed.

Yet I've read favourable reports, mainly on other forums, of some titles. I'd be grateful for a list of any Odeon RKO titles known to be true PAL, which should be reflected by the running times (I wonder if those given on Amazon are reliable?)

[Ashirg]

I stand corrected.

Amazon is usually unreliable about running times. There are running times listed on Odeon's own web page for each title, but I don't know how accurate are those.

[Frankinho007]

Released this Tuesday:

Remastered:
Athena (1954) - includes three outtake musical numbers, theatrical trailer and the stereo mix!
The Romance of Rosy Ridge (1947)

Standard:
The Vanishing Virginian (1941)
Seven Sweethearts (1942)