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Until the end of the World: Director's Cut (* unfinished project *)

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 (Edited)

I would like to put together a “special edition dvd” for the Wim Wender’s film “Until the end of the world”, while it does have it’s problems it’s a very interesting film, the best version of this film is the director’s cut which is split into 3 parts, my thought for a collection would be:

The complete Directors Cut (subtitled in English)
The US or German “short” version of the film
deleted scenes
u2 music video “Until the End of the World”
Trailers
making of extras

Any thoughts? idea? things you would perhaps like to include?

Material So Far:

3 - part Director’s Cut
German Teaser
“Up Down Under Roma” Interview with Wim Wenders sitting in the back of an open covertable while driving around Rome
“Until the End of the Film” Interview with Wim Wenders
Outtakes
Photo Gallery
“Wim Wender - Interview with Roger Willemsen” (In German, no subs)
“Until the End of the World” U2 Music Video

Blade Runner: The Complete Collection

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There are various R2 dvds of the long version (a German one and an Italian one) with some extras too, but I don't think they include the short version.
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Originally posted by: Kakyoin
There are various R2 dvds of the long version (a German one and an Italian one) with some extras too, but I don't think they include the short version.


The two I am aware of as you say is the german and italian dvd release of the director's cut trilogy. The italian released dvd, which I believe is out of print, is 4 discs while the german is 3. I think there are other differences. Then I believe there is a german "short" version is 20 minutes longer then the us version.

Blade Runner: The Complete Collection

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I'm Italian and I see it quite often in stores, too bad it's kinda expensive
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I have a 3 Xvid + deleted scene set I pulled from eMule.

It's really high quality, but there are 2 drawbacks. First there is a lot of music in the film and with the 4% PAL speed up, it just sounds funny to me.

Second is that the english subtitles (at least on the net) are crap. Whoever put them together did not speak english (maybe at all).
So what I did for myself was a framerate slow down, recoding the audio (this fixes the 4% speed up). I also rewrote the sub files, using a mix of the theatrical subs and translating additional dialog myself.

I actually built a set of NTSC DVDs off this for a friend of mine who is a huge Wim Wenders fan, and they look damn good.
I wouldn't object to a full NTSC version direct from DVD if someone were to do it.

If anyone wants some great information on this movie and why there will NEVER be a U.S. extended version read here:
http://theacf.com/endworld/

Or if you have a R2 PAL player, just buy the movies here: http://www.scarecrow.com/sales/item.asp?ProductID=002566 It's a U.S. company and they're listing $35.

Dr. M

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I remember reading about this film a while ago, definitely very interested. Do you actually have copies of both the long and short films?

BTW, this is apparently coming out in the UK on June 26th, might be useful for the subtitles. No clue as to what cut it is:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000EHRUFW/qid%3D1147335334/202-6943819-8091823
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Sounds good focuspuller. If you're interested I can provide you with the subtitle files I built for the Trilogy version.
I believe the extended DVDs lack english subs for foreign languages.

Btw, I think that technically there is a difference between the Director's Cut and the Trilogy.
The DC being the original full length single film and the Trilogy being a re-cut with a different run time and split into 3 films.

Which version of the extended film will you be doing? Are you proposing reconstructing the Director's Cut?

Btw, I've seen the deleted scenes from the DVD, they're kind of crappy. Mostly the scrap film from before and after they yelled cut. Some people mumbling to each other, and the occasionally laugh ruining a take.

Edit: Has the U.S short version ever been on DVD or will this be reconstructed from the Trilogy footage?

Dr. M

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When you referred to the German short version, you had me confused because it's frequently referred to as the Japanese Laserdisc cut.

As far as the different versions go, for some reason I was of the mistaken assumption that the U.S/German versions were a cut down Director's Cut that he later recreated/update as the Trilogy. Anywhere, here's the full low down (From Wikipedia):

Wenders apparently foresaw his struggles with acceptable running time and kept the original elements rather than surrendering them to distributors. After the film's theatrical release, Wenders worked with internegative copies and, with the cooperation of Sam Neill, who recorded additional narration, completed a 280-minute version of the film. The 280-minute cut, which Wenders regards as the definitive and complete version of Until the End of the World, unfolds as a trilogy and is presented in three parts (the opening titles appear three times). This version of the film has been screened publicly numerous times, including U.S. screenings at the University of Washington in 1996, at least two presentations at the Egyptian Theatre in Los Angeles, by way of American Cinematheque, once at the DGA Theater in New York City, by way of the American Museum of the Moving Image, once at the USA Film Festival in Dallas, Texas, once at the Walter Reade Theater, by way of the Film Society of Lincoln Center, in New York City, and once at the Cinema Arts Centre in Huntington, NY. Wenders has been present at all of these screenings but the USA Film Festival screening and the Walter Reade Theater screening.

The 158-minute theatrical cut of Until the End of the World was released on VHS and laserdisc (widescreen) in the United States. In addition, a 179-minute "European cut" was released on laserdisc (letterboxed) in Japan, accompanied by a 58-minute featurette shot in Tokyo entitled Dream Island by Sean Naughton, who had worked with Wenders on the HD sequences in Until the End of the World. The 280-minute "trilogy" version of Until the End of the World made its first DVD appearance in 2004, with an Italian 4-disc edition featuring outtakes, bloopers, trailers, and interviews with Wenders. In 2005, a 3-disc DVD edition was released in Germany. Both editions feature new digital transfers that were personally supervised by Wenders.

Anchor Bay Entertainment had once announced that it would be releasing the director's cut of Until the End of the World in North America, but has since switched hands and abandoned interest in Wenders' catalogue. Currently, there are no known plans to release the film on DVD in North America.

Dr. M

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That's is very true. For legal reasons (music clearence and movie studio rights, etc.) it's been said that it's highly likely there will NEVER be a Trilogy release in the U.S.

Dr. M

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Ok, I now have the italian and German DVD editions of the director's cut as well as other bits and pieces, so what we have so far is this:

3 - part Director's Cut
German Teaser
"Up Down Under Roma" Interview with Wim Wenders while in the back of an open top car driving around Rome
"Until the End of the Film" Interview with Wim Wenders
Outtakes
Photo Gallery
"Wim Wender - Interview with Roger Willemsen" (In German, no subs)
"Until the End of the World" U2 Music Video

Any thoughts? Ideas?

Blade Runner: The Complete Collection

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Won't you need VHS copies of the other cuts in order to reconstruct them from the extended DVD material? At least I thought that's what you were planning.

Btw, when you convert to NTSC, absolutely do a slow down to 23.976 with the video and audio (not 25 fps with 29.97 flags). Surprisingly, for all the music in that film they didn't bother to pitch shift it when the sped it up.

Dr. M

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I have already converted the film to NTSC and it looks great. Also for the record, everything I have listed so far except for the U2 music video is from a PAL source. I of course plan to add more to this set, like for example the short version of the film, this is just what I have on the list so far. If anyone has anything related to this film or would have suggestion for inclusion please feel free.

cashiers, cheers, what DVDrs are you talking about?

Blade Runner: The Complete Collection

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Apparently there is a short film (50 minutes or so) made by the guy who did all of the HDTV sequences which apparently follows Wim Wenders around Tokyo. I have never seen it (it was included as side four of the japanese laser disc), but if you can track it down, it would probably be worth including as part of your special edition.

In other news related to this most neglected of films, the release date for the fabled UK version has come and gone without any evidence of an actual DVD. Boo.
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I finally found the Italian boxset. If you watch movies on your PC (or projector or whatever), you could simply use a WinDVD 7 feature called "PAL TruSpeed".
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ThatCleverShark, you are talking about "Dream Island", a 58-minute featurette shot in Tokyo by Sean Naughton, who had worked with Wenders on the HD sequences in Until the End of the World expanding on some of the ideas from the movie.
It was present on the Japanese Laserdisc. I don't know if it's ever show up anywhere else.

I'd be curious to see that too.

Dr. M

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I talked to Metrodome this morning, and they said "not until October at least, but we plan to have it out this year for sure."

There's a small discussion about this over at the Wim Wenders forums.

In a perfect world, Critereon would pick this up. As far as I'm concerned, this is RIGHT up their alley. Then again, I'm almost hoping that the US release does get delayed so that IF it ever does get picked up, it might be released in HD. Then again AGAIN, I'm still on the fence on if I'm going to bother with HD dvds (due to drm, HDCP, etc.). Whatever. I know I don't have any idea how licensing and rights work, but I just don't understand why this stuff wasn't worked out when the film was being put together in the first place.

Anyway, I'm eagerly awaiting any English-language release, especially the director's cut. Hopefully it'll come out in my lifetime. At this point I keep my laserdisc player setup pretty much ONLY on the off chance I feel like watching this film (which I've only done twice so far since it was released years ago -- I don't want to get tired of it before I finally get to see the directors cut).

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Originally posted by: jeffd
I talked to Metrodome this morning, and they said "not until October at least, but we plan to have it out this year for sure."


Did metrodome happen to mention which version they are going to be releasing? I know that Wenders supervised the digital transfer to the German DVD (and it looks amazing) so I'm wondering if they might just use the same elements and throw some English subtitles onto the few non-English scenes.

What I'm really hoping is that they release the original theatrical cut (the three hour version, the one from the Japanese Laserdisc). I've never seen it but I gather it might be a reasonable middle ground between the trilogy and the videocassette.

I wish I hadn't sold my Laserdisc player now...
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Nope, they didn't mention which version they'd be releasing. I don't have high hopes though -- this is the same sort of thing which happened with Anchor Bay here in the US. At this point, what is the best version to get, the Italian release, or the German release? I'd really like to avoid the PAL speedup problem, and I'd also like all the extras I can get. Also, on the non-subtitled portion of these releases, are these scenes on the US laserdisc release?
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Yeah, what happened with Anchor Bay? From the sounds of things, they just decided to stop dealing with all Wenders titles. This is massively disappointing as I was looking forward to seeing "The State of Things", "Kings of the Road" and "Far Away So Close" again. They are, of course, only currently available in Germany (in german language).

Anyhow, in terms of UTEOTW, I can only speak firsthand for the German release which is 3 discs long and features optional german subtitles. The longest foreign language scene is the one in which Claire first encounters the bank robbers. The scene is longer on the DVD than it is in the american version but the general idea is still the same. Otherwise there are only a few places throughout where a foreign language is spoken (usually french). In most scenes where language might be an issue, there is the omnipresent voiceover from Eugene, explaining what's going on.

There are only two special features on the German DVD, an interview with Wim Wenders (in German, no subtitles) and about twenty-five minutes of extra footage that got left on the cutting room floor.

The video transfer is fantastic though. Crisp images and nicely saturated colours.

I believe the italian version has more extras (some of which may be in English) but is more or less the same film (and, like the german version is PAL). Anyone out there buy the italian version?
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Originally posted by: That Clever Shark
Yeah, what happened with Anchor Bay? From the sounds of things, they just decided to stop dealing with all Wenders titles. This is massively disappointing as I was looking forward to seeing "The State of Things", "Kings of the Road" and "Far Away So Close" again. They are, of course, only currently available in Germany (in german language).

Anyhow, in terms of UTEOTW, I can only speak firsthand for the German release which is 3 discs long and features optional german subtitles. The longest foreign language scene is the one in which Claire first encounters the bank robbers. The scene is longer on the DVD than it is in the american version but the general idea is still the same. Otherwise there are only a few places throughout where a foreign language is spoken (usually french). In most scenes where language might be an issue, there is the omnipresent voiceover from Eugene, explaining what's going on.

There are only two special features on the German DVD, an interview with Wim Wenders (in German, no subtitles) and about twenty-five minutes of extra footage that got left on the cutting room floor.

The video transfer is fantastic though. Crisp images and nicely saturated colours.

I believe the italian version has more extras (some of which may be in English) but is more or less the same film (and, like the german version is PAL). Anyone out there buy the italian version?


I have both dvd editions. The italian dvd has a slightly better copy of the film, and yes has more extras.

The collection I will be releasing will have the extras from both as well as other things. I would like to include the docu from the laserdisc but I don't have that as yet, so I may simply release with what I have so far. My copy of the film will be NTSC and have english subtitles.

I also have good word that Criterion is working now to secure the release of SOME Wim Wenders films as "director approved editions", UTEOTW is one of them. Others I've been told about are The American Friend, Wings of Desire, and Lisbon Story. Treat this strictly as a rumor.

Blade Runner: The Complete Collection