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TServo2049

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27-Aug-2006
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5-Mar-2024
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Post
#265592
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/265592/action/topic#265592
Time
Hey,

I was watching the Princess and the Cobbler version a while back, and I'm convinced that Ed E. Carroll's voice work for the Thief amounts simply to that stupid laugh that's added in when he does that dance during King Nod's speech. (Perhaps some of the other wheezing and coughing that's ADDED into the Calvert version, too, but I'm not sure about that...)

Ed E. Carroll, judging by his IMDB listing, is an American character actor, who mostly did bit parts in TV shows, made-for-TV movies, and low-grade films during the 80s. Since Carroll is American, I highly doubt that he would have done voice work on the Williams version; except for Vincent Price, everybody else in Williams' cast is British and/or generally worked in Britain. However, the Calvert voice cast was indeed comprised of Americans and/or talent that worked primarily in America. Ed E. Carroll seems to fall into that category.

As for who did the original wheezing and gasping, Patrick and I have mulled over the possibility that it might be Richard Williams himself...but don't quote me on that.
Post
#260429
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/260429/action/topic#260429
Time
Well, it all depends on how good that tape looks, and if someone could go and get it for us. I have no idea what the plan is, but I know Jerry said he'd only be in Australia until the 8th. However, he also said the stuff would remain there, so someone could go get it regardless...if they worked it out with him, I assume.

Is there any plan by any one of our members Down Under?

And Garrett isn't the be all, end all of this film. I know he was the catalyst that started this thing, but there are other competent people out there to "lead" the movement of awareness of / interest in the film. The word just needs to be spread...
Post
#259767
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/259767/action/topic#259767
Time
Actually, FYI, it's incorrect to call them Miramax. Miramax Films is still a division of Disney. Bob and Harvey Weinstein's new company is called The Weinstein Company.

And I know, it does sound rather unsettling. Even so, the Weinsteins may only have certain rights to the film. If Disney had relinquished ALL rights to the Weinsteins, Don Hahn would have said so at Comic Con, and would have said that a Disney restoration was thus impossible, rather than saying it was a "someday" project...

It'd be a shame to see an official restoration tied up in legal wranglings, what with Disney holding the film materials and the Weinsteins holding (some kind of) ownership rights.
Post
#258011
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/258011/action/topic#258011
Time
Well, I remember you mentioning way back when that Jerry Verschoor said that he had a PAL tape of the workprint. I think you concluded that it's the same one we all know, but I realized, it's probably first-generation off the master tape, and it'd be great to have an actual PAL tape of the workprint (instead of a PAL AVI or an NTSC tape).

EDIT: Yes, you did say that, back in March:
He saved a VHS copy of the workprint direct from the U-matic, but he did so three months before the studio closed - which means it's the normal workprint that we all have. I had hoped that he had managed to get the fabled "second and final workprint," which no one seems to have bootlegged.

His copy would presumably be in PAL and high quality, and thus very desirable...


Even though there isn't going to be a Mark III, I think a complete, first-gen PAL copy of the workprint would be a great thing to have. It'd certainly be a big help to Patrick (Og) and *his* projects (Google Video version of the workprint, and his "enhanced" workprint edit)...and I, for one, would love to see a better, non-AVI version of the workprint, period.

And who knows, maybe it's a copy without that nasty long audio dropout in the middle...
Post
#257449
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/257449/action/topic#257449
Time
I was the same way; again, after seeing the Miramax cut, I've softened to the Recobbled Cut.

I mean, all the new voice people sound like they're phoning it in. Matthew Broderick doesn't even sound like he's acting; it's more like he's just reading the dialogue in his normal voice.

Patrick and I have this theory that Jonathan Winters recorded his dialogue in one take while watching the film. (He always sounds extremely bored, like "When is this gonna be over?")

Patrick even thinks that Winters may have just ad-libbed some of the dialogue on the spot. (Why did the combined Calvert/Miramax rewriting require six writers? Three to not come up with something good, and three to come up with something not good?)
Post
#257379
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/257379/action/topic#257379
Time
IMO, Robert Folk's score is decent. Just decent.

It also feels extremely derivative. Besides the fact that the Thief's theme sounds like the Pink Panther theme (melody-wise), it sounds like Folk is desperately trying to channel James Horner. With the sweeping, grandiose music, I keep thinking Star Trek II. With the soft, pastoral, and/or emotional stuff, I keep conjuring up images of The Land Before Time.

And is it just me, or does the music (also heard in the Recobbled Cut) when the Thief gets the last golden ball from the war machine, and flies up toward the viewer before plummeting back down, sound like the famous bicycle scene from E.T.?
Post
#257205
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/257205/action/topic#257205
Time
I have thankfully never seen the Miramax cut until now. It's almost like some kind of sick, twisted joke...except it's not a joke. Jonathan Winters' running commentary (I cannot call it anything else) feels more like a poor attempt at either an MST3K-style riff job, or Bob Saget's stupid voiceovers on America's Funniest Home Videos.

It'd be morbidly funny if someone did a joke parody version of The Gold Rush, or the General, or some other classic silent comedy, with a Winters-style voiceover for Charlie Chaplin, or Buster Keaton, or whoever, spouting stupid jokes and random pop culture references...it'd be no more an insult than this...

Oh, am I glad I've watched the workprint and/or Recobbled Cut about a dozen plus times before ever seeing this train wreck...
Post
#257096
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/257096/action/topic#257096
Time
I'm watching the Google Video version, and I just noticed something. I know how Garrett has talked about some Calvert shots having been done by Williams' London team (sans Williams), and I think I found another one: The "consult the Brigand's Handbook" shot. It's definitely Williams pencils (which we see in partially unfinished pencil-test form in the workprint), like some of the other London Calvert shots. Unfortunately, unlike the Thief looking at the bubbles, or the Thief stealing the film, it's obviously on twos. (Just compare the background characters to the corresponding pencil-test footage in the workprint.) Even so, it runs circles around the Los Angeles animation (especially the L.A. animation's Korean ink and paint work). And note in particular the lighting and cinematography, two big reasons why I think it's the London team.

Anyway, here's a comparison I did between that shot, and the next shot we see of the Brigands after the scene with the caravan:
http://img487.imageshack.us/img487/7876/twofacesofcalvertnd1.jpg
I think the image speaks for itself...
Post
#257084
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/257084/action/topic#257084
Time
For Esn:

Since the Mee-Mee "Maybe something died" was in the workprint, which of course dates from after Mee-Mee being removed from the film, it was obviously intended to be in Williams' final cut. The reason it's such a discrepancy is because it's still a pencil test of Tissa David's animation from c. 1977-80, at a time in which Mee-Mee was still in the film, and the scene. In the workprint, this late-70s animation was featured as a placeholder; new animation would obviously have been done to replace all of those shots, to remove Mee-Mee, redesign Yum-Yum, or replace Mee-Mee with Yum-Yum.

Since Hilary Pritchard's voices for Mee-Mee and Yum-Yum were so similar, the original dialogue was obviously edited down (or re-recorded? The mouth movements sometimes seem off...) to turn it from a scene with Mee-Mee and Yum-Yum into a scene with just Yum-Yum. The "Maybe something died" would have, in a finished version, been uttered by a reanimated Yum-Yum (with correct design).

In fact, in Fred Calvert's workprint (and in the Recobbled Cut), the shot of Yum-Yum holding her nose after smelling the Thief is a pencil test of a reanimated (by Williams' crew) version (obviously done / filmed after the Williams workprint we have, but before his "forced departure"), in which Yum-Yum is drawn with her finalized design, and Mee-Mee is absolutely gone. (For those who have only seen the Recobbled Cut, the workprint instead has Tissa David's late-70s animation in this spot, with the earlier Yum-Yum design, and Mee-Mee in the bath next to her.)

Oh, if only we could find the last Williams workprint (the one from which Calvert got all those new pencil tests and finished shots for *his* workprint)...it would clear a lot of this stuff up...
Post
#256350
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/256350/action/topic#256350
Time
The Weinsteins "liked it so much" that they took the rights with them? Probably almost as dumb as Jake Eberts praising what Miramax did to the film. If the Weinsteins indeed own the film lock, stock and barrel, then we have no hope of the film ever being restored.

But wait a minute...if Don Hahn says that a restoration/reconstruction at *DISNEY* is a "someday" project, then Disney obviously holds some control over the film; Don himself said that they have all the material (film, art, etc.) that Miramax had ended up with.

Hahn being able to even consider such a project possible at all must mean that it must be legally possible for Disney to do its own version.

We can only hope...
Post
#254877
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/254877/action/topic#254877
Time
What a shame. I was so sure that a new release would be a new 16x9 master. Here I was worrying about potential DVNR, and they didn't even do a new master...

What was with all the advance info about it being widescreen then? And I still don't know how The Weinstein Company has any rights to the film; they didn't actually get the rights to their films under Miramax when they broke off...

Hopefully, someone at Disney, the true owners of what could constitute the true film, will get an official project going in the not-too-distant future; hell, I'd work for free on such a project...
Post
#250395
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/250395/action/topic#250395
Time
It's been described on several advance-info sites as "Widescreen Collector's Edition," so it's probably that.

That pop-up cover is horrendous. Especially Tack, who has never been correctly depicted in any post-Williams official material for the film. (Yum-Yum is probably a close second.)

And look! Tack and Yum-Yum. Riding a freakin' magic carpet. Now there's a scene we all remember. Unfortunately, it's from the wrong movie.

Shame. Zig-Zag with the cards and the Thief grasping at the balls are at least vaguely semi-quasi-Williams-esque. But they moved the balls to the top of the palace, which, judging by its design, is also from the wrong movie.

I long for the day when promotion for the film will stop drawing associations with that other movie. Judging by this cover, today is not that day.

At least we'll be getting an anamorphic widescreen version that will undoubtedly be superior to the R2 release.
Post
#248796
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/248796/action/topic#248796
Time
Let's get off that topic...

Does anybody here know if the Cadbury's Caramel "sexy rabbit" ads were done by Williams? They sure look it to me...
One with a beaver: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjQ5Yw72xtA
One with some birds: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D94AegQPmek
(And interestingly, according to further research, the rabbit is voiced by Miriam "Maiden from Mombasa" Margolyes...)

Could this ad for Sweetex Plus sweetener also be Richard Williams?
http://www.tv-ark.org.uk/commercials/commercials_p-s/sweetexplus1985.rm

Or this one for Toys R Us?
http://www.tv-ark.org.uk/commercials/commercials_t-z/toysrus1989.rm

Maybe this one for Um Bongo fruit drink?
http://www.tv-ark.org.uk/commercials/commercials_t-z/umbongo1988.rm

Or United candy?
http://www.tv-ark.org.uk/commercials/commercials_t-z/united1982.rm

Vitalite spread?
http://www.tv-ark.org.uk/commercials/commercials_t-z/vitalite1989.rm

I also found an ad on TV Ark which I *know* to be Williams, because the BFI's database says so.
Corona orangeade "Fizzical": http://www.tv-ark.org.uk/commercials/commercials_a-c/corona1976.rm
Notice the perspective changes, a hallmark of Williams. According to BFI, Williams did a bunch of similar ads for Corona around the same time.

Also according to BFI, Williams did the titles and daydreams for "Here We Go 'Round the Mulberry Bush" (1967), the titles for "30 is a Dangerous Age, Cynthia" (1968; starring Dudley Moore), the titles for "Sebastian" (1968), a cartoon sequence [the "giant car" boardroom pitch] for "The Magic Christian" (1969; starring Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr), the titles for "Gawain and the Green Knight" (1973), and the titles for "Looks and Smiles" (1981).
Post
#243184
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/243184/action/topic#243184
Time
Speaking of who recorded what, we may finally have a concrete year for when Vincent Price first recorded dialogue for Zig-Zag. (I say "first recorded" because, like Anthony Quayle, he probably came back to record more dialogue later.)

In The Psychotronic Video Guide to Film, there's a little mini-bio on Vincent Price. This text is contained within:

"Some credits not reviewed here are:...The Thief and the Cobbler (1974), voice for a British animated feature..."

1974 seems perfect. Nasruddin had been scrapped by then, and Anwar had evolved into Zig-Zag, or something closer to Zig-Zag, by then. (Was Zig-Zag still called Anwar when Price began performing the voice?) To me, the Zig-Zag-like concept artwork of Anwar looks to have come before Price's involvement, probably 1972; the design, though obviously familiar, lacks the flamboyance of Zig-Zag as voiced by Price. Williams certainly put a lot of Price's performance into his animation of Zig-Zag, so I would assume that the Zig-Zag-like Anwar image is from before Price's voice worked its way into Zig-Zag's design.

Though I'm still confused: If the last Anwar design looked like Zig-Zag, and he already looked that close to the final version prior to Price's involvement, what in Pete Sampras is that rat-faced, buck-toothed thing in Art Babbitt's extant footage in the workprint? It seems to have been animated to Price's dialogue, because the mouth movements seem to sync up.

Perhaps I've got the timeline all wrong, and that Anwar design was done AFTER Price had come on board. Meaning that Price DEFINITELY would have come in to do new dialogue later, in particular anything where "Zig-Zag" or "Phido" is uttered.

But anyway...1974. Seems completely logical.
Post
#242891
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/242891/action/topic#242891
Time
A couple days ago, I saw Who Framed Roger Rabbit on the big screen. Naturally, it was absolutely awesome. It was a brand new print, with only minimal problems, and without the (minimal) censorship on the DVD version.

The part with Roger getting flushed down the toilet really reminds me of the similar scene from The Thief and the Cobbler; the animation isn't exactly the same, but both Roger and the Thief do that great stretch effect when they actually get sucked down.

Is it just me, or is one of the caricatures in the Brown Derby photo in Roger's wallet that of Richard Williams?

I still marvel at how Richard Williams nailed Droopy. The Droopy part got laughs and applause from the audience.

When Richard Williams' name appeared on screen, I cheered.
Post
#242399
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/242399/action/topic#242399
Time
Well put, Patrick.

And the Variety ad idea was not intended as some call to arms or expression of outrage, but just a means to help Disney realize that we're out there.

Garrett, I understand your qualms with my idea. I did mention that it was "utterly insane." I did mention that it was "wishful thinking." I've called it a "pipe dream" to Patrick and others. It's just what I said: an "ideal scenario." I know it's unlikely to happen; it's just less unlikely to happen than before this whole Recobbled Cut thing.

I know I'm in over my head with my ideas. It's just something to shoot for. Something to aim at. I always assumed the ultimate outcome of this whole thing would be Disney eventually completing the film as Williams intended before it was taken away from him. It'd be nice for Williams to be alive to see a final version, and be proud of it.

I agree with Garrett about "you have to crawl before you can walk." People with grand schemes need people to pull everything back down to earth. And vice versa.
Post
#242304
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/242304/action/topic#242304
Time
Originally posted by: ocpmovie
To tell the truth, I think that as far as doing what needs to be done to get the word out and get Disney more interested in a reconstruction, this project is accomplishing that already.


That's just it; the objective Patrick and I have discussed is more than just a reconstruction. The most ideal situation would be that Disney would not only restore the finished footage, but actually go back and do the rest of the animation (and re-animate the junk that Calvert wrecked or that the artwork doesn't exist for, through referencing of the workprints and such), preferrably bringing in surviving (and still active) Thief veterans such as Roy Naisbitt, Alex Williams, Holger Leihe, Gary Dunn, and Andreas Wessel-Therhorn, and other Williams protegés such as Eric Goldberg, to animate scenes and help the Disney crew get the Williams look down. (And come on, how many animators would turn down the opportunity to help finish Richard Williams's magnum opus?)

Williams left enough stuff behind that Disney could finish the film without actually having to bring him in to directly work on it. Stanley Kubrick, though not directly involved, offered advice for the restoration of Spartacus, and Richard Donner did the same for the new recut of Superman II (which is one of the recent happenings which has convinced me that such a project is indeed possible).

This is wishful thinking, I know, but it would probably only require $10 million and about a year of work, and could well be out in theaters by 2008 if we started pushing for it now. A Variety ad and full-scale (dare I say, OriginalTrilogy.com-scale) campaign, publicized on other forums, including professional animation-related ones such as Animation Nation, AWN, and The Animation Show, and at places like ASIFA, could help drum up enough voices of support, both inside and outside the animation industry, to convince Disney that it would be profitable to undertake a REAL project to complete the film. I mean, with people like John Lasseter (who, being the ultimate animation geek, almost certainly admires The Thief and the Cobbler) and Don Hahn in high places, the chances of this actually happening are greater now than ever before.

I know it's an utterly insane idea, but it would finally bring a fitting conclusion to the decades-long ordeal...and I'm sure there are plenty of people here who would give their left kidney to see a 100% complete and true to Williams's vision version of The Thief and the Cobbler.
Post
#242082
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/242082/action/topic#242082
Time
Originally posted by: Esn
Whoah... I've been looking for this movie. Is the English version really that much worse? I noticed that Isaac Asimov (a scientist and author whom I very much respect) revised the translation.


I've never actually seen either version, to tell the truth. It was listed on some website (someone predicting that the Weinsteins would screw up Arthur and the Minimoys) with The Thief and the Cobbler and The Magic Roundabout as another example of an animated film ruined by Miramax/Weinstein. Unfortunately, no actual comparison of the French and U.S. versions exists anywhere. I just know that it was rescored, rewritten, edited, and that Harvey Weinstein put his director credit about Laloux's. Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned it in the first place, since I don't know anything about it.

I guess you'll just have to watch it for yourself, and find out. I shouldn't have jumped to conclusions just from the guy's description. I'd never even heard about the film before I read said page, so I apologize for making such a rash statement.

Anyway...this is about The Thief and the Cobbler. Let's not get off-topic here.
Post
#241972
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/241972/action/topic#241972
Time
Well, who would have trusted the Weinsteins to do anything truly good with the same film they were responsible for the final bloody mangling of?

Disney may have owned Miramax at the time, but trust me, the Weinsteins were the ones who ruled the roost just the same.

These are the same Weinsteins who only left "Princess Mononoke" untouched because Hayao Miyazaki sent them a real samurai sword, with the note "NO CUTS."
These are the same Weinsteins who were partners in crime, with fellow Thief-wrecker Jake Eberts, on the generally despised Americanization of the "Magic Roundabout" movie.
This is the same Harvey Weinstein who oversaw the re-editing, rewriting, rescoring, and celebrity-cast English dubbing of René Laloux's "Gandahar," retitled "Light Years," then had the audacity to give himself a director credit, ABOVE Laloux's.

This is why I believe that, given the right push, Disney could very well actually be able to restore and complete the film, true to Williams's vision. Simply put, the right people are in control now, and the people who were in control then aren't there anymore.
Post
#241829
Topic
The Thief and the Cobbler: Recobbled Director's Cut (Released)
Link
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/241829/action/topic#241829
Time
Originally posted by: ocpmovie
[DaveHolmes] thought it was a 2 disc set when that's not mentioned anywhere.


You know, looking back at it, you're right. *Wah wah wahhhhh*

And thinking about it, I'm more and more convinced that the Weinsteins only control the Arabian Knight hackjob. How they even own that, when they didn't take any of the Miramax/Dimension catalog with them after splitting from Disney, is beyond me...

At least we'll get Arabian Knight with superior quality and framing than what has come before.