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James Bond - The Living Daylights - 35mm (Released)

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 (Edited)

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2017 is a big year for James Bond anniversaries. It marks the 50th anniversary of You Only Live Twice, the 40th anniversary of The Spy Who Loved Me, the 30th anniversary of The Living Daylights and the 20th anniversary of Tomorrow Never Dies.

It is almost exactly 30 years to the day since I saw The Living Daylights at a cinema in London. I was 12 years old, and had already seen most of the other Bond films already, and I thought it was fantastic. After the film I went out and bought everything James Bond that I could find, which wasn’t much - just Sally Hibbin’s books and the book on tape version of the film - but I’m still collecting all things Bond to this day and sharing as much as I can of it with fans via The007Dossier.com

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago I was offered the chance to buy an original UK print of the film and before I could say “But I have it on Blu-ray,” the 12 year old inside me was sending the money and the deal was done.

THE ASSIGNMENT

But having bought the print, I don’t have enough money left to get it scanned, and (not having access to a 35mm projector) unless I get it scanned we’re not going to get to watch it and find out just how heavy handed Lowry Digital was with the DNR… A few years ago I had a 35mm trailer of this film scanned. The film was missing the last few seconds so (without making any effort to blend them) I replaced the missing frames using the trailer from the Bluray (35mm in the middle, blu-ray on the sides):

35mm vs Bluray

The print appears to be in excellent condition:




Here it is being projected at an undisclosed location, somewhere in Europe (click on the image to see the video clips):

Scanning will cost around $820 (€720)

From what little I have seen of it, the print looks nice and clean but we could (if there is enough interest) send the print for the same ultrasonic cleaning that Poita used on ESB. That would cost an additional $1200, so whether or not that happens will depend on how much interest there is in the project. It sounds like a lot of money, and it is for any one person, but all it would actually take is for 20 people to donate $100 each.

DOSSIERS

The print will be scanned in 4K and available as a fan edit to anyone who already owns the official bluray. It’s too early to say whether or not any digital cleanup will be needed, or how long the project might take, but I’ll keep you posted in this thread.

  • UHD MKV
  • A 1080p Blu-ray, with menus and extras including 35mm Trailers, and other exclusive bonus content from my archives (TBD).

How will you get them out?
“Sorry, old man, section 26, paragraph 5. Need-to-know. Sure you understand.”

ALLIES

The print has been purchased and is ready for shipping.

Minimum Target (scanning only) $820
Maximum Target (cleaning and scanning) $2020

Pledges so far: $400

Anonymous: $100
Williarob: $100
Soupdrinker0: $200

TheStarWarsTrilogy.com.
The007Dossier.com.
Donations always welcome: Paypal | Bitcoin: bc1qzr9ejyfpzm9ea2dglfegxzt59tys3uwmj26ytj

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My next few payments are spoken for with other scan projects but I can give 200 round the end of August for this 😃

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This is going to be a really great project! For those not as film-savvy, this is a UK print on Fujifilm. It’ll have a different look to the US prints that were on Kodak LPP. Just like Star Wars on Technicolor looked different to Star Wars on Kodak, and Titanic on acetate looks different to Titanic on polyester. What a treat this will be to have the domestic UK version preserved!

Here is the same video posted in the OP (made up of three shot clips joined together) from a projection of the print, but with no flicker reduction etc as applied to the one uploaded by Williarob:


Password: tld-35mm-Fuji

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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Williarob said:

Soupdrinker0 said:

My next few payments are spoken for with other scan projects but I can give 200 round the end of August for this 😃

That’s fantastic, thank you so much!

Quite welcome Williarob, happy to help out - can’t get enough of these scans.

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Bumping in hopes this gains a little momentum and another pledge or two…if that isn’t kosher don’t berate me too harshly but harsh enough for me to learn please.

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Sorry, I was on Vacation. But I’m back now and the print should be on its way to the scanner any day now, so if you are interested in this project and you are willing and able to donate some money, please send me a PM. Thank you!

TheStarWarsTrilogy.com.
The007Dossier.com.
Donations always welcome: Paypal | Bitcoin: bc1qzr9ejyfpzm9ea2dglfegxzt59tys3uwmj26ytj

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Holy shit this is amazing! If you’ll still be needing funds next month I should be able to donate then.

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It will probably be much better than the next Daniel Craig Bond too! 😛

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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Quick update: The scanner I was going to send this to is a little backed up at the moment - it could take more than 6 months to get the print scanned there, so I’m currently exploring some alternative options…

TheStarWarsTrilogy.com.
The007Dossier.com.
Donations always welcome: Paypal | Bitcoin: bc1qzr9ejyfpzm9ea2dglfegxzt59tys3uwmj26ytj

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That looks fantastic, Rob!

I just happened to watch the opening sequence on Hulu the other day and it was a terrible low-res upscale or something, so I turned it off. But this I would watch.

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I was going to ask why a 35mm print would have an edge over the current Blu-ray… but then I did a comparison. The color timing done for the Blu-ray is a mess, and they’ve crushed a lot of shadow detail. I’m guessing this is the case with most of the Bond transfers (minus OHMSS – which has clipped whites)?

“That said, there is nothing wrong with mocking prequel lovers and belittling their bad taste.” - Alderaan, 2017

MGGA (Make GOUT Great Again):
http://originaltrilogy.com/topic/Return-of-the-GOUT-Preservation-and-Restoration/id/55707

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The issue with the Bonds is a mixed one - some of them look great on Bluray and they have done a good restoration job, others were rushed to meet the deadline and look awful. Really they should have restored them in batches instead of trying to do all 22 Bonds (at the time) at once.

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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RU.08 said:

The issue with the Bonds is a mixed one - some of them look great on Bluray and they have done a good restoration job, others were rushed to meet the deadline and look awful. Really they should have restored them in batches instead of trying to do all 22 Bonds (at the time) at once.

IIRC they basically did the great restorations for the most popular films, then rushed the rest.

“You don’t really mean you’ll kill me, do you?” - Juror 8
“Silence, Earthling! My name is Darth Vader. I am an extra-terrestrial from the planet Vulcan!” - Calvin “Marty” Klein

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I think it was more determined by what order they did the films in. From memory most of the Sean Connery films were done well, but then Goldeneye which is by far the most popular Brosnan Bond is a DNR-heavy mess.

Maybe we should look for a GoldenEye print? 😉

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]

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All 6 reels have now been scanned, and from what I’ve seen, the whole film looks incredible. It will be a couple of weeks before I receive the full raw scan, but I should be able to post some more samples around Christmas time 😃

TheStarWarsTrilogy.com.
The007Dossier.com.
Donations always welcome: Paypal | Bitcoin: bc1qzr9ejyfpzm9ea2dglfegxzt59tys3uwmj26ytj

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Looking forward to it. The colors are incredible.

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I’m still downloading the nearly 2 TB of frames (it will probably take another 9 days, downloading 24/7 to grab them all) but I now have enough to put together a few samples. Here’s the first, from Reel 2:

Living Daylights Sample

This is essentially just the raw scan - the aspect ratio has been corrected and the contrast adjusted, but there’s no digital cleanup or color grading going on here.

Note: The audio is from the laserdisc. The optical audio track for reel 2 hasn’t been downloaded yet - it’s still in the queue!

TheStarWarsTrilogy.com.
The007Dossier.com.
Donations always welcome: Paypal | Bitcoin: bc1qzr9ejyfpzm9ea2dglfegxzt59tys3uwmj26ytj

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Ah! What a beautiful new directive!!!
You’re right it’s definitely not color graded but already the detail is wonderful and the black levels are great!!

VADER!? WHERE THE HELL IS MY MOCHA LATTE? -Palpy on a very bad day.
“George didn’t think there was any future in dead Han toys.”-Harrison Ford
YT channel:
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It’s looking great!

[ Scanning stuff since 2015 ]