The Aluminum Falcon said:
The "A Hard Day's Night" preservation is all done, and only needs menus and a few of the extras to be finished off. I've also included the extra rare original theatrical mono mix (only ever available on the first issue of the MPI VHS back in the 1980's) in PCM format. The mono/stereo upgrade mix used on all other MPI and Criterion releases is also included in PCM sourced from the Criterion 2 disk laser set.
I've found another "Lawrence of Arabia" disk set with AC-3 audio. I was going to add that to my Criterion preservation.
Wow! Tell me when A Hard Day's Night is completely done, FanFiltration. I'm a big Beatles fan and would be very interested in getting a copy of the final project. I'm so eager to listen to the mono mix.
I will post when it's all done. The original (film only) mono mix is not that great I'm afraid. The sound is kind of flat with little fidelity. This is how it is presented on the first issue VHS tape. The only other way I would assume that you could obtain this mix would be from a 16 or 35 mm print, and I'm not sure the sound elements would be any better. I'm sure MPI did the best they could with what source they had at the time their first VHS version was produced. The great thing about VHS back in the early and mid 80's was that the tapes had a high quality and stood up much better then later tapes. This was because video tape were only used for rentals back then. Tapes of movies could cost close to $100, so not many people owned films. So anyway, my source was of excellent quality, and I used a very good 4 head VHS player. I can understand why they felt they had to replace the songs with the British LP stereo mix when the restoration was done circa 1982. But there is a fan interest out there for historical reasons that this lost original mono mix should (and must) be preserved. The mono mix of the songs used for the current official home video release are taken from the British mono LP and single mixes, and differ from the exclusive original (film only) mixes. I'm sure the tapes given to United Artists of these tunes for insertion into the film are long destroyed, or hiding in someones basement.