THX 1138 "preservations" + the 'THX 1138 Italian Cut' project (Released) — Page 47

Another poster I've never seen before...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/THX-1138-GEORGE-LUCAS-ORIG-BRAZILIAN-1-SH-MOVIE-POSTER-/280913782862?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4167c4284e

For a movie that was considered a box office failure, it seems to have enjoyed a large worldwide release. I wonder if the accountants at Warner's hid some profits from George at the time?

^ Quite similar to the US one-sheet.

I'm actually working on the video again, despite my previous claim that I was done with it. I've learned some new things regarding nominal analogue blanking: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominal_analogue_blanking

and how this affect how transfers appear on screengrabs etc, you may recall that I was correcting the aspect ratio due to it being slightly vertically stretched, but DVD transfers such as the 2004 one don't take nominal analogue blanking into account, the LD transfer do, so a circle shouldn't appear as a perfect circle on screengrabs like they do on the official DVD. The LD transfer is vertically stretched though, I just redoing my calculations slightly so that it will appear correct on playback. Damn these things are confusing sometimes...

The LD format was littered with widescreen transfers that were incorrect in one way or the other, so don't feel bad.

Since THX was filmed in an unusual format anyway, I've never expected it to look perfect. The vertical stretch might even be in the dodgy print they used, just like Coily.

It might be a common problem on old transfers, I encountered the same issue on my Technidisc pressing of SW, on that one, only some reels were affected, I think they just didn't scan the prints correctly sometimes, the widescreen format on video was also still relatively new back in the early '90's.

I guess most people don't even noticed or cared but I tend to spot these sort of anomalies and it irritates me. ;) Speaking about that, I wonder if Coily may perhaps be on the negative.

Don't thank me yet... and just keep your expectations low as it's still just a LD transfer, but your encouragement is appreciated. :)

DisgruntledFan said:

I got a few 35mm film cels from a THX 1138 trailer recently and I've scanned them at decent resolution. I'd be happy to upload them somewhere if anyone was interested. PM me.

Did you get my PM? I would love to see your scans.

Also, SilverWook or thxita, did you ever save my srt file of the english subtitle stream I posted way back, if so and if you still got it I'm interested to get it as I lost it in my HD crash.

Is it the one for the Italian cut?

Oh, I forgot to mention it, it's the subtitles I did for the '78 restored english version of the film, I think I may have posted them but if you guys don't have it it's not the end of the world, it would just save me a lot of time if I decided to include them. I had not yet synced them to the film though.

You could try LAB or XYZ for color correcting that 16mm footage, might come in handy. :)

http://www.infognition.com/VirtualDubFilters/color_correction.html

Yes, that's the sub file I was talking about, I'm glad you still have it. :) Silver didn't, so it would be great if you could please send it to me when you are able to, thanks.

Rogue-theX, thanks for the suggestion, will check it out.

I must admit I've never seen the 2004 DVD version more than once in its entirety but when I'm now going through it side-by-side with the real director's cut to make adjustments to the aspect ratio I'm amazed by the high level of differences in it, the amount of digital manipulation is insane, the Special Editions of the Star Wars trilogy don't even come close to the tinkering that's been done on this.

I'm still amused by the title "The George Lucas Director's Cut", should that title suggest someone else was the director of the film earlier but it's now George Lucas who is the director? I mean wouldn't calling it "Director's Cut" be enough. Either it is a director's cut or it's not, maybe Lucas are trying to tell us that the young director is now replaced by an older much different Lucas. The title is so stupid on so many levels I cannot find words for it. :)

Anyway, the amount of warping on the print used for the Laserdisc makes it next to impossible to overlay it and match the DVD transfer, in doing so, I resized the '04 DVD from 720x480 to 704x480 so that I could make adjustments more accurately but it will never be perfect, but it will be much more accurate than just a straight resize to 16:9.

What's equally amazing is how little publicity the changes got compared to the Special Editions. You'd think there would be a documentary bit with George explaining how that little albino lizard bit him, when he tried gluing antennae and wings on it back in 1970. ;)

This also seems to be the beginning of the trend to not even credit the people who worked on the new shots.

SilverWook said:

You'd think there would be a documentary bit with George explaining how that little albino lizard bit him, when he tried gluing antennae and wings on it back in 1970. ;)

That would've been something. :) What surprises me the most, is the extreme re-editing that took place, I simply cannot understand the reason for it other than it was done just for the sake of re-doing it. I'm no editor, but I cannot see what the new editing accomplish other than being different. I mean he was the editor on the original film, he and assistant editor Marcia had already done a great job on it. Sigh...

thxita said:

I'm back home only on the 19th, will that slow you down msycamore?

No problem, as you have the file I'm just happy that I don't need to re-doing it from scratch.

DisgruntledFan said:

Still in orbit - we de-orbit in about a week. Need to find somewhere to upload em'. Watch your mailbox then.

 

Nice, looking forward to it. :)

msycamore said:

I must admit I've never seen the 2004 DVD version more than once in its entirety but when I'm now going through it side-by-side with the real director's cut to make adjustments to the aspect ratio I'm amazed by the high level of differences in it, the amount of digital manipulation is insane, the Special Editions of the Star Wars trilogy don't even come close to the tinkering that's been done on this.

I'm still amused by the title "The George Lucas Director's Cut", should that title suggest someone else was the director of the film earlier but it's now George Lucas who is the director? I mean wouldn't calling it "Director's Cut" be enough. Either it is a director's cut or it's not, maybe Lucas are trying to tell us that the young director is now replaced by an older much different Lucas. The title is so stupid on so many levels I cannot find words for it. :)

Anyway, the amount of warping on the print used for the Laserdisc makes it next to impossible to overlay it and match the DVD transfer, in doing so, I resized the '04 DVD from 720x480 to 704x480 so that I could make adjustments more accurately but it will never be perfect, but it will be much more accurate than just a straight resize to 16:9.

I was shocked to hear about the DVD release back in '04, because I only was able to see the film staying up very late one night in the 90's to catch it on TCM. (On a weeknight before school, which took much arguing with parents to do) I bought the DVD and was surprised to see just how "clean" it looked. The white everywhere just seemed to be too white and stark and the changes were not subtle. Then I found the angrysun LD transfer and realized the extent of how much we were duped. It is much much much worse than the SE, because you don't realize how much has actually been changed. And the changes ruin the entire meaning of the film to boot. I watched the DVD once and have wanted to junk it ever since.

IDK what freaking print source they used for the LD, but you're quite right it is quite poor. You'd think it would be easy to pull a clean print as it's not like THX was ever a huge rental and they did make a director's cut with the few minutes put back in afterwards.

In any case, Techniscope does not look like the DVD. I've seen original Techniscope prints projected and they have a distinctive look to them that underlines the inherent grittiness in THX's world.

Freaking CGI monkeys. I'm surprised he didn't just "put the freaks up front".

I hated the CGI chase scenes even more than the monkeys.  They are poorly done, repetitive of other, older footage (shades of Jabba's deleted scene repeating lines from the previous Greedo scene) and wreck the look and feel of the movie.  That THX was made as an attempt to make a futuristic-looking movie using only existing locations and available light makes this "special edition" all the worse.

And the re-editing is just bizarre.  Certain scenes are re-ordered to confusing effect, alternate takes are substituted frequently, and in general, the GLDC favors faster cutting between actors in a dialogue scene.  One of my biggest pet peeves is how the "faces around the room" scene (when Duvall suspects others know his secret) is sped up to make room for other cuts.  

The original THX did not at all feel like an American movie.  The style of the movie (particularly the editing) reminded me a lot of Antonioni.  The GLDC was a poor attempt to infuse a lot of kinetic energy into a movie that was designed for slow burns and oppressive atmosphere.  

As I've said many times before, when the documentary on the DVD cuts to a CGI cityscape as George talks about using real locations in 1970, my jaw dropped.

If Lucas really wanted those kind of shots back then, he probably could have gone with matte paintings. Guys like Albert Whitlock were still practicing their craft in the industry at the time.

As it is, those sprawling cityscapes undercut the claustrophobic underground vibe.

silverwheel said:

The original THX did not at all feel like an American movie.  The style of the movie (particularly the editing) reminded me a lot of Antonioni.  The GLDC was a poor attempt to infuse a lot of kinetic energy into a movie that was designed for slow burns and oppressive atmosphere.  

Maybe that's one reason the movie seems to have enjoyed a wide release outside the U.S. :)