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Preserving "French" Original Trilogy - ANH V1.0 released - ESB in progress — Page 10

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Yes, you are right, I made a mistake. 

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No problemo. I can't wait to see the scans anyway! I mostly can't wait to hear the original French mono track as you already know! :-)

“English, motherf***er! Do you speak it!?”

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Is it just me, or the starfield background is missing from the last two clips? Or is the picture just too dark to recognize them?

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Laserschwert said:

It's interesting that there WERE French credits though. This might be an indication, that there were in fact German credits as well, which I didn't know of.

 Not necessarily. The French seem to usually translate the entire credits sequences (and continue to do so). In Germany, this is rather an exception (from 50s till the 70s it was done more often, but in the 80es, it rather went down).

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TheHutt said:

Is it just me, or the starfield background is missing from the last two clips? Or is the picture just too dark to recognize them?

 The picture is too dark and the compression doesn't help, but the starfield is here.

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Ah, I see.

PS: on TESB, the French end credits of the TV rip are clearly in a wrong font (not the one used in the English version).

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Another vidéo : ROJ subtitles taken from the Laserdisc and a TV broadcast (4:3 pan&scan). The laserdisc subtitles seems to be the original subtitles.

http://vimeo.com/139154832 (pass: ot.com)

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Yup, look authentic to me (and also in line with the German theatrical subs for ROTJ).

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I have started working on the french ESB crawl. Vielen Dank an Laserschwert who share with me the template he use to make the ANH crawl.

Here is the first version of the crawl redone. It's not perfect and the layers don't always move correctly, but it's a first step.

http://vimeo.com/143122633 (pass : ot.com )

What do you think about the colors of the letters ? Is ESB using the same color as ANH ? In the scan I made from the VHS and LD, the letters are more yellow, less orange.

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That password doesn't work for me.

Luke threw twice…maybe.

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Password corrected, sorry, it should now work.

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Just found this interresing text in the great book “La guerre des étoiles : la saga Star Wars vue de France” :

I’ll translate it soon, but if someone want to translate it quick himself, he is welcome !

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Here is the translation :

    Considering the success met by the movie in the US, the French version of Star Wars will be exploited in stereo, but the installations of the SND allow only some mono mixing. Pierre Davanture puts immediately an option on the “Cathedral”, the biggest auditorium of the SIMO, in the studios of Boulogne-Billancourt. He wishes to join Jean Nény, who designed it. This outstanding technician makes only few dubbing, but agrees, for his friend Pierre Davanture, to attend Star Wars projection in Saint-Ouen. Jean Nény, impressed by the movie, is convinced and agrees to realize the mixing. In August 1977, he locks himself into the Cathedral to mix the various French voices with the international bands containing sound effects, extraterrestrial voices, as well as John William music. The American sound engineer Ben Burtt, the creator of Star Wars revolutionary sound universe, comes in Boulogne-Billancourt to oversee the final phase of the French version and so becomes the first spectator of La Guerre des étoiles.

    The work is not ended. The release prints are made in the United States and the sound is added in Saint-Cloud at LTC laboratories. The Dolby process not being used in France, the stereo mix of the French version is recorded on magnetic strips, 4 for 35mm and 6 for the 70mm. These magnetic strips are added to the film by LTC using a machine made by Pyral, company which participates, at the same time and with the same process, in the manufacturing of the tickets of the Parisian subway.

    On Wednesday, October 19th, 1977, with a week of delay, Twentieh Century Fox France, associated with Gaumont, starts the exploitation. 23 copies go out in first exclusivity to Paris and its periphery. 13 are distributed in the capital, including three in original version. For the French version, are exploited two 70mm copies (6 tracks), one at “Le Grand Rex”, the other one at “Pathé Marignan”, two 35mm copies (4 magnetic tracks) and finally, six 35mm mono copies. On October 26th the movie goes out throughout the country, and so we discover La Guerre des étoiles… Il y a bien longtemps…


So there was 3 mixes : a 6 tracks mix (70mm) , a 4 tracks mix (35mm) and a mono mix. But it seems that there are all based on the same stereo mix.

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I corrected a few mistakes, Marvins. Hope you don’t mind.

Considering the success met by the movie in the US, the French version of Star Wars will be released in stereo, but SND* theaters only allow mono mixes. Pierre Davanture immediately reserved the “Cathedral”, the biggest auditorium of the SIMO, in the studios of Boulogne-Billancourt. He wished to include Jean Nény, who designed it. This outstanding technician only does a few dubbings, but he agreed to attend a projection of Star Wars in Saint-Ouen for his friend Pierre Davanture. Impressed by the movie, Jean Nény was convinced and agreed to do the mix. In August 1977, he locked himself into the Cathedral to mix the various French voices with the international tracks containing sound effects, extraterrestrial voices, as well as John Williams’ music. The American sound engineer Ben Burtt, the creator of Star Wars’ revolutionary sound universe, came to Boulogne-Billancourt to oversee the final phase of the French version and therefore became the first spectator of La Guerre des étoiles.
    The work did not end there. The release prints were made in the United States and the sound was added in Saint-Cloud at LTC laboratories. Because the Dolby process is not currently used in France, the stereo mix of the French version was recorded on magnetic strips: 4 for 35mm and 6 for 70mm. These magnetic strips were added to the film by LTC using a machine made by Pyral, a company which is also involved, at the same time and with the same process, in the manufacturing of the tickets of the Parisian subway.
    On Wednesday, October 19th, 1977, with a week’s delay, Twentieth Century Fox France, associated with Gaumont, began distribution. 23 copies premiered exclusively in Paris and its periphery. 13 were distributed in the capital, including three in its original English version. For the French version, two 70mm copies (6 tracks) were distributed: one at “Le Grand Rex”, the other one at “Pathé Marignan” along with two 35mm copies (4 magnetic tracks) and finally, six 35mm mono copies. On October 26th the movie was released throughout the country, and this is how we will discover La Guerre des étoiles… A long time ago…

*SND: Société Nouvelle de Distrubution. A French film distributer now owned by M6

What’s the internal temperature of a TaunTaun? Luke warm.

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Mavimao said:

I corrected a few mistakes, Marvins. Hope you don’t mind.

No problem, I dont have a perfect english. Thanks !

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Hi everyone,

I just have one essential and silly question : where can I get such a marvel ??? (send me PM please 😉

Thank you so much in advance, and may the Force be with you in 2016 !

Major General Maximilian Veers
Imperial Army
Commanding officer of the Blizzard Force of the Death Squadron at the Battle of Hoth
(actually I am not an admiral, damn it !)

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As I grew up with the very soft “ça ne m’étonne pas”, I had never heard that “pauvre cave”. This change is as significant for the scene as the stupid Greedo’s fire.

Some replicas of the french dub might have been written by Audiard !

The subtitles have been changed for the SE to better match the original text, haven’t they ? It seems to me Greedo mentions the imperial cruiser etc.

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I’ve transcribed the 16mm subtitles. Could anyone check if they look OK? Some of the subtitles are hard to read, and I don’t know French. Also, does anyone know if the tractor beam controls (around 1h23m) were subtitled in the French theatrical release?

Tu pars en voyage, Solo ?

Trop tard. Fallait payer en temps voulu.

Jabba a mis ta tête à prix, on te recherche
dans toute la galaxie pour te descendre.

Je vais toucher la prime !

Donne-le-moi et j’oublierai que je t’ai vu.

Jabba en a marre de toi.

Il n’aime pas que les passeurs…

…jettent la camelote par-dessus bord.

Jabba se contentera peut-être
de confisquer ton engin.

Je m’en charge !

Ça fait des années que j’attends ce moment.

Project Threepio (Star Wars OOT subtitles)

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CatBus said:

Also, does anyone know if the tractor beam controls (around 1h23m) were subtitled in the French theatrical release?

In the french 16mm reels there is no subtitle for the tractor beam controls.