thxita

Well, I'm surprised but not entirely. Judging from the Italian version, localizing this film seem to have been more of an afterthought than anything. In fact, most of the alteration made to localize it are half-assed or at least they were made as cheaply as possible: freezeframing the panning of the terminator before the English text appears, cutting out "THE" from the title in the most unconvincing way (since here it is distribuited simply as "Terminator"), remaking the entire end credits with generic font and fading-out before the original credits start and so on... 

The only effects that are properly done are the names and roles of the cast in the intro. From the US they must have provided a blank version only of the intro where each foreign country would have added their own localization, so I expected at least that intro in the French and German versions.

Considering that it was perceived as a cheap B-movie, probably distributors in other foreign countries never bothered spending more money to substitute any text (except for Italy).

We also had T2 with Italian localization but unfortunately it can only be found on VHS... and 35mm obviously :/

MrBrown said:

Hi, nice idea! As from Germany, seeing localized Versions dimish with upcoming of DVD and BD from the home cinema market, I really would love to see more movies with intact German localization.

I don't know, if terminator was localized in theatres, but the LD only has english opening credits.

Do you know what release date does the German LD have?

According to this website ( http://www.lddb.com/search.php?search=the+terminator&sort=title&format=ld ), there are two German versions: one has an unknown release date and another is from 1995 (possibly a later release).
France also has two releases, one from 1985 and another with unknown date.

Perhaps later releases from the 90s made use of the original US master while earlier ones came from the "regional" versions?

That's odd. VHS and LDs here in Italy generally came with the theatrical version, so if the film was localized one can always verify that by checking the VHS tape.

Surely France had a localized version! Any French owner of Terminator on LD/VHS?

Me and Leonardo are working on recreating the Italian version of Terminator with fully localized titles, credits and Terminator POV HUD.

Most of our reference material is based on the Italian Laserdisc and a version that comes from a tape for TV broadcasting which had even higher details than the LD - both containing the theatrical release) and we plan on making use of the already existing “1080p regraded” version by substituting all the localized text with a process similar to that used by Harmy for his Star Wars preservation.

We thought this would be a good occasion to work on other foreign releases of the same film, since we are at work to remove all the text.

Am I right to guess that at least Germany and France had their own localized versions on Laserdisc?
 

We are looking for owners of foreign releases of Terminator on Laserdisc who would like to add their Country’s version to our preservation project.
 

Leonardo will add some of the screengrabs from the TV broadcast, just to give you an idea. These will be redone in 1080p to match the regraded version, obviously. Currently we are working on recreating the font (which for most parts is different from the American one).

**ADDED NOTE:

We found out that Terminator in 1984 was never localised in any other languages other than Italian so this preservation will be limited to Italian.

Well, since we are there at fixing... my name has changed from erri_wan to thxita in these years ;)

I'm for a "include every single scene in exsistence" version, whichever that might be! Ahah

I wouldn't get too fixated on the running time, too many variables there (we already established pages and pages ago that some of those running times were just typos or based on information found on books and similar). I don't see it as too important a topic. All it counts is what original material we can get our hands on.

Imdb info rely on users, that info came from the usual 2004 DVD documentary. I'm not saying it's false but anything that George Lucas says since 1997 should be always re-checked twice

Msycamore, you are the most qualified for that!

Ahahahah!

since this thread has become a real monster to browse, maybe we should think of a way to summarize all the info collected so far on this film. A wiki perhaps? With source links directed to specific posts of this thread? I don't know, something like that.

our original guess about the Italian cut is that Warner may have experimented their idea of putting the end of the movie at the beginning when they released it in Italy. The little success of the film also in Italy perhaps made them rethink the whole thing for the other European releases.

Lucas might have never known about the Italian cut or more likely he just ignored it so his story of success against the evil Warner could sound even more successful.

I wish I had managed to talk to the director of the Italian dubbing (now deceased) to know if the narration was in the print they received from Warner or if it was an adaptation choice that they decided locally. From the way the Italian cut is structured, my guess is that they did have a narration also in English. The question is: did Duval do it? Would he remember doing it? It's all so bizarre.

Is the 16mm also 4:3 ratio?

The Italian version contains the whole scene of SEN with the kids. Unfortunately it's only in 4:3 so I'm not sure how you can possibly blend it with the rest :(

another problem: was the English audio of that scene found? I can't remember. The Italian version is dubbed

I have recently changed computer and unfortunately all my attempts to reseed THX have failed miserably, the only solution is re-downloading it and leaving it in seed again for future users... only problem is that I see no active peers.

Could anyone seed it so I can download it and be the bearer of the torch?

Thank you for your help

WOW I'm in the hall of fame! I'm not worthy, I'm not worthy

I love the colours and the photography in general of this film!

Which versions of that list have we actually "seen"? Which one haven't emerged yet?

...aaaand the odd Italian edit (available on VHS, containing the extra shots of SEN and the narrated flashback edit), which should go on a parallel time-line like on the blackboard of Back To The Future II :lol

Since eBay links are not forever, is there anyone saving this rare stuff on his PC/hard disk/cloud space?

Sentenza is the Italian equivalent of Angel Eyes in the English adaptation. Just to be clear

More rare than the print you just acquired, it's seeing a fellow Italian selling a thing like that! The guy must be really broke, usually this stuff never resurfaces from Italian collectors' basements

I don't know if the lens used in the final scene is that special other than being a tele or super tele with filters. Probably the filters used are harder to guess than the lens. Will you try to emulate that shot with a tele lens?

I have them all, the Italian ones I mean, they can be also found in the released Italian version as extra.

I remember the drawing on the floor from other pictures. Perhaps a cut scene that never made it even into the theatrical cut