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What Would You Like To See Restored?; For Starters!
Topic Started: Mar 9 2006, 10:09 PM (3,586 Views)
panzer the great & terrible
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Mouth Breather
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Some folks do, I grant you that. Gravy's a fan if memory serves. It just happens to bore me.
Life is just a bowl of cherries, it's too mysterious, don't take it serious...
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riddlerider
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MONSTER AND THE APE is one of the few things Panzer and I agree on. I'm still hoping someone will come up with technology that would transform all safety prints of it into nitrate, so that the silly thing decomposes as soon as possible.

The use of the term "restoration" for "good video transfer" always throws me until I realize what you guys are talking about. Restoration is something you do with film elements, not bootleg DVDs.

For those interested in the restoration or preservation of original nitrate film elements, time is running out. THE GREEN ARCHER was mentioned above; when I first saw the feature version's surviving 35mm footage in 1990, Reel Three was already deteriorating but Reels Four and Five looked okay. UCLA made a color safety negative of Reel Three soon afterward and then junked the nitrate reel. Some years later -- maybe around 1995 or '96 -- one of my buddies at the Archive ran Reels Four and Five for me again. By this time they, too, showed serious signs of decomposition, despite being stored in UCLA's climate-controlled vault. I was told there wasn't enough money to preserve them, and unless somebody has since ponied up the dough, those reels might already have disintegrated. Anyway, that's what I'm afraid of. At one time UCLA asked me to write introductory text titles to accompany a planned preservation of the existing footage. But I haven't heard anything about GREEN ARCHER's status in years, and I'm afraid it's because the other two reels were too far gone to be saved.

UCLA had lots of other 35mm nitrate serial chapters in need of preservation, but I don't know how many were actually copied. Some of the stuff was in good shape when I saw it, but nitrate is very unpredictable. Lord only knows how much of it still survives. In the late '90s I was given a list of the Archive's serial holdings and asked to submit a priority list of material to be preserved. I've not been in contact with any of my friends there in several years now and have no idea what's been copied lately.

PIRATE TREASURE was also mentioned above. Universal holds a 35mm fine grain protection print struck from the camera negative, so this serial could still be restored. Not too many years ago, before the big vault fire, Universal's Bob O'Neill had scheduled the 1932 Tom Tyler serial JUNGLE MYSTERY for preservation. But there seemed to be a question as to whether or not they had all the original nitrate elements, and after the fire the project was shelved so that Bob could concentrate on replacing the prints and tape masters lost in the blaze. Other Universal films are now being restored, but JUNGLE MYSTERY has yet to be rescheduled.
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andarius
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What Would You Like To See Restored?

Hmm..

My bank account! :D
That Larry "Buster" Crabbe Tarzan serial.
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Pa Stark
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A lot of us are still waiting for some word on what the big announcement that Gravy mentioned VCI would make.
Honest and Lovable Pa Stark
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Chandu
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Pa Stark
Aug 21 2012, 08:42 PM
A lot of us are still waiting for some word on what the big announcement that Gravy mentioned VCI would make.
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Not plane, nor bird, nor even frog. It's just little ol' me...
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panzer the great & terrible
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Yup, me too!

Life is just a bowl of cherries, it's too mysterious, don't take it serious...
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andarius
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Chandu
Aug 22 2012, 11:25 AM
Pa Stark
Aug 21 2012, 08:42 PM
A lot of us are still waiting for some word on what the big announcement that Gravy mentioned VCI would make.
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LOL! :D
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mort bakaprevski
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Was that announcement ever made??????
"Nov Shmoz Ka Pop."
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panzer the great & terrible
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I suspect that Mr.G's info from VCI has dried up a bit. He's welcome to correct me if I'm wrong. He may be too Olive for them.
Life is just a bowl of cherries, it's too mysterious, don't take it serious...
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Laughing Gravy
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I haven't heard from them in a while, that is true. No idea if it's the Olive thing or what, but I'm too busy to worry about it. They had asked me not to mention anything specific because it was "under negotiations" and I'm not comfortable going any further than that, since I promised.
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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turan38
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I'd like to see any surviving material from Universal's "Lightning Express" and "The Jade Box," both 1930.
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panzer the great & terrible
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Mouth Breather
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Well, so would I, and there probably are surviving chapters in private collections.
Life is just a bowl of cherries, it's too mysterious, don't take it serious...
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Laughing Gravy
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Our buddy Trevor's newly upgraded The Sea Hound has arrived in the Balcony; I will duly watch and review anon!
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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riddlerider
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turan38
Aug 12 2013, 06:01 PM
I'd like to see any surviving material from Universal's "Lightning Express" and "The Jade Box," both 1930.

Surviving nitrate elements from JADE BOX were already deteriorating in the late '80s, when TARZAN THE TIGER was temporarily "liberated" and transferred. I was told that only a few chapters survived complete; others were represented by odd reels of separate picture and track. And even those seemed to be in bad shape. Ditto for another 1929-30 Universal serial, TERRY OF THE TIMES. I don't remember hearing anything about LIGHTNING EXPRESS, although its remnants should have been in the same storage facility.

I'd be very surprised if any of that footage was salvageable today.
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mort bakaprevski
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Sheeeesh, I'm easy. I'd just like to see VCI release a nice looking version of THE PHANTOM RIDER (1936). Why?

1. Really enjoyed Buck's THE RED RIDER.

2. Riddle Rider has me intrigued about the cues used therein.
"Nov Shmoz Ka Pop."
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