I went ahead and ordered a copy of Leo McCarey’s Once Upon a Honeymoon from the new Warner Archive collection. The good news is that I like the movie as much as the last time I saw it on TCM. It’s pretty uneven with scenes that just feel padded or unnecessary (like Ginger Rogers’ embarrassingly long first conversation with Albert Dekker’s counterspy character), but it’s very effective in being one of the few films of the era that shows the real crimes committed by the Nazis in Europe while managing to retain moments of high comedy. It’s part of the same group (but certainly not in the same league) as The Great Dictator and To Be or Not To Be. (You sure as hell wouldn’t see this kind of stuff in a picture from Walt Disney!)
The bad news is: this mail order copy sucks. It’s a DVD-R, unrestored, interlaced, and with no special menus or chapter stops. In summation, I could have just recorded this off TCM (on VHS even) and I could have had just as good a copy. I’m hearing that the other older black-and-white movies fit the same bill. I have no idea if later movies from Warner Archive are preserved in anamorphic widescreen (better than a TCM recording) or just letterboxed (same as a TCM recording). My advice is to just wait until one of these non-widescreen titles shows up on TCM and get your copy from there.
Come to think of it, Warners is the last studio that I’d like to see do this, because they at least have a 24 hour classic movie channel. Universal (and pre-49 Paramount), Fox, and Republic on the other hand, I’d jump at even in the same lackluster presentation, given the reams of unavailable titles.
there is something that is not mentioned. If the public use the service, that will make that more popular with the others companies and we will have acces to more movies. that is my 2 cents.
I think the widescreen issue depends on what print is used. From what I hear, some prints used are newer transfers, so those are anamorphic. If they used the old Turner print, it’s letterboxed. Depends on the title.
My issue with the whole program is that most of the stuff that I wanted I’ve already gotten from TCM. I wish Columbia or Fox would do a similar program. Then we’d get some really rare stuff.
Even better, if somebody would do this with the Republic catalog…..
DVD-R? Interlaced? No menus or chapter stops? Like they used to say on Fat Albert, “That’s like school in the summertime — no class!”
I wish the studios would put out more boxed sets like Warner’s Pre-Code sets. Something professionally done, but with rare films.
Well, the resemblence to a homemade DVD-R is rather upsetting. My hopes for this project was that all such films would be as good as the quality of the main programs found on any manufactured Warner Brothers DVD set that we’ve all crowed about on the web, like the LOONEY TUNES GOLDEN COLLECTION sets, but I’m still going to support this project in hopes that Warner Brothers does go ahead and allow for full or near complete restorations of their “forbidden” cartoons or even give us that COMPLETE TEX AVERY set that we’ve all been wishing so hard for. It seems that, now, this is the only way we’re going to see it since LOONEY TUNES are out of the question for restorative release on the video shelves this year. I say, bring on the cartoon collections and I think there will be much, much talk on blogs around this project. I don’t think that other such companies will “get the hint”, though. Look at all the stunning compilations that have been released and have seen successful sales figures, including those good ones at Warner Brothers and Disney, and still, say, Classic Media, Paramount, Fox or Columbia hasn’t listened! I think that the various companies should take their own advice–be extravagant with the good product, and I truly believe that the collectors will get the message and start buying again!
To quote:
> If the public use the service, that will make that more popular with the others
> companies and we will have acces to more movies.
If you buy crap, all you’ll be offered is more crap. Because you’ve shown you’re willing to accept it.
i ordered a few titles myself, and yes, the widescreens (well I only bought one WS so far) are letterboxed. There actually are chapter stops, but they’re automatically created ones that allow you to skip through at 10-minute intervals. these aren’t actually DVD-R’s of the quality you can pick up at Best Buy, but appear to be something in between the quality of that and a pressed DVD.
I agree the presentations could be given a bit more care, but given that the titles released under the warner archives are ones they don’t expect to make a great deal of money from (or they’d do proper dvd’s of them), it makes sense they wouldn’t put a lot of money into cleaning up prints, designing menus and special features, etc. Still, it can’t be that hard to do progressive vs. interlaced, can it? that’s a simple enough request.
Still, I’m just stoked about the prospect of getting access to titles otherwise unavailable for purchase. I certainly hope other distributors(esp. Universal, Lion’s Gate, Fox, Sony) take their cue from this and open up their own libraries in a similar fashion.
I agree with Jim!
The deal is about these discs is that it’s either this, or you won’t see these titles at all. Warner has many titles that would not sell enough to warrent a full blown release. This is Warner’s way of making those titles available and maybe making a few bucks. If you don’t order it, the disc doesn’t get made. I think it’s a great idea. Sony is supposedly working on a plan like this also.
Rodney: Anamorphic vs Non-anamorphic on DVD has nothing to do with the print, but the video transfer. The same print can be telecined twice and the end result will be different depending on the configuration.
Thad: no better than VHS? Seriously?
Many of these are just the same transfers used for the Laserdiscs of long ago… and most have been available on the web for years through collectors and for a hell of a lot less. Do some in depth searching, you can find just about any film ever made… while unofficial releases on DVDR… how official are Warner DVDR’s? To me that’s just a load of crap, and an insult to film fans everywhere.. and I won’t support CRAP!
I placed an order for several of these before I found out they were junk… they won’t play in any of our home DVD players… we have DVD/VHS Combo recorders, all Pioneer, in each room (Living Room, Bedroom, Den) they won’t work in my Dell laptop, and only work in the little Sony portable DVD player I bought for my kids to use when we go on vacation in the car… what a load of crap!!!!!!!
$75 down the toilet!
Official DRM loaded Bootleg Warner DVD’s….. that’s how I see it.
I’ll go elsewhere in the future.. and no, I don’t care if Warner gets a cut or not.