Kirby - perhaps not memory fails, so much as where your local house sat in
the food chain when it came to second hand prints. Quality of local
presentation being of high order as you describe would not disguise quality
of print.
No question that Eastman Color prints were often way substandard to
Technicolor prints... and knowing what I know about work being fobbed off
for large runs of prints (in pre-secondary market/home video etc days) when
houses kept popular films like THE BIRDS running well beyond their supposed
end date even if sessions had to be stacked, then it is not beyond the
realms of possibility that what you saw at your local Odeon (so to speak)
was a cheaper print subbed out by Technicolor.
Not writ in stone, or one that would ever be admitted to, but quite
possible.
I strongly recall quality of suburban print of FLOWER DRUM SONG I saw in
Sydney was dreadful.
The 70mm roadshow SPARTACUS and LAWRENCE OF ARABIA shown in Sydney were
dazzling prints, censor cuts aside in SPARTACUS. The (edited) 35mm SPARTACUS
was murky in comparison.
Let's see, I was 13 when LAWRENCE opened, and I saw it 6 Saturday 11am
screenings (the least attended back then) in a row in all its first version
cut, 70mm magnificence.
Seeing the "restored version" years later was like coming home. So I had NOT
imagined that shot, or that shot, or that scene.....
Phil E.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Kirby McDaniel" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <MoPo-L@LISTSERV.AMERICAN.EDU>
Sent: Monday, June 23, 2008 2:55 PM
Subject: Re: [MOPO] THE BIRDS in Hi-Def
Memory fails, apparently, and I'll defer to Richard and Phil's claims
here. The print on MGM-HD
certainly did look good.
Nevertheless, I can remember many Universal Films from that period which
did look excessively grainy, most of which were
probably Eastman Color.
Here's an interesting link about TECHNICOLOR.
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/essay/1075/Technicolor+Movies+The
+History+Of+Dye+Transfer+Printing+Book+Review+
Thanks for pointing out the error, boys!
Kirby McDaniel
On Jun 22, 2008, at 11:25 PM, Richard Ducar wrote:
All of the original 1963 35mm release prints of THE BIRDS were printed
in dye-transfer Technicolor which means they did not look grainy or
unattractive nor did they suffer from cheap labwork. The Technicolor
company had the best quality control of any film lab and their release
prints could not be matched by any other company which is why Hitchcock
used them for all of his color films. I just watched my 35mm Technicolor
print a few months ago and even though it's 45 years-old now, the color
still looks the same as the day it was made. Because original
Technicolor prints were made with dyes instead of chemicals, the colors
won't fade for over a 100 years. The color and picture quality of the
new hi-def transfer is basicly what the 35mm prints look like.
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