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This topic comprises 2 pages: 1 2
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Author
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Topic: Early Widescreen
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Stephen Furley
Film God
Posts: 3059
From: Coulsdon, Croydon, England
Registered: May 2002
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posted 05-13-2008 06:18 PM
quote: Bill Gabel
On May 13th. Fox will be release a Region 1, 2 disc. Special Edition of "The Big Trail" featuring the 70MM (2.10:1 ratio version) and the full frame (1.33: version). The 70MM version will feature commentary with film historian/author Richard Schickel. And featurettes: The Creation of John Wayne, Raoul Walsh: A Man In His Time, The Big Vision: The Grandeur Process, The Making of The Big Trail and a Photo Gallery. Feature running time 122 minutes.
Looks like you were just about spot on Bill. I bought my copy this afternoon, it was just in time, I fly home tomorrow. I bought it from the Saturday Matinee shop at the Staten Island Mall; they had at least one other copy of it. It was in the normal 'Westerns' section, not in the 'new releases' one. It was marked Our price $19.99 On sale $17.99. Seems like a bargain for a two disc set. I've only played a few minutes of each version, and the Grandeur one looks generally very good, with just few slight scratches and other minor damage here and there. The sound quality is generally poor, as it was on both the 35mm (from Grandeur) and VHS (from 35mm) versions which I have seen previously.
In terms of both picture quality and composition, the Grandeur version really is much better than the 35mm one. I was going to say better than the 'Academy' version, but I think the release of this film pre-dates the Academy standard. There's a comment in one of the documentaries which come with it that it's a surprisingly modern looking film, and it is; the dialogue however is not modern, it sounds fairly typical of early-ish sound films. Combined with the poor technical quality of the sound this really does let the film down somewhat; maybe the film should have been made ten years later.
It is region 1, which I feel is regretable; I've had to reset the DVD drive in my laptop to play it, and I've now only got one change left, but the drive is playing up anyway, so I'm going to have to fit a new one soon. At home I have an all region DVD player, but it is an early one which will not play recordable CDs or DVDs, and a desktop computer which has two drives, one region 1 and the other region 2. I only have a handful of region 1 discs. Given the limited market for this film, and the fact that a region 2, or indeed any other region, version is unlikely to be released, I think that it should have been a NTSC all region release. There's no issue of conflicting with theatrical release dates, and I see no reason why the video rights should not be for a World wide release for a film such as this.
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Stephen Furley
Film God
Posts: 3059
From: Coulsdon, Croydon, England
Registered: May 2002
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posted 05-13-2008 08:37 PM
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it was made from a 35mm anamorphic fine grain element; the camera head of the optical printer shown certainly looks like a 35mm one, and it was my understanding that the restoration element was a 35mm fine grain positive. I'm not clear if the video transfer was made directly from this, or from another film element derived from it. If a 70mm print was made then it would presumably have been by optical enlargement from the 35mm. Also, if a 70mm print was made then it would have been in modern, i.e. Todd-AO style 70. Even if it were possible to make a Grandeur format print there would be no point in doing so as, to the best of my knowledge, there is not a cinema in the World which could show it.
I do wish the documentary would not depict the widescreen version in a horizontal sort of mock Vistavision format, with round perforations.
Although I think the sound is one of the weakest points of the film, both in terms of its poor technical quality and its rather 'stiff' dialogue it must have been very difficult, and a considerable achievement to record sound on location at this time.
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Dan Sherlock
Film Handler
Posts: 11
From: Hollywood, CA, USA
Registered: Feb 2008
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posted 05-18-2008 02:14 AM
The first use of the term "Natural Vision" that I have come across was for the public showing of the wide film version of Widescope in November, 1926. Widescope started out as a 3-camera panoramic process during development but quickly became a 2-film single camera process. Although demos were done using the technique in 1922, I have not seen any evidence of any theatrical showings of the two film process.
The process was then abandoned in favor of a 57mm wide film version using a swept lens process. A short subject titled "Natural Vision Pictures" was shown to the public in New York in 1926. At the time, the term "Natural Vision" was more of a description of a large screen wide angle (well, about a 60 degree field of view) image with sharp focus. Images photographed on large film and shown on a large screen had an almost "3-D" quality without being truly stereoscopic.
The 63.5mm Spoor-Berggren process was used to film the feature film "The American" in 1925, but the film was never shown to the public. With the battle of the widescreen formats in 1929-1931, the Spoor-Berggren process was used for the feature film "Danger Lights" and the short subject "Niagara Falls" which were shown to the public in 1930. The process up to that time had been typically referred to as the "Spoor-Berggren" process, but a name that was more "catchy" was desired and they used the term "Natural Vision" for the process name in the ads. The other titles that were supposedly presented in the process did not in fact have any public screenings.
As for Grandeur and "The Big Trail"…
Grandeur used ASA Type I film which had a 0.234 inch perf pitch (before shrinkage) and large 0.130 x 0.080 inch sprocket holes. The restoration master was anamorphic 35mm, and the restored version was released only as 'scope 35mm. Since was printed down from the 70mm negative, it still had a very sharp image in many of the scenes.
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