Biblical-Roman-Egyptian epics not yet on Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Douglas R]

Unfortunately, the KL Insider confirmed that whoever ended up with the Weinstein Company owns both El Cid and Fall in perpetuity, so there’s no telling when we’ll ever see proper restorations of those films.

KL Insider didn’t say the Weinstein Company. He said they are owned by Harvey Weinstein himself. So unlikely to ever have a US Blu-ray release unless/until he sells them.

 

[OliverK]

Unfortunately, the KL Insider confirmed that whoever ended up with the Weinstein Company owns both El Cid and Fall in perpetuity, so there’s no telling when we’ll ever see proper restorations of those films.

I have gone into this before in other threads but the situation is most probably still that these 4 Bronston productions belong under the same ownership, not with the Weinstein company or a successor by the way:

El Cid
55 Days at Peking
The Fall of the Roman Empire
Circus World

The reason we do not have El Cid and Fall looking a lot better is that the Weinstein company got them first and created those subpar HD masters that since have shown up on something like a dozen different releases all over the world. The current owwers last I heard do not really see how they would get sufficient income from going back and creating new and better masters as those companies who currently hold the rights everywhere would not likely pay much or anything at all to be able to use them.

So for the time being both movies are still looking for funding which due to their age and the amount of film involved would be quite substantial especially if one wants to do things right.

edit:

Here are all 4 movies courtesy of Hollywood Classics offering the movies for Euro London Films who as I understand represent the owners:

Hollywood Classics - Euro London Films Catalogue

Read Hollywood Classics - Euro London Films Catalogue by Hollywood Classics on Issuu and browse thousands of other publications on our platform. St...

issuu.com

 

[Stefan Andersson]

Thank you very much OliverK! Very interesting info about the ownership.

There remains the question of footage still missing from the film:

"The film was cut a number of times, from 187 minutes to 185 to 165 to 158. The very first scene to go was one between Commodus and Livius in the middle of their drinking session on arriving at the German fort. As they go upstairs to pick out two of the hostage German women, Commodus explains that he is on the horns of not a dilemma by a trilemma - if there are gods, they have decided what he will do so it doesn't matter whether he is good or bad; if there are no gods, then it simply doesn't matter if he leads a good or a bad life; and if he himself is a god, then he gets to decide what is good or bad. That is why, if you listen carefully, you can hear the gods laughing... The omission of this scene explains that incredibly abrupt cut from them going upstairs to Commodus trying to force a drink on the German girl. /.../ Sadly, the only version that was ever released uncut was the Super 8mm feature release back in the early 1990s, which was taken from the original 16mm neg that was struck before any of the cuts were made but which was prohibitively expensive."

Source:

The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964) - Alternate versions - IMDb

The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964) - Movies, TV, Celebs, and more...

www.imdb.com

A reaction shot, with Commodus, seems to be missing from the end of the film; there is an abrupt cut at this point.

Other relevant quotes:

"The 'trilemma' sequence - where Commodus explains that if there are gods, it doesn't matter what he chooses to do because they'll have already decided for him, if there aren't any gods it doesn't matter what he does and if he is god it also doesn't matter what he does - does still exist on the 16mm negative and was on the feature length Super 8mm prints released in the 1990s (which had much more detail than the BD), the only time since the film's first run they were seen. I was asked to locate the footage, which at the time was held at Filmbond on the UK, but the Weinsteins then decided to wasn't worth paying to add it (I wasn't paid either, bless 'em)."

"at one point the film was even longer - stills exist of Eric porter murdering Finlay Currie's character in the Senate (still of Anthony Mann showing Porter how he wanted him to stab here: http://www.gettyimages.ae/detail/new...hoto/106752081) - but those additional scenes were all cut before the film's disastrous premiere at the Cannes Film Festival which (as with Once Upon a Time in America) led the US distributors to panic and start cutting the film further. When the Weinsteins found out that searching for the cut scenes from the pre-release version (which probably wasn't even scored or properly dubbed) would be time-consuming and they'd have to spend some money they lost interest in looking for it."

Source: posts 16-17 by Aclea here:

The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964) - Blu-ray Forum

The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964) Germany

forum.blu-ray.com

The link to gettyimages above is dead. I got no relevant hit when searching Gettyimages.

 

[Allansfirebird]

Some time ago, I spent a few days at the Herrick library out here in LA reading and transcribing the revised shooting script for Fall of the Roman Empire held in the Paramount Pictures scripts file. There was a lot removed from the final cut: More stuff with the Barbarian girl Helva, the aforementioned murder of Currie's character, a significant extension of Livius' cohort infiltrating a "swamp of death" before the fight with Ballomar, a reveal that some of the senators burned at the stake during the ending sequence were Christians, and some other bits throughout. The script even has a different intermission point than the final cut - right after Commodus essentially exiles Livius and Lucilla from Rome and says they'll never see each other again, which actually falls at the mid-point of the script.

I'd probably estimate it would amount to another 15-20 minutes of footage in total.

 

[PatrickDA]

Was the 'FOTRE' missing footage found just after the Miriam Special Edition DVD set was released in North America from the BFI vaults in London or elsewhere? I can't recall the length of what was found either. For some reason, I think it was around eight minutes.

Update: https://dvdspindoctor.typepad.com/dvd_spin_doctor/2008/02/lost-fall-of-ro.html

Okay it was 30 minutes!

 

[murrayThompson]

Is there any one BD copy of Fall of the Roman Empire thats good qaulity?
My BD copy is one of the worst I have out of 3000 BDs, its discusting it almost looks like DVD upscaled, I just cant watch it!

 

[PatrickDA]

Is there any one BD copy of Fall of the Roman Empire thats good qaulity?
My BD copy is one of the worst I have out of 3000 BDs, its discusting it almost looks like DVD upscaled, I just cant watch it!

The French digi-book package is decent.

 

[Douglas R]

The French digi-book package is decent.

The French version is a very nice package but I don’t think picture quality is any different to other BD versions. However to say they look like DVD upscaled is a massive exaggeration.

 

[Alan Tully]

As I understand it both Fall & El CID were transferred from new low-contrast prints (some years ago now), & that’s just not good enough for Blu-ray. I’m thinking that any Blu-ray that pops up in any country has come from the same source, that old transfer.

 

[murrayThompson]

The French version is a very nice package but I don’t think picture quality is any different to other BD versions. However to say they look like DVD upscaled is a massive exaggeration.

Its not an exaggeration when you screen it on a 150" curved scope screen. Its horrible and again I say the worst print I have out of 3000+ films.