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mbalson
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#1 Post by mbalson » Sun Dec 19, 2004 8:48 am

matt wrote:
mbalson wrote:We really need a DVDBeaver comparison with this and the Masters of Cinema R2 disc.
The Kino transfer is the same as the first disc of the MoC.
Apparently this is not the case. From Digitally Obsessed's review of the Kino DVD of Michael: "Unlike some other recent Kino European silent films on DVD, this doesn't appear to be a PAL-NTSC transfer; at any rate there are no conversion artifacts that I noticed."

The screen shots found HERE show that the Kino looks at least as good as disc 1 from the MoC set.
Michael - Masters of Cinema DVDBeaver review HERE

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#2 Post by unclehulot » Sun Dec 19, 2004 12:52 pm

I think it's been explained before, but the master for disc one of MoC's Michael was provided to them by David Shepard (in digibeta form, I'm not sure technically how that format is converted to PAL). It IS an NTSC ttransfer, thus it should look as good (or possibly better?) on the Kino.

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mbalson
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#3 Post by mbalson » Sun Dec 19, 2004 2:59 pm

It IS an NTSC ttransfer, thus it should look as good (or possibly better?) on the Kino.
Exactly.

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Tribe
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#4 Post by Tribe » Wed Dec 22, 2004 4:57 pm

In light of Criterion's release of L'eclisse, and it being part of a trilogy with L'avventura, was interested in getting some views regarding Kino's Il Grido. Don't worry about the transfer....after all, it is a Kino release. But I am interested in any comments about the film itself.

Thanks.

john

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Jeff
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#5 Post by Jeff » Fri Dec 31, 2004 2:07 am

press release from davisDVD:
KINO ON VIDEO TO RELEASE A FOUR-DISC SET TRACING THE IMPACT OF THE EDISON COMPANY ON THE ART OF THE MOTION PICTURE


Kino on Video is proud to announce the release of a four-disc box set named Edison: The Invention Of The Movies, made possible by an unprecedented collaboration between The Museum of Modern Art and Kino International, the leading distributor of silent and early cinema on DVD. This groundbreaking box set comes chiefly from the extensive Edison collection of the Department of Film and Media at The Museum of Modern Art, in New York, with additional footage provided by the Library of Congress, and includes over 140 films produced by the Edison Company between 1891 and 1918. Prior to this release, the majority of these films have been unavailable for viewing in a high-quality format except for 35MM projections at The Museum of Modern Art in New York and Library of Congress in Washington DC.

In addition to the original motion pictures themselves, EDISON: THE INVENTION OF THE MOVIES brings two hours of interviews with seven Edison and silent cinema scholars and over 200 scans of rare photographs, scripts, promotional pamphlets and internal correspondence by the Edison staff. These interviews are interspersed among the 140+ films, creating a unique study tool of this groundbreaking moment in the history of cinema. Each film on this series will be accompanied by a text description (also available for download) written by the world's leading expert on the Edison films, Charles Musser, Yale University Professor of Film and American Studies.

Edison: The Invention Of The Movies will prebook on January 4, 2005, with a street date of February 1, 2005, at a suggested retail price of $99.95.

Responsible for developing the technical apparatus of commercial motion picture between the years of 1888 and 1893,a camera, a viewing machine, systems for printing, the developing of long strands of film, The Edison Company, owned by Thomas Edison, also produced hundreds of films. In order to feed its circuit of Kinetoscopes, the arcade peepshow device that had been developed by W.K. Dickson, Edison and his staff started to produce short films that were duplicated and used for exhibition throughout the world.

In 1894, The Edison Company was the world's sole producer of commercial motion pictures. A year later, the Lumiere Brothers introduced their Cinematograph and a battle ensued for dominance of the newfound film industry. Edison struggled not only to maintain technical superiority over his competitors (through a series of mechanical patents) but to also remain artistically innovative. As a result, for twenty years the Edison company reigned supreme over the American film industry.

Thomas Edison's enterprise also allowed talented filmmakers like Charles Brabin (A WICKED WOMAN, 1934) and J. Searle Dawley (THE HARVEST MOON, 1920) to have their first directing jobs and in hindsight, was essential in enabling the career of Edwin S. Porter, the man who developed the concept of continuity editing and paved the way to Griffith's THE BIRTH OF A NATION.

Digitized from MOMA's 35mm restored print, Kino's version of Porter's THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY (1903, 10 min.) brings the first appearance of parallel editing two separate lines of action cut together as to indicate simultaneity as well as the first pan shot and camera movement ever captured on film. EDISON: THE INVENTION OF THE MOVIES also makes available several other films directed by Mr. Porter, like THE LIFE OF AN AMERICAN FIREMAN (1903, 6 min.), THE GAY SHOE CLERK (1903, 1 min.), EUROPEAN REST CURE (1904, 13 min.), THE LITTLE TRAIN ROBBERY (1905, 11min.) and COLLEGE CHUMS (1907, 11 min.).

The new Kino series also includes an 1895 film with synchronized sound ("Dickson Experimental Sound Film"), a hand-colored 1906 film ("Three American Beauties"), and some of the first appearances of stop-motion animation ("The Teddy Bears"), tracking shots ("The Passer-by"), and outlandish special effects ("Dream of a Rarebit Fiend").

The earliest material in the collection is MONKEYSHINES (1889). This crude photographic experiment of late 1880s was considered unsuccessful and was never viewed by anyone outside the Edison laboratory. It has been carefully reanimated for this Kino box set and represents a true world premiere. EDISON: THE INVENTION OF THE MOVIES also encompasses a wide array of genres, including early comedies ("How a French Nobleman Found a Wife..."), educational films ("The Wonders of Magnetism"), fantasy ("Jack and the Beanstalk"), documentary ("The Public and Private Care of Infants"), western ("At Bear Track Gulch"), crime drama ("The Great Train Robbery"), and even examples of early product placement ("Serenade by Proxy").

Presented in chronological order, interspersed with introductions by a panel of historians and archivists, the first disc of this set covers the early years of Edison's films, between 1891 and 1905, and includes 100 early shorts. The second and third discs, respectively, collect Edison shorts from the periods of 1905 to 1907 and 1908 to 1913, while the last disc, covering the period between 1913 and 1918, brings seven short films and one feature film, the rousing war epic THE UNBELIEVER (1918, 80 Min.), featuring Erich Von Stroheim and directed by Alan Crosland (THE JAZZ SINGER, 1927).

More than an indispensable source of historical information on the history of the cinematic medium, the EDISON box set also represents a unique film record of urban and rural life in late 19th century and early 20th century North America.

Following is a list of the film scholars featured in video interviews on this all-new EDISON box set:

* Steven Higgins -- Curator, Department of Film and Media, The Museum of Modern Art.
* Charles Musser -- Professor of Film and American Studies, Yale University. Author of "Before the Nickelodeon," and "Edison Motion Pictures, 1890-1900," among others.
* Patrick Loughney -- Head, Moving Image Section, The Library of Congress
* Michele Wallace -- Professor of English, The City College. Author of "The Black Macho and The Myth of The Superwoman," among others.
* Eileen Bowser -- Curator Emerita, The Museum of Modern Art.
* Paul Israel -- Director and editor of the Edison Papers; among others.
* Richard Koszarski -- Associate Professor of English, Rutgers University. Author of "An Evening's Entertainment: The Age of the Silent Feature Picture 1915-1928," among others.


Edison: The Invention Of The Movies (DVD)

U.S. 1889 - 1918 14(+) Hours
Black and White 1.33:1
In English subtitles
Produced by Thomas Edison
Interviews with Charles Musser, Steven Higgins and Paul Israel
UPC# 7 38329 03832 8
SRP $99.95

PREBOOK: January 4, 2005
STREET: February 1, 2005

End Of Release

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manicsounds
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#6 Post by manicsounds » Fri Dec 31, 2004 9:48 am

wrote about it the Edison release on the old crashed forum.
It's something I would love to have in my collection.

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bcsparker
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#7 Post by bcsparker » Sun Jan 02, 2005 1:40 am

I know the Edison set has been mentioned here, but here is a list of other upcoming '05 titles from the latest Kino catalog -

1. I Have Found It (Kandukondain Kandukondain) - India (Winter '05)
2. The Chess Players - dir. Satyajit Ray (Coming Soon)
3. Edison - Invention of the Movies (4 Disc) (Winter '05)
4. Untold Scandal - dir. E J-Yong, South Korea (Summer '05)
5. The Day The Sun Turned Cold - dir. Yim Ho, HK/China (Coming Soon)
6. The Ninth Day - dir. Volker Schlondorff (Coming Soon)
7. Free Radicals - dir. Barbara Albert, Austria (Winter '05)
8. The Storm Over Mont Blanc - dir. Arnold Fanck, Germany (Summer 05)
9. Touki Bouki - dir. Djibril Mambety, Senegal (Spring '05)
10. Several Josephine Baker DVDs - Princess Tam Tam, Zou Zou, Siren of the Tropics - (Coming Soon)
11. Tavernier/ Noiret Box Set - Coming Soon
12. Siberiad - dir. Andrei Konchalovsky, Russia (Coming Soon)
13. Rasputin - dir. Elem Klimov, Russia (Coming Soon)
Many others I will list later when my eyes don't hurt.

Hope this was helpful.

solent

#8 Post by solent » Sat Jan 08, 2005 12:38 am

Unless you have to have everything by Antonioni avoid IL GRIDO. The acting is bad, the direction untypical [due to use of actors unused to Antonioni's style - e.g. Americans] and the screenplay/story is very very crass. I feel LA NOTTE is only marginally better with L'ECCLISSE & L'AVENTURRA being slightly above in the critical stakes and in comparison to better films from the period (by the French). I stress: this is my opinion only since I am not a [total] Antonioni fan.

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Tribe
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#9 Post by Tribe » Sat Feb 12, 2005 11:22 am

Saw my first Bollywood production with I Have Found It. It's a charming, light movie with a sense of humor about itself, and very professional and intricately choreographed dance numbers. Not sure that I could live on a steady diet of Bollywood movies though...particularly at three hours a pop. All in all, a pleasant surprise for me....marred of course by Kino's inability (or disinterest) in obtaining an anamorphis transfer! Is there really any good excuse for this?

Tribe

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ben d banana
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#10 Post by ben d banana » Sat Feb 12, 2005 2:04 pm

yeah, i ordered that as a gift for the gf because she is obsessed w/ aishwarya rai, bollywood music and often goes to bollywood productions when they play at the cinemark theater here (there's at least one indian theater nearby too but i doubt they have subtitles). i wasn't totally surprised when kino didn't list as anamorphic due to the quality of most bollywood dvds (legit bootleg-ish to bootleg, and really expensive unless you have a little india in your town, we do). a pakistani friend has said that the industry there is basically mob controlled so that's probably why things are so dodgy. we got to see devdas (which rai mentioned on letterman this week as the movie that broke her name outside of india) in a big packed house w/ us as maybe the 2% white minority. the gf has since then bought the dvd ($15 canadian in little india here, $55 u.s. in amoeba) and basically remembered it and forced it on anyone she can. and yes, we know it was like the zillionth remake or something. i can always bug her (and aforementioned friend) for more recommendations if you care (hmm... thinking of bollywood duet now).

edit: seems amoeba has much more reasonable prices on eros (bollywood dvd label that released devdas) now.

iangj
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#11 Post by iangj » Sun Feb 13, 2005 3:16 pm

Tribe wrote:Saw my first Bollywood production with I Have Found It. It's a charming, light movie with a sense of humor about itself, and very professional and intricately choreographed dance numbers. Not sure that I could live on a steady diet of Bollywood movies though...particularly at three hours a pop. All in all, a pleasant surprise for me....marred of course by Kino's inability (or disinterest) in obtaining an anamorphis transfer! Is there really any good excuse for this?

Tribe
I know what you mean about whether you could live on a steady diet of Bollywood, having sat through a festival of them a couple of months ago - a lot of classics (Mother India, Raj Kapoor, Guru Dutt etc) but I just reached the point where life seemed too short to spend on another three hours of a Bollywood musical and I didn't bother with the rest that I booked for. It wasn't helped by the programmers throwing Satyajit Ray's Devi in the middle of this festival. Once I'd seen that (twice, in fact), why bother with Bollywood...?

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backstreetsbackalright
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#12 Post by backstreetsbackalright » Mon Mar 07, 2005 3:24 pm

Not that this is vital information, but I emailed Kino on Friday to inquire about the prospect of any Kaurismaki DVDs in the near future. I was told that there are currently no such plans. :(

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What A Disgrace
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#13 Post by What A Disgrace » Sat Mar 12, 2005 12:16 am

Jafar Panahi's The Mirror and Zhang Yuan's Seventeen Years, both from KimStim, are up for pre-order on Kino's website, with an April 5 release date.

Barebones, $30 pricetag. Netflix away!

cbernard

#14 Post by cbernard » Sat Mar 12, 2005 12:25 am

What A Disgrace wrote:... Zhang Yuan's Seventeen Years
Strongly recommended.

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Michael Kerpan
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#15 Post by Michael Kerpan » Sat Mar 12, 2005 9:56 am

cbernard wrote:
What A Disgrace wrote:... Zhang Yuan's Seventeen Years
Strongly recommended.
How does this compare with his excellent and unaccountably neglected newer film "Green Tea"?

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ellipsis7
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#16 Post by ellipsis7 » Sat Mar 12, 2005 10:18 am

Re. IL GRIDO - a very interesting transitional film... Antonioni returns to the Po valley of his documentary days in a drama clearly influenced by Visconti's OSSESSIONE... The subtitling on the Kino DVD leaves quite a bit to be desired... I have the English translation of the screenplay and a whole load of stuff is left out... I sometimes watch it with the script in front of me to get the full meaning of the dialogue...

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FilmFanSea
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#17 Post by FilmFanSea » Thu Mar 17, 2005 8:56 pm

What A Disgrace wrote:Jafar Panahi's The Mirror and Zhang Yuan's Seventeen Years, both from KimStim, are up for pre-order on Kino's website, with an April 5 release date.

Barebones, $30 pricetag. Netflix away!
From Kino's e-mail newsletter today:
New Movies from KIMSTIM:
Kino International is proud to announce that it will be distributing movies from KimStim. KimStim's mission is to release overlooked, under appreciated masterworks of world cinema to home video and theaters. Since its inception KimStim has compiled a diverse and critically lauded series of works by such world famous directors as Francois Ozon, Tsai Ming Liang and Takeshi "Beat" Kitano. In this newsletter we are announcing our first two releases from KimStim, and will introduce additional releases in the near future.

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tryavna
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#18 Post by tryavna » Thu Mar 31, 2005 12:12 pm

Has anybody seen and/or formed an opinion about Kino's release of "Contraband"? This is one of the last Powell/Pressburger films I have yet to see, but I've never located a really good review of the quality of the disc.

Also, are Kino's releases of the von Stroheim silents (esp. "Queen Kelly") any good? More diverse range of extras on these than usual for Kino.

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Tribe
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#19 Post by Tribe » Thu Mar 31, 2005 12:27 pm

Kino's release of "Contraband"
It's a so-so transfer that clearly shows its age, if not neglect. Not a particularly good film, imho.

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FilmFanSea
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#20 Post by FilmFanSea » Thu Mar 31, 2005 2:16 pm

tryavna wrote:Also, are Kino's releases of the von Stroheim silents (esp. "Queen Kelly") any good? More diverse range of extras on these than usual for Kino.
I just finished watching Kino's Foolish Wives two nights ago. Even in this grossly truncated form (von Stroheim's original cut ran over six hours), it still strikes me as a masterpiece. Overall, the picture quality is more than adequate; the piano score is fine; the commentary is decent; and the 1979 documentary (The Man You Love to Hate) is informative. Not a stellar release, but very good nonetheless--I would recommend it. I hope to watch Queen Kelly sometime over the next few days.

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tryavna
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#21 Post by tryavna » Thu Mar 31, 2005 10:19 pm

Thanks for the info. If you don't mind, would you post your thoughts on "Queen Kelly" once you've finished with it. I'm particularly interested in that title, but I may pick up the "Foolish Wives" disc now because of your recommendation -- the docu on von Stroheim sounds intriguing.

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milk114
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#22 Post by milk114 » Wed Apr 06, 2005 11:10 pm

has anyone seen the new African Cinema titles yet?
Daresalam
Guimba the Tyrant
Karmen Gei
I'm curious how the films themselves are and the transfers (for of course there are no extras). thanks

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What A Disgrace
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#23 Post by What A Disgrace » Thu Apr 28, 2005 9:23 pm

From a recent Kino newsletter...
Upcoming DVD releases include a South Korean version of Les Liaisons dangereuses, Untold Scandal (June 7). For the first time on DVD Josephine Baker in three classic films, Siren of the Tropics, Zou Zou, and Princess Tam Tam (all June 21). Animation fans look out for The Collected Short Works of Jan Svankmajer (June 21) a two-DVD collection from KimStim.
I imagine the two disc Svankmajer collection will just be a combination of the two volumes out by Image. A shame, as I already have one volume.

Still waiting for word on the Maurice Tourneur and Mauritz Stiller films.

Has anyone seen Kino's disc of Jafar Panahi's Mirror?

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zedz
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#24 Post by zedz » Thu Apr 28, 2005 10:33 pm

What A Disgrace wrote:From a recent Kino newsletter...
Animation fans look out for The Collected Short Works of Jan Svankmajer (June 21) a two-DVD collection from KimStim.
I imagine the two disc Svankmajer collection will just be a combination of the two volumes out by Image. A shame, as I already have one volume.
If this is the case, that title would be pretty misleading. In book publishing, "collected" and "selected" mean quite different things. Fingers crossed that this is the former! Having all of Svankmajer's shorts in one collection would make for a phenomenal release. The existing Image discs contain some superb films, but they're by no means exhaustive, and some of Svankmajer's best shorts aren't included.

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solaris72
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#25 Post by solaris72 » Fri Apr 29, 2005 11:42 am

zedz wrote:The existing Image discs contain some superb films, but they're by no means exhaustive, and some of Svankmajer's best shorts aren't included.
Yeah...so far as I know, his Don Juan short hasn't even ever been translated into English anywhere, let alone released on DVD in R1. I've got an unsubtitled bootleg, and it's a must see (even if you don't know what they're saying)...it forms a sort of trilogy with Punch and Judy and Faust in which Svankmajer was experimenting with using puppet theater in film. I hope Don Juan's on the new release.

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