MovieChat Forums > Cabaret (1972) Discussion > Disappointing Blu-Ray and Where's The Di...

Disappointing Blu-Ray and Where's The Director's Cut?

posted 12 years ago by carrotcake8
8 replies | jump to latest

this is no reflection on the film itself but the 1080p HD
transfer done for the blu-ray disc is rather underwhelming.
there are just too many scenes where it looks like you're
watching a regular dvd on a blu-ray player and not an actual
blu-ray disc. i know the film is 40 years old but the
blu-ray discs of ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT from 1930 and
GRAND ILLUSION from 1937 are impeccable with a capital I in
the way blu-ray discs should be.

also in th extras from the 1st dvd edition co-producer Martin
Baum mentions that the director's cut shown to executives at
ABC Pictures just didn't work. this was late summer 1971 and
the film was set toopen the beginning of February 1972. so
he said he co-producer Cy Furer and director Bob Fosse worked
on it for four weeks to get the cut that was theatrically
released February 1972. so where's the director's cut? how long
was it and how different was it?

[–] puirt-a-beul 12 years ago

Respectfully, I disagree with you on the Blu-ray, carrotcake. I've just watched it, and while much of the image was soft, there was far more detail than you'd get from a DVD, and it was never out of focus.

Its softness, almost gauziness, was how the film has looked every time I've seen it projected, so I have to believe it's an accurate representation of the source material. I would have hated to see it artificially sharpened and digitally scrubbed of grain — too much detail would have been lost.

You might very well think that. I couldn't possibly comment.

[–] AcademyAwardWinnerJordy 12 years ago

No commentary or special features with Liza???

[–] shieldsdraeger 8 years ago

The 2013 Blu-ray book edition does have a commentary and many featurettes with Liza
and others.

[–] Mr. Bug 12 years ago

Blu Ray is taken from a top IP and is fine. The often soft/diffused look is accurate as many shots were taken with a diffusion filter.
see also
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/topic/320673-a-few-words-about%E2%84%A2-cabaret-in-blu-ray/

[–] laurence01 12 years ago

I agree, a lot of people either don't know or forget that this film was deliberately shot to make it look old.

Let Zygons Be Zygons.

[–] wwestar 11 years ago

Geoffrey Unsworth who photographed the film and won an oscar was one of the most recognizable cinematographers of all time. Throughout the 70's Unsworth had a very soft look to all his films these included...

Zardoz
Murder on the Orient Express
Return of the Pink Panther
A Bridge too Far
Superman
First great train robbery.

...To name but a few.

This effect was achieved by gamma flashing the negative prior to it being exposed.

[–] Doghouse-6 11 years ago

Just the same, one thing that struck me from my first viewing 41 years ago was the way the musical numbers staged at the Kit-Kat Club were rendered in a photographic style differing from the film's plot sequences: sharper and more vividly colored, with an immediacy that contrasts with the visual style of the rest, presenting what's onstage as more "real" than reality.

I've always interpreted these choices as an ironic visual commentary on fantasy - the way citizens of the Weimar Republic moved through their daily lives in gauzy complacency, only vaguely aware of what was happening around them - versus reality - the Emcee and company's prescient observational portrayals of both that complacency and the coming menace, as if to say, "Pay attention: the real story is up here, and we're trying to wake you up not only to where and what you are, but to what's in store for you."

That commentary is emphasized in the Emcee's closing echoes of his own opening lines, now both sarcastic and mechanical ("We have no troubles here; here, life is beautiful"), and summed up in his preface to those lines: "I told you so." It's clear from the final shot that when he's just said, "Where are your troubles now? Forgotten," that they're truly anything but.

Poe! You are...avenged!

[–] 8 years ago

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