Criterion
should release this with a new print and transfer... the MGM dvd is a terrible transfer of the film, doesn't do it justice at all.
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that would be my dream release.
shareI have dream releases all the time.
shareFirst, @ mrmatt5 - LOL!
Second, @ NiceGuyEddie75, re: the MGM DVD transfer - The image transfer on the present DVD was overseen by director Robert Altman and cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond themselves. The washed-out look of the film that is probably making you think you are watching a poor transfer is the look they were going for, using a technique called "variable flashing" (essentially overexposing the negative to light, adding white to the image, lightening the values of all colors). Altman and Zsigmond used the same technique two years earlier on McCabe & Mrs. Miller (which DVD viewers also mistake as poor image transfer). There is both an interview with Zsigmond and an extensive article in the Long Goodbye DVD's Special Features section describing this technique and explaining why the film looks the way it does.
It looks like LA air and captures the tone of the city. I relish the look for those reasons and because it makes the film more personable. And it's extremely hard to make a contemporary film have it's own look. They went for it and succeeded marvelously! I've also found people don't like the gold tint in John Huston's "Reflections in a Golden Eye" but that's what the light looks like during fall in the South. The way it goes.
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