I should come here more often, but I had to come back for this.
I am so happy. No, ecstatic. It's a new restoration, first of all. That alone would have me excited, because it meant they listened to and at least tried again for fans. Second, it actually looks good and faithful. How faithful? Let's discuss!
The first thing I looked for after being astounded by the new transfer clip was the Fairy Godmother's blouse or top or whatever under her cloak. In the Laserdsic, and all previous versions till the 2005 DVD, it was lighter than her cloak and skirt:
In the 2005 Platinum and Blu-rays, it was mistakenly made the same color as the rest of her outfit:
For Berlinale's 2023 clip, it's finally back to being lighter, but now the Fairy Godmother's ensemble looks
very blue:
In the transformation, the magic dust in the Laserdisc looked like this;
The 2005 restoration botched it and the DVD and Blu-rays made some of that dust disappear. Especially look above Cindy's arms and head:
But it's all
finally back, in Berlinale 2023's clip!:
So, it looks like we got the linework and magic dust and details all back, but the colors are questionable. So, are the colors wrong?
Here are two cels from the film:
Cinderella's dress is very gray, and her hair is very mustard gold. I have always liked her hair like that, so I can't complain that this restoration has that color. The cels of the Fairy Godmother have usually been very purple, though, from what I have seen. So why does her costume look so blue now? Did it look blue in the Black Diamond Classics VHS? I remember thinking it was blue as a child, but maybe the 2005 restoration had the colors more right?! Maybe Cinderella's hair was more brownish orange and the Fairy Godmother's costume more blueish purple.
What I think maybe happened was Disney may have not color-timed the negatives properly. You see, cels have different colors when timed in Technirama or whatever. Maybe
Cinderella didn't have Technirama, but I have a little anecdote I need to share. When DIsney restored
Sleeping Beauty again in 2008, they saw the cels of Aurora had green hair. So they had to do the right Technirama color timing to get the gold shade. That's what they said anyway (I can't recall seeing Aurora cels with green hair). So, I dunno what's going on with the colors. I actually LIKE most of the colors of the 2005 restoration! It was just the disappearing lines and magic dust that bothered me (and Cindy's dress not being silver enough at the entrance of the ball). BUT I still like what Berlinale has!
Someone said they saw an IB Technicolor print of this film, and that her har was the dirty blonde Berlinale color. But another person said Disney production notes wrote that Cinderella's hair was titian, the brownish orange color!
So, in conclusion, I guess Disney may not have done the film as faithful as it could be yet again, but this new transfer with all the details intact, I will very, very happily take. In fact, this honestly is a dream come true. It doesn't just make my day. It makes my LIFE. I even prayed for this! So, this is a Godsend and I'm ecstatic.
