Gulliver's Travels coming to Blu-ray! (Fleischer)

[Daniel]

Tangentially related, a brief video on how a film is scanned and cleaned up:



Fascinating watch!

[Ben]

Good ol' Steve! (Wish he’d answer my emails and fulfill my orders from years ago though…)

And nice to see Mark still going and contributing to these efforts. I love just listening to these guys.

[EricJ]

I was going to wonder why we're so excited about a public-domain title, until I read the '09 discussion, and realized it wasn't an announcement.
Ah, the early frontier days of Blu-ray, when only the PD pioneers homesteaded the prairie...

As long as it can get a GOOD steady home, like Criterion's PD rescues, or the 3D Archive restoring the PD Abbott & Costellos, I wouldn't mind seeing one more version of Fleischer's Gulliver.
(As you can usually find about twelve on any streaming channel.)

[Daniel]

Thunderbean already released an infinitely superior version a few years ago.

[Ben]

That disc is excellent.

[Daniel]

Puts the Blu that started this thread to shame.

[Ben]

(Shudder!)

I took a look back in the thread and, awe, I miss ol' George.

[Daniel]

Yeah, me too.

[Randall]

Surprise! Kino Lorber is putting out Hoppity Goes to Town!

"Coming Soon on Blu-ray!
2019 HD Master by Paramount Pictures – 4K Scan of 35mm Technicolor Successive Exposure Negative"

[Ben]

Oh my word!

At least we now know why Thunderbean's version was…"delayed"… Definitely part of that proposed project, though, going by the 2019 scan date.

Links?

[droosan]

?? I have a Thunderbean disc of Hoppity Goes To Town, which I received last year. I definitely think it was one of their 'unofficial' disc releases, though.

My only disappointment with that 'unofficial' TB disc is that the Paramount main title is scanned from a 'noticeably-lower-quality' source than the main feature .. but at least it wasn't the 'tacked-on' NTA main title which was on the Laserdisc release, way back when.

Hopefully, this Kino Lorber release will likewise present the original Paramount main title, and will have a consistent (hopefully lovely!) image quality throughout.

[Randall]

It was announced today on the KLSC Facebook page, but it's also up at Blu-ray.com now:
https://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=33684

I recently watched my Thunderbean disc. Yes, it is definitely an unofficial release, and the print used had some serious issues with dust and scratches. The only thing I really liked about it was seeing the original "Mr. Bug" titles, but otherwise I would rather watch my laserdisc copy, to be honest.

The Kino disc should be quite complete given its origin, though the 2019 master is known to suffer from DNR; Tommy Jose Stathes of Cartoon Roots has flagged this issue. Meanwhile, the group restoring the Fleischer cartoons says they are working on a 4K master for theatrical distribution. Too bad Kino couldn't wait for that. (Perhaps a 4K disc could be available in the future, but that seems doubtful.)

[Ben]

Never got my Thunderbean disc from Mr Stanchfield…but then I’m still waiting on discs from an order I placed in 2016…

(It’s an ongoing issue…he sends an occasional title every now and then, or a small bundle, but I’m owed about half of his output, which he keeps apologising for not sending, and then still doesn’t send anyway.)

I love my Hoppity LaserDisc of Mr Bug Goes To Town, NTA titles or not. It's a lovely, crisp and clear presentation of a good print and miles better than anything I’d yet seen on TV or video. When we got our cinema up and running, it was actually the first laser I played to see what LDs would look like!

If coming from Paramount’s scan, then yeah, it should be complete with their logo (I suspect Steve was replacing substandard sections where he could with other sources), though the DNR aspect sounds a shame, if that is indeed the case. DNR is added after a scan and cleaning process, usually and mostly as a way to create a more "pure" image for disc authoring to handle.

I’d be very surprised if DNR was baked into the 4K master, since this is usually a process added after. Maybe Tommy's seen a digital/disc-ready/presentation file and not the raw 4K master? Hopefully that’s what Paramount will give to Kino for them to mess it up all o their own!

Good to hear Fleischer is also working on a resto, although from which sources, me thinks? The same raw 4K scan? That probably wouldn’t make much in a new cinema release, outside festivals and art houses, but being a PD title they would be more than entitled to put out their own disc. Perhaps this is the reasoning behind why Paramount, after years of indifference, has suddenly made this available to Kino…?

[Randall]

All very interesting, eh?

The FB post from Kino said they were getting an "HD master from Paramount", based on their 4K scan. I agree, the 4K scan would be fine, but it's the "HD master" part that is potentially concerning. If Paramount only supplies Kino with the same master that got overly DNR'd, there won't be much for Kino to do but put it out with the DNR. Of course, Paramount may take another pass at it prior, knowing that the DNR issue has been pointed out; or Kino could insist on getting the 4K file themselves and deal with it as they wish.