The 1950s were a time of enormous turmoil for Hollywood. Movie audience — which had peaked in 1946 — plummeted as audiences began abandoning bijous in million thanks to the rapid proliferation of free television in the United States. Many smaller theaters closed, and the studios began dusting off a variety of discarded gimmicks dating back to the 1920s (and earlier) in their desperation to compete by provide an viewing experience that couldn’t be duplicated on the tiny sets of the area, which in that analog, pre-cable and -satellite era often showed images severely degraded by “interference” that was commonly referred to as “snow.”
Instead of the nearly square image that had, with rare exceptions, been the movies’ standard mode of presentation since they were created (and remained the TV standard until the end of the the century), Fox came up with Cinemascope, which produced a picture roughly two and a half times as wide as it was high, presented on wider screens using standard projectors through the magic of special lenses. Other studios licensed Cinemascope and copycat systems, while Paramount came up with the visually superior (if more cumbersome, because it required special projectors that ran films horizontally instead of vertically) VistaVision, which produced sharper images that were generally less wide. Another idea that had been tried and abandoned in the early talkie era, filming and presentation of films on 70mm, was revived in the mid-1950s under labels like ToddAO, Technirama, Ultra MGM Camera 65 and Super Panavision (and has been brought back yet again this year to sell “The Master”).
3-D, another revived gimmick that has come back to haunt us twice (both in the 1980s and currently) also briefly flourished. But arguably the most unusual and distinctive presentation mode from this era was Cinerama, which employed three projectors to show images on a trio of deeply curved screens (total width 75 feet) to provide a highly-detailed, 147-degree image that gave a 3-D effect without the glasses. Those enteprising archivists at Flicker Alley are next week bringing out a superb Blu-ray/DVD combo pack with a stunning restoration of the first Cinerama feature, “This is Cinerama,” which is celebrating its 50th anniversary — presented in the same deeply curved “Smilebox” format used to simulate Cinerama on Warners’ release of “How the West Was Won” (which I finally saw in its original format, and was blown away by, earlier this year as part of the TCM Classic Film Festival at the Cinemera Dome in Los Angeles, one of several theaters specifically designed to show Cinerama movies).
“This is Cinerama”’ had its world premiere on Sept. 30, 1952 at the still-extant Broadway Theater, a mostly legitimate house that had a decade earlier hosted the road show engagement of Disney’s “Fantasia,” the first feature shown with an early version of what was later called stereophonic sound — a system deployed to great effect as part of Cinerama and faithfully reproduced on Flicker Alley’s great-sounding video release. The reviewers were ecstatic. “Cinerama, the new photographic projection and sound method being shown on Broadway at 53rd Street, is an innovation so startling that everyone will want to see it once,” wrote The Post’s longtime movie critic, Archer Winsten, a man not generally given to hype. “Beginning with the roller-coaster ride and ending with a flight into the clouds, this travelogue with operatic culture creates illusions of movement and live sound that are incomparably more powerful than anything yet viewed on screen. It really makes you dizzy at times. Scenes of Niagara, the Western wheat field, the Yosemite and and the Grand Canyon are only a few of the shots that practically surround and capture you.”
Bosley Crowther’s review, which ran on the front page of the New York Times, was even more over the top, comparing the introduction of Cinerama to the birth of projected films more than 50 years earlier (just as its inventors claim in the original program, a reproduction of which is included as a printed insert with the Flicker Alley release). “With due account for the novelty of the system, it was evident that the distinguished gathering was as excited and thrilled by the spectacle presented as if it were seeing motion pictures for the first time.” Whew. “This is Cinerama” ran for seven months at the Broadway, which had been rented out for the occasion, then moved over to the old Strand, the cavernous former flagship of the Warner Bros. movie chain that was renamed the Warner Cinerama and hosted most of the subsequent Cinemera releases as well (later known as the RKO Cinerama and finally as the RKO Warner, it was demolished in 1986 to make way for the Marquis Hotel). All told, “This is Cinerama” ran for an astounding 133 weeks in New York and went on to gross $41 million in the U.S. alone, despite playing at a very limited number of specially-equipped theaters. It was re-released several times, the last in 1973. It was showing in Hartford, where I lived at the time, and I decided to skip what I then considered a quaint curiosity.
“This is Cinerama” is pretty much a promo reel for the process, which had been developed by Fred Waller, a former special-effects expert at Paramount who may have been partly inspired by the three-screen projection system that Abel Gance employed for his amazing “Napoleon” (1927), which I finally saw this year in San Francisco and hasn’t been shown in New York since the 1980.. Waller demonstrated a more cumbersome system that employed 11 projectors called Vitarama at the 1939 New York World’s Fair, but despite attracting some well-heeled investors had trouble getting the system off the ground until a trio of showmen became involved in the middle of the century.
Legendary producer Merian C. Cooper (who served as Cinerama’s first president until he was replaced by deposed MGM mogul Louis B. Mayer) and showboating radio newsman Lowell Thomas share a presentation credit, and producer Mike Todd has an associate producer credit. Thomas also served as the on-screen narrator of the two-hour film, which opens with a black-and-white prologue, an apparently deliberately dry lecture on the history of film presented in the old, square aspect ratio only on the middle screen (reportedly directed by an uncredited Ernest C. Schoedsack, Cooper’s collaborator on “King Kong,” in his final screen assignment). Then, in one of the great theatrical flourishes in movie history, the curtains (photographed at the Cinerama Dome) open and the audience is plunged into the film’s most famous sequence, a ride on the old Atom Smasher roller coaster at the long-gone Rockaway Playland (filmed in day by Todd’s 21-year-old son Mike Jr.) It’s a thrill that still packs a punch in its Blu-ray incarnation, though the Smilebox can’t quite replicate the three-dimensional-like effect of seeing genuine Cinerama in a theater.
Cooper himself seems to have filmed the still-dazzling footage of aerial footage of Niagara Falls and other America vistas shot from the air after the original director, famed documentarian Robert Flaherty, died of pneumonia after filming Gen. Douglas McArthur during a rainstorm, a sequence not included in the film. Todd Jr. was reponsible for the remarkable footage of other European locales (including a bullfight in Spain and an excerpt from “Aida” performed at La Scala) except for a sequence with the Vienna Boy’s Choir filmed by Gunther Fritsch. Waller apparenty supervised a lengthy water-show sequence shot at Florida’s Cypress Gardens (he also invented water skis) and black-and-white footage of a Long Island choir originally filmed to show to potential investors. The latter is shown with a sepia tint in an otherwise robustly-colored restoration from original CinemaScope prints prepared by Technicolor
This exemplary release includes a highly informative commentary track by Cinerama’s John Sittig, film historian Dave Strohmeier and others; a 19-minute featurette about the restoration; a radio interview with Waller; and a fascinating featurette about a retired projectionist’s revival of the long-dormant format in Dayton, Ohio in the 1990s. (For a definitive documentary about Cinerama, see Strohmeier’s 93-minute “Cinerama Adventure,” included as an extra on Warners’ gorgeous 2008 release of “How the West Was Won”).
Next Tuesday, Flicker Alley is also releasing “Windjammer: The Voyage of the Christian Radich” (1958), filmed in a different but compatable process multi-screen process called Cinemiracle. This surprisingly interesting 143-minute documentary about the travels of Swedish navel cadets was ultimately distributed in the United States by Cinerama, which eventually exhausted the audience for feature-length documentaries. A two-picture deal with MGM yielded the all-star “How the West Was Won” and the much less successful “The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm,” both released in 1962. Cinerama turned out to be impossibly cumbersome for fictional feature films. Actors were required to look over each others shoulders during dialogue sequences while facing enormous cameras. Worse, Cinerama’s achilles heel — the lines dividing the three projected images occasionally glimpsed in “This is Cinerama” — necessitated peculiar set designs and compositions designed to hide the lines, as well as sometimes extremely awkward blocking of scenes. Closeups were virtually banned, and even medium shots took hours of preparation in a medium best suited for vast vistas (aerial outtakes from “This is Cinerama”’ were used for that film’s prologue and epilogue).
Faced with these obstacles, director George Stevens abandoned plans to shoot “The Greatest Story Ever Told” (1965) in Cinerama and instead used the single-camera 70mm Super Panavision process. Cinerama admitted defeat and licensed its name for presentations of “Greatest Story” and a number of other event films shot in 70mm (most notably “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad Mad World” and “2001: A Space Odyssey”’) until the failure of 1970’s “Song of Norway” rang down the curtain for good. Thanks to the Dayton revival, though, there are now three theaters in the world that show Cinerama films periodically. Besides the Cinerama Dome (which is celebrating the anniversary with showings of all the extant films beginning next week), there’s another in Portland, Oregon (saved from the wrecker’s ball by Microsoft founder Paul Allen) and one at a cinema museum in England. None in New York, sadly. It’s a truly unique way to see a movie, and Flicker Alley deserves thanks for making this an unlikely, but extremely welcome, addition to the video canon.
I haven’t had a chance to spend time with “Indiana Jones: The Complete Adventures,” which Paramount is releasing on Blu-ray today. Besides all four adventures starring Harrison Ford, there are hours of special features, mostly ported over from various DVD editions. The only one I’ve looked is Laurent Bouzerau’s excellent “On Set With Raiders of the Lost Ark,” which combines never-seen 16mm production footage with 35mm outtakes and deleted scenes, some of which I’ve never seen before. It runs about an hour and is in high definition. There’s also a 1981 featurette, “Making Raiders of the Lost Ark,” which is said never to have been available on video before.
The Warner Archive collection today completes its run of Jeanette MacDonald-Nelson Eddy musicals with the release of Robert Z. Leonard’s “The Girl of the Golden West” (1938) and “New Moon” (1940), both previous available only as exclusives from Movies Unlimited. WAC’s other releases today are also costume pictures: David Butler’s unintentionally hilarious “King Richard and the Crusaders” (1955), a WarnerColor adaptation of Sir Walter Scott’s “The Talisman” staring Rex Harrison, Virginia Mayo, George Sanders and Laurence Harvey; John Sturges “The Scarlet Coat” (1955) with Cornel Wilde, Sanders and Anne Francis; and Leonard’s “The King’s Thief” (1955) starring David Niven, Sanders and Ann Blyth. From MGM’s international era, WAC is offering costumed kiddie matinee fodder: “The Adventures of Superman” producer George Blair’s “The Secret of Monte Cristo” (1961) starring Roy Calhoun and Gianna Maria Canale as well as Baccio Bandini and Etienne Perier’s “Swordsman of Sienna” (1961) with Stewart Granger and “Hercules” co-star Sylva Koscina’s. WAC is also taking pre-orders for four films starring horror icons for release Oct. 25: Christopher Lee has the title role in a pair directed by Jeremy Summers: “The Face of Fu Manchu” (1965) and “Vengeance of Fu Manchu” (1967); also Albert Zugsmith’s asian-themed, San Francisco-set “Confessions of an Opium Eater” (1962) starring Vincent Price, and Michael Reeves’ “The Sorcerors” (1967) with Boris Karloff in one of his final roles.
When Nora Ephron died back in June, I suggested a trio of Ephron-releated releases to the newly-launched Fox Cinema Archives manufacture-on-demand program. So, tentatively for Oct. 16, they are announcing the long-awaited DVD debut of her directing debut, “This is My Life” (1992) starring Julie Kavner, Samantha Mathis and Gaby Hoffman — as well as Henry Levin’s never-on-video comedy “Take Her, She’s Mine” (1962). One of my more illustrious predecessor as a Post film critic, Frank Rich, recently wrote about this adapation a Broadway play by Ephron’s parents, Henry and Phobe, which features Sandra Dee as a character based on their teenage daughter Nora. James Stewart and Audrey Meadows play her parents. Far more obscure is Henry Ephron’s sole directorial effort, “Sing Boy Sing” (1958) a musical starring singer Tommy Sands, Edmond O’Brien and Lili Gentile. Also at my suggestion, FCA is rolling out Vincent Sherman’s “The Second Time Around” (1961) with the recently-deceased Andy Griffith and Debbie Reynolds.
The other FCA titles penciled in for that date include a pair of vehicles for George “Foghorn” Winslow, Robert Parrish’s “My Pal Gus” (1952) with Richard Widmark and Oscar Rudolph’s “The Rocket Man” (1954) with Charles Coburn and Spring Byington; the Technicolor musical biopics “Swanee River” (Sidney Lanfield, 1939) with Don Ameche (as Stephen Foster) and Al Jolson as well as Lloyd Bacon’s “Golden Girl” (1951) with Mitzi Gaynor (as Lotta Crabtree) and Dale Robertson; and Henry Koster’s much-requested Yuletide favorite “Come to the Stable” (1949) starring Loretta Young and Celeste Holm as nuns (which racked up seven Oscar nominations).
Also from FCA on Oct. 16: Young and Van Johnson in Bacon’s “Mother is a Freshman” (also 1949); Frank Strayer’s “Big Business” (1937), the fifth installment in the “Jones Family” series starring Jed Prouty and Byington; Butler’s “Kentucky Moonshine” (1938) a musical with the Ritz Brothers and Tony Martin; John M. Stahl’s “Holy Matrimony” (1943) starring Monty Woolley and Gracie Fields; Lothar Mendes’ “Tampico” (1944) with Edward G. Robinson, Lynn Bari and Victor McLaglen; Harmon Jones’ sports comedy “The Kid From Left Field” (1953) with Dan Dailey, Billy Chapin and Anne Bancroft; and Frank Borzage’s “They Had to See Paris” (1929) with Will Rogers, previously available only as part of Fox’s pricey “Murnau, Borzage and Fox” box set. Widescreen era films (I’m still checking on the formats) on the slate include Nunnally Johnson’s “Night People” (1954) starring Gregory Peck and Broderick Crawford; Clifford Odets’ “The Story on Page One” (1959) with Rita Hayworth and Anthony Franciosa; Jack Leewood’s “Thunder Island” (1963) with Gene Nelson and Fay Spain; Bernhard Wicki’s “The Visit” (1964) starring Ingrid Bergman and Anthony Quinn; and James Ivory’s “The Guru” (1969) with Rita Tushingham and Michael York.
In the world of Blu-ray, Universal has postponed its “Alfred Hitchcock Masterpieces” Blu-ray set to Oct. 30, reportedly because of quality-control issues. The Criterion will be offering a Blu-ray upgrade for Terry Gilliam’s hugely influential “Brazil” (1985) with Jonathan Pryce and Robert De Niro on Dec. 4, as well as Rene Clement’s out-of-print “Purple Noon” (1960) starring Alain Delon, the latter an adaptation of a Patricia Highsmith novel that was remade as “The Talented Mr. Ripley” (1999) with Matt Damon in the title role. A week later, Criterion will round out another terrific year by debuting Christopher Nolan’s first feature, the thriller “Following” (1999), on Blu-ray and DVD, as well as a set comprised of Godfrey Reggio’s nature documentaries “Koyaanisqatsi” (1984), “Powaqqatsi” (1988) and “Naqqoyqatsi” (2002) with lots of special features.
Details are still pending, but Kino Lorber has confirmed that it will be releasing “The Ultimate Keaton” collection on Blu-ray Dec. 4. The 15-disc extravaganza reportedly includes the 10 restored Keaton features that Kino has already put out in high-definition transfers, as well, exclusive to this set, the Blu-ray debut of Keaton and James Horne’s “College” (1927) and a number of Keaton shorts. A week later, Kino will be offering a Blu-ray upgrade for Josef von Sternberg’s “The Blue Angel” (1929) starring Emil Jannings and Marlene Dietrich — presumably in both the well-known subtitled German-language version as well as the more rarely see English-language verson that Kino also released on DVD.
This just in: the first major video announcement for 2013 is the Blu-ray debuts of two Academy Award winners for Best Pictures. Coming on Jan. 8 are the Blu-ray debuts of Edmund Goulding’s “Grand Hotel” (1933) starring Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, John and Lionel Barrymore, as well as William Wyler’s “Mrs. Miniver” (1942) starring Oscar winner Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon. Warners has previously announced it will release a total of six Best Picture winners during its 90th anniversary year.
