Jean Renoir

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Finch
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Re: Jean Renoir

#76 Post by Finch » Fri Sep 03, 2010 1:38 pm

Knappen wrote:It turns out that the Nuit du carrefour DVD isn't a proper TCM release at all, just something sold under the guise of their name by a company called "Video Dimensions". These guys have simply found a custom version with fansubs in the back channels of the Internet, made a quick PAL->NTSC conversion and presented it as their product.
Gutted to hear this. I can only hope that it's at least watchable on my plasma.

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Knappen
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Re: Jean Renoir

#77 Post by Knappen » Fri Sep 03, 2010 2:10 pm

At least you can be sure that the subs are first class.

evillights
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Re: Jean Renoir

#78 Post by evillights » Wed Dec 07, 2011 1:58 am

Which company has released this DVD-R/on-demand version of THE CRIME OF MONSIEUR LANGE, which has been available on Amazon since May, apparently? No label is listed.

Has anyone purchased?

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ellipsis7
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Re: Jean Renoir

#79 Post by ellipsis7 » Thu Dec 15, 2011 3:57 am

I'm lucky, I have the old OOP Warner UK 3 film set (then licensed from Studio Canal), with CRIME included... Only slight downside is the subs are fixed, but that has never bothered me...

Monsieur Hare - warm season's greetings, you have been much missed in these parts for the last while...

Jonathan S
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Re: Jean Renoir

#80 Post by Jonathan S » Thu Dec 15, 2011 3:58 am

Yes I still have it too in the 2004 Renoir set from Studio Canal/Warner, so it could be "borrowed" from that. The 1990s BBC broadcast may also be floating around. Both these would be PAL originally of course.

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ellipsis7
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Re: Jean Renoir

#81 Post by ellipsis7 » Thu Dec 15, 2011 6:06 am

David, yes, I second your high opinion of the Park Circus BOUDU BR, it's simply revelatory of Renoir's superb original decoupage, the HD detail pointing up the marvellously sharp depth of field in several setups, contrasting with softer focus/diffusion filter narrow plane imagery in certain closer shots, the precise stagings of some scenes, and the verite nature of others... This was all stuff mainly lost in the lower resolution of DVD, now rediscovered in the new resto on BR... It's a BR release that markedly improved my appreciation of the film BOUDU itself, which already was considerable...

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John Edmond
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Re: Jean Renoir

#82 Post by John Edmond » Thu Dec 15, 2011 9:43 am

I picked it up only recently - I had hoped Criterion would do something with the restoration (it's Renoir, it's Simon, it's Boudu). I imagine a few people feel the same.

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Peacock
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Re: Jean Renoir

#83 Post by Peacock » Thu Dec 15, 2011 9:48 am

(First of all, great to see Schreck and yourself back!)

I personally haven't picked up the Boudu Blu as I figured Criterion would be releasing both the longer and shorter cut (perhaps) on Blu-ray as well, and it's not like Park Circus have released a better Blu-ray than any rival release yet... Perhaps 2012?

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ellipsis7
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Re: Jean Renoir

#84 Post by ellipsis7 » Thu Dec 15, 2011 10:06 am

By the way if Criterion do upgrade to Blu with this resto, they could also let us have the full Renoir/Simon Cineastes de Notre Temps episode rather than just an excerpt... That would justify a double dip!...

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John Edmond
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Re: Jean Renoir

#85 Post by John Edmond » Thu Dec 15, 2011 8:21 pm

*grits teeth at hearing about the missing subtitles* At least I'll know what's happening in that sequence. And it's a film about physicality anyway. I've only ever seen the Optimum DVD which was a revelation in its time, but looked soggy as all hell last time I watched.

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ellipsis7
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Re: Jean Renoir

#86 Post by ellipsis7 » Fri Dec 16, 2011 3:45 am

Sometimes subtitlers work from existing dialogue lists provided by sales agents/distributors. It is possible that in this case this restored scene was not included on such a list, but it's a lazy and unpardonable omission nevertheless...

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MichaelB
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Re: Jean Renoir

#87 Post by MichaelB » Fri Dec 16, 2011 6:05 am

ellipsis7 wrote:Sometimes subtitlers work from existing dialogue lists provided by sales agents/distributors. It is possible that in this case this restored scene was not included on such a list, but it's a lazy and unpardonable omission nevertheless...
I can't believe they don't get someone to sit down and watch the authored disc from beginning to end to flag up these issues. In addition to my own DVD productions (where I do this personally, as I don't trust anyone else), I do freelance QC work from time to time, and every single release I've handled has had a significant problem that wasn't spotted at the authoring stage, whether it's the wrong aspect ratio, subtitles out of sync or missing, etc.

The fact that in most cases it's easy to see why these things happen makes it harder to excuse when they're not spotted by the people who should be keeping an eye on things - and the authoring house shouldn't have the final say.

To be fair, some problems are genuinely impossible to spot at the production stage - for instance, the issue with the BFI's The Leopard that led to a recall occurred at the pressing stage after the master had been properly QCed, and it's clearly not realistic to expect to do another round of QC after the final pressing, since it should be identical to the signed-off master. But such situations are very much in the minority.

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John Edmond
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Re: Jean Renoir

#88 Post by John Edmond » Fri Dec 16, 2011 6:59 am

What's weird is that they must have had to adjust the subtitle timing, otherwise the subtitles would have fallen out of sync after the restored sequence*. How do you miss an error you've partially corrected for?

*Still haven't seen, please tell me the film doesn't fall out of sync at this point.

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John Edmond
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Re: Jean Renoir

#89 Post by John Edmond » Fri Dec 16, 2011 8:18 am

My point is not the difficulty of changing subtitles, but the fact that it had to be done. Somebody had to correct the subtitles timing to compensate for the added minute of footage - and yet they didn't say hey, wait. And I've probably missed your point again, in which case ignore this stupid post.

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martin
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Re: Jean Renoir

#90 Post by martin » Sun Dec 18, 2011 4:34 pm

I agree with the praise the transfer is getting in this thread. Yes, it's "only" a BD25, but the film isn't very long. I actually got a bitrate of 29860 kbs for the video according to BD Info when I tested the specifications.

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JacquesQ
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Re: Jean Renoir

#91 Post by JacquesQ » Fri Nov 16, 2012 2:45 am

Le Bled (1929) is now available on Gaumont "à la demande" series - actually not "upon demand" at all, it's just that some people at Gaumont randomly dig out things from their vaults, some of them already released a dozen times including much better versions, some real crap like 3rd-rate French comedies of back then, but, luckily, some sorely missed films whose copyright they happen to retain, like a few missing ones by Yves Robert, Max Ophuls, Marcel Carné - and this last Renoir silent, a true rarity even in Renoir retrospectives.

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hearthesilence
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Re: Jean Renoir

#92 Post by hearthesilence » Fri Feb 28, 2014 9:47 am

I finally saw one of Renoir's Hollywood films. Two actually: The Woman on the Beach and This Land Is Mine.

The latter is actually on Jonathan Rosenbaum's "alternative" top 100 list of American films - I remember first seeing that list thinking I'd never see most of them since so many were unfamiliar and seemingly unavailable. Now I've seen all but nine of them.

The former was fascinating almost right off the bat - it's a kick to see Renoir string together dreamy images like Jean Cocteau. But the studio meddling is painfully obvious, and the dialogue, much of which was apparently redone and shoved into the film after a terrible preview screening, can be hard to sit through. The worst passages seem to go on forever, especially when it's holding on a fairly bland two-shot close-up. Once you know the plot, it's probably worth revisiting with the sound off and speeding through the expository scenes, just so you can concentrate on what Renoir's doing visually - it can be pretty great but still frustrating that there isn't a great film built around those elements.

This Land Is Mine is probably the kind of film Hollywood expected from Renoir after getting to know his work through La Grande Illusion. I wasn't sure what to expect - it's been heavily criticized as being dated, but obviously it has some passionate defenders. It's not a great film, it's too uneven due to some clumsy elements, but if you can look past those, there's still some wonderful stuff there, beginning with the opening scene that sets up the movie.

It's a film about occupied life in France, and of course it's going to be slick compared to, say, Léon Morin - as to be expected for a '40s Hollywood studio film. But Renoir works his usual wonders with the relationships between characters, and even when a few of the performances seem wrong for this picture (particularly the mother), the film can hold a lot of weight when it ties these relationships to the plot and Renoir is able to sketch out the personal struggles shading every conflict.

Calvin
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Re: Jean Renoir

#93 Post by Calvin » Wed Aug 19, 2015 1:59 pm

I haven't seen it reported here yet, but both La Nuit du Carrefour and Chotard & Cie were released on DVD in France via Rene Chateau earlier this year. I haven't been able to find any reviews.

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Rayon Vert
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Re: Jean Renoir

#94 Post by Rayon Vert » Thu Aug 20, 2015 12:11 am

Calvin wrote:I haven't seen it reported here yet, but both La Nuit du Carrefour and Chotard & Cie were released on DVD in France via Rene Chateau earlier this year. I haven't been able to find any reviews.
I don't know if it means anything, but they're not listed on amazon.fr - the company's releases usually are.

Numero Trois
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Re: Jean Renoir

#95 Post by Numero Trois » Thu Aug 20, 2015 11:15 pm

Probably not. It took a while for La Religieuse to get listed on Amazon some years back.

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Trees
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Re:

#96 Post by Trees » Sun Apr 17, 2016 4:12 pm

HerrSchreck wrote: Orson Welles was talking about the studio system, and how Fox/Zanuck emasculated Renoir... to the point that they assigned him Irving Pichel.. as a liason-- meaning that while making the film (I believe it was Swamp Water) Renoir was told that he may only speak to Pichel, and Pichel would then speak to the cast.

Anyway Welles (this was definitely around the period of his wine commercials for E & J Gallo) said that the people who thrived in the studio were people who wanted to make the kind of films that the studios wanted to make. And that those who wanted to make something different had a very difficult time of it (sad as Welles of course was the epitome of this) in Hollywood.

Then he went on to talk specifically about Renoir (the interview was "about" Renoir and the above quote was leadup to the coming quote, which is the point of this post), saying "..someone like Jean Renoir-- who I think is the greatest, ever, had a very Very Difficult Time. Hollywood studios did not want a Jean Renoir movie; the heads of the studios didn't want a Jean Renoir movie even if it made money and was a big success."

That statement-- the final, boldfaced line-- just struck me from my scalp to my toes, as one of the most incredibly sad things I'd ever heard about Hollywood. The man is not talking about "the studios were risk averse, and stayed away from formal experiments as they never made money." Renoir didn't make "formal experiments" or "arty art films". His films were by and large (Regle excepted) moneymakers, and vastly beloved in Europe, and some even here in the US (ie La G. Illusion). He was generally like any other of the pool of expat filmmakers in the US coming from France, Germany, UK etc... only better.

You can take the statement-- or confirmation-- of what we all know about what happened to Renoir in the USA as further confirmation of what has already been written, and I guess its old news. But essentially it seems the essence of "they don't want a successful Jean Renoir film" is... basically the equivalent of a sign that says "The Real Thing Not Welcomed Here." Because I guess the real thing-- or a kind of real thing-- could not be construed as Studio Product, a result of more than one Guiding Hand.
If true, this is really a disgrace.
Tommaso wrote: Zanuck also didn't have any understanding for Renoir's techniques. In one of his infamous memos on "Swamp Water" (which can be read in the aforementioned Bergstrom article), Zanuck states for example:
"You are wasting entirely too much time on non-essential details in your background" or "You used four different angles to get over the action with the sheriff on the porch. This could have been covered with one or two angles at the most." It seems that Zanuck objected against precisely those things that make Renoir so great in many people's view: deep focus photography and the attention it must receive, the almost abstract organisation of space as in "Regle du Jeu", all the care for seemingly unimportant details of the mise en scene in general, and of course the complexity of the characterization.
This reminds me somewhat of the producer notes to Ridley Scott on Blade Runner, which scorned him for putting so much time, money and effort into composing scenes, which turned out to be the film's greatest strength, and the reason it is so beloved today.

I have only seen a few of Renoir's films, but it's instantly clear what a master he was in blending art with entertainment.

A Day in the Country (1936) - This film is exuberance, and a heartfelt homage to nature, and our place in it. This film snuck up on me and genuinely delighted me. I have read that the film is "unfinished" but it does not seem to be lacking anything at all.

La Bete Humaine (1938) - The human beast! This is one the craziest pictures I have seen in a while. These old French films are kind of interesting in that every single man is a potential rapist and psycho, and every female is only one step away from being accosted. If a woman is seen sitting alone in public, and no one else is around, some male is surely lurking in the corners ready to leap out and attack her. I guess this is a play on stereotypes, and maybe back then, in France, this is how things were! Who knows. In any case, the Human Beast is one of the more exhilarating films from this era, and certainly one of the best made. The camera techniques used to film from moving trains were decades ahead of their time. When you watch La Bete Humaine, it looks like a film that must have been shot in the 1950s, the blocking and camera techniques are so far ahead of their time. Even between the years of 1937 and 1938, it's very easy to spot how drastically the train-based camera techniques improved between Grand Illusion and Human Beast. But while I speak about camera techniques, it's obviously the human story that excels most of all in this era of films from Renoir.

I'm not sure that I can add much of substance to what has already been written about La Grande Illusion or The Rules of the Game, both of which I loved, especially the latter. I want to rewatch Rules soon, because it doesn't seem like the kind of film you can learn everything about in one viewing.

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hearthesilence
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Re: Jean Renoir

#97 Post by hearthesilence » Thu Nov 16, 2017 3:39 pm

Just out of curiosity, has anyone seen the new restoration of The Crime of Monsieur Lange currently playing at Film Forum? I ask because I caught what was supposed to be the same restoration at the NYFF and it looked awful, enough that I have a tough time believing another viewer can see the same thing and say "that looks great!" Then I came across Jim Hoberman's review in the NY Times where he writes "with its splendid 4K restoration, 'Monsieur Lange' looks brand-new." Were we looking at the same film? It's a masterpiece by the way, so I'm glad people can see it when it was so difficult to find for a long time, but going by what I've seen in recent years, the source elements known to have survived are clearly subpar, and the restorers seemed to have gone overboard with the clean-up and grain management in a futile attempt to make it look better than it can possibly look.

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Brian C
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Re: Jean Renoir

#98 Post by Brian C » Fri Jan 19, 2018 1:05 am

hearthesilence wrote:Just out of curiosity, has anyone seen the new restoration of The Crime of Monsieur Lange currently playing at Film Forum? I ask because I caught what was supposed to be the same restoration at the NYFF and it looked awful, enough that I have a tough time believing another viewer can see the same thing and say "that looks great!" Then I came across Jim Hoberman's review in the NY Times where he writes "with its splendid 4K restoration, 'Monsieur Lange' looks brand-new." Were we looking at the same film? It's a masterpiece by the way, so I'm glad people can see it when it was so difficult to find for a long time, but going by what I've seen in recent years, the source elements known to have survived are clearly subpar, and the restorers seemed to have gone overboard with the clean-up and grain management in a futile attempt to make it look better than it can possibly look.
I saw this the other night at the Siskel, and I agree with you that it left a lot to be desired. I'm not remotely educated in these matters, of course, but I still found myself wondering what exactly it was I was looking at, because it didn't look like it came from a film source. At the same time, though, it looks too old and worn to be anything else. So I guess I would agree that it looked digitally overscrubbed and flat, for a lack of a better word; it was simply missing that depth that comes from film, even with battered old prints, which to me is often compromised when projected digitally but not to this extent. As david hare points out, this is hardly the first restoration of an older film with poor surviving elements, and I just don't think this is how something like this is supposed to look?

As for the film itself ... I wish I had been in a different state of mind, because I feel like I really missed the boat on it. But I'd been sick the past couple of weeks, and I probably should have waited a couple of days longer to get over it but didn't want to miss it. Kind of a wasted opportunity and I regret it.

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Drucker
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Re: Jean Renoir

#99 Post by Drucker » Fri Jan 19, 2018 10:20 am

Brian C wrote:
hearthesilence wrote:Just out of curiosity, has anyone seen the new restoration of The Crime of Monsieur Lange currently playing at Film Forum? I ask because I caught what was supposed to be the same restoration at the NYFF and it looked awful, enough that I have a tough time believing another viewer can see the same thing and say "that looks great!" Then I came across Jim Hoberman's review in the NY Times where he writes "with its splendid 4K restoration, 'Monsieur Lange' looks brand-new." Were we looking at the same film? It's a masterpiece by the way, so I'm glad people can see it when it was so difficult to find for a long time, but going by what I've seen in recent years, the source elements known to have survived are clearly subpar, and the restorers seemed to have gone overboard with the clean-up and grain management in a futile attempt to make it look better than it can possibly look.
I saw this the other night at the Siskel, and I agree with you that it left a lot to be desired. I'm not remotely educated in these matters, of course, but I still found myself wondering what exactly it was I was looking at, because it didn't look like it came from a film source. At the same time, though, it looks too old and worn to be anything else. So I guess I would agree that it looked digitally overscrubbed and flat, for a lack of a better word; it was simply missing that depth that comes from film, even with battered old prints, which to me is often compromised when projected digitally but not to this extent. As david hare points out, this is hardly the first restoration of an older film with poor surviving elements, and I just don't think this is how something like this is supposed to look?

As for the film itself ... I wish I had been in a different state of mind, because I feel like I really missed the boat on it. But I'd been sick the past couple of weeks, and I probably should have waited a couple of days longer to get over it but didn't want to miss it. Kind of a wasted opportunity and I regret it.
Nothing worse than going to a theater and not being in the mood for a film! This has happened to me too many times.

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whaleallright
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Re: Jean Renoir

#100 Post by whaleallright » Sun Jan 21, 2018 1:15 pm

It can be a pain to get to the Siskel Film Center in Chicago in the winter. By the time I've marched to the El, waited for the train in freezing weather, walked through falling snow from the train to the theater, marched up the long stairs, and then waited in their charmless overlit lobby, I can be in no shape to watch some lengthy art-film masterpiece. I once went to some lengths, despite being under the weather, to see Oliveira's rare Doomed Love, a film I'd been wanting to see for years, (I even left work early etc.) and fell asleep within ten minutes of the film starting. :(

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