Universal Monsters: Undo BD 'fixes'

[crissrudd4554]

Hello this is a project I've considered proposing for a little while now. Back in 2012, 9 of Universal's classic Monster films were released on BD for the first time. For the most part they were positively received by the fans. However two things have caught my attention with two key films of those 9 restored films: Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein. The issue with Bride has been discussed sporadically among some fans since the BD's release (http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum.yuku..._MSfSMrKCQ). I only a few months ago discovered something with the first Frankenstein.

First with the latter. The sequence of Henry and Fritz wheeling the slab with the corpse up the hill toward the gallows early in the film has been tweaked. Originally about midway through the sequence, just as they pass under a pointed rock formation in the foreground, it cut to them closer to the gallows. Either something was cut or missing here. For the BD the sequence has been repositioned so the scenery passes by seamlessly however the two men and the slab jumping forward is all more noticeable than it had been previously. Here's two GIFs to demonstrate what I mean.

First shows the original edit.

[Image: 4NlZyh.gif]

Second the BD edit.

[Image: sno0S_.gif]

Next Bride. This IMO is a bit more distracting then the edit to Frankenstein. It's the shot of the Monster approaching the hermit's cabin. It previously consisted of two shots, the first being farther away than the second. For the BD the first part of the sequence has been blown up to match the second part so the sequence looks more complete. However the editing is a bit jarring and a tree branch that was missing in the second half now magically 'disappears'. Below are GIFs to detail this change as well.

Original

[Image: bof-walk35.gif]

BD (recreation)

[Image: bof-walk2012.gif]

Why these changes were made who knows?? Are they bad?? Not necessarily but it would be nice if they had been left alone. Perhaps this is a nitpicky topic but hey we need those from time to time right?? Anyways anyone by any chance be interested in attempting to restore the original edits to the BD versions and if so can provide any suggestions on how to do so?? I'm no master of upscaling and such so I won't be much help. The availability of the original edits isn't much a challenge. Any pre-2012 DVD release will have them. It's possible maybe the iTunes versions may have them since I remember renting an HD version of Frankenstein off iTunes a year or two before the BDs had been released that wasn't the BD print (obviously). Anyways let me know what you guys think.

[monks19]

Well. Personally I don't find them that distracting, even with the fact we don't know if those jump cuts were caused by either missing frames or bad editing. In any case, for a film of this age, Universal could have either left it this way, or made some research on other known copies and see if the jumps cuts were still there. In fact, Universal didn't do anything to restore those (even with the fame of horror that comes with). It's mostly thanks to other entities like UCLA that we can still have access to them. Otherwise, they would have junked it long ago like Phantom of the opera (1925). Also, if HD copies pre-restoration exist of those, I think it'll be nice to get them. Any idea where we could look (including Itune) ?

[monks19]

Ok, I just finished reading the whole thread on the monster kids forum, and the more I think about it the more I think that either we fix Universal's butchery like one of the forum member did, or we find those HD untempered copies and put the on them spleen for safekeeping until we do any other work on those (actually, doing both seems a much better idea).

[crissrudd4554]

This might be of some interest. FRANKENSTEIN is available in HD for free on On Demand in the Free Movie section under TCM. The print is actually NOT the BD print. Its noticeably grainer but not too bad and has the original editing of the sequence of the slab being wheeled up the hill. BRIDE is also available but it is the BD print so no use there. Anyways is there anyone here who would be willing and have the necessary tools to do so to capture the sequence from FRANKENSTEIN from the On Demand version?? My capture device does not record in HD otherwise I would do it myself. At the time I'm writing this it says its available for another 23 hours.

[The Aluminum Falcon]

There was a bonafide 1080i25 HD capture of both Frankenstein (1931) and Bride of Frankenstein (1935) on the now-defunct Cinemageddon that predated the Blu-Rays. From what I recall, they were quite nice for the time being.

Did anyone happen to keep these? I think they were CG exclusive, but for all I know they could have shown up on some newsgroup.

Unfortunately, I only have 29.97fps re-encodes of these, which, though still high quality, I won't be able to access until I'm back in California in December. It would be quite the challenge to convert it back to 23.976fps, though.

[TServo2049]

Cinemageddon is actually not defunct, they were just temporarily brought down by DDoS attacks. It's back up now (but it doesn't consistently load well, and it now has Cloudflare DDoS protection to prevent the kind of shit that took it down to begin with). I'm trying to see if those torrents are still there and seeded, I did get onto the site, but it's just "Waiting for..." in my browser when I try to run a search.

EDIT: Yup, Bride is at least still up with 1 seed. Trying to check about the original...

EDIT 2: And yes, the original is up and has 2 seeds.

[monks19]

Cinemageddon is actually not defunct, they were just temporarily brought down by DDoS attacks. It's back up now (but it doesn't consistently load well, and it now has Cloudflare DDoS protection to prevent the kind of shit that took it down to begin with). I'm trying to see if those torrents are still there and seeded, I did get onto the site, but it's just "Waiting for..." in my browser when I try to run a search.

EDIT: Yup, Bride is at least still up with 1 seed. Trying to check about the original...

EDIT 2: And yes, the original is up and has 2 seeds.

That's good news. Do you think you can download them and share them with us (with, of course, the sound work that's done by Jerry and Crissus) ? That'll be a huge bonus here.

Speaking of mess ups by Universal, any other blunders that we should be aware of in the other Universal movies (Dracula [both spanish & original versions], The Invisible man, The Wolf man, the Mummy, etc) ? We can get to those while we're at it.

[crissrudd4554]

Off hand I know the opening credits for Dracula was somewhat recreated. Check out posts 46 and 47 in the link below.

http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum.yuku..._uya4b3bYU

Also in The Invisible Man, when he first 'reveals' himself, on the BD the sound of the wig hitting the table when he pulls it off is missing.

[The Aluminum Falcon]

Dracula is also on Cinemageddon. I'm having trouble getting on, though...

[monks19]

Off hand I know the opening credits for Dracula was somewhat recreated. Check out posts 46 and 47 in the link below.

http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum.yuku..._uya4b3bYU

Also in The Invisible Man, when he first 'reveals' himself, on the BD the sound of the wig hitting the table when he pulls it off is missing.

Is it on the DVD ? If yes, which one ?

Dracula is also on Cinemageddon. I'm having trouble getting on, though...

Anything you can tell about this one ? Pre-restoration or not (or anything else) compared to the Blu-Ray ?

Also, does anybody knows where the shooting script of those films can be found online ? It'll be interesting to add them as bonus with those projects, I think. What about you ?

Furthermore, I've managed to get a copy of a Fanedit of a restoration of Dracula. If there's any interest, I can share it there or just give you the download link where to get it, but you'll need JDownloader for that, I'm afraid (policy of the website hosting it). For more information about this: https://ifdb.fanedit.org/dracula-restored/

BTW, is there anything on The Invisible Man on CG ?