Topic: Old Topic - New Insights

[Giff me dat fill-em!]

I've recently purchased a copy of the 4 most reproduced episodes in Stooge history ...
Disorder in the Court, Sing a Song of Six Pants, Malice in the Palice and Brideless Groom ... which have lived lives on VHS and DVD in various incarnations.
HOWEVER ... the copy I recently purchased was a "colorized" version from Legend Films, and I have a pointed comment -

I now KNOW the reason why people who have seen colorized versions of the boys are so adamently against them. The black and white flatness of the films give them a much more cartoonish nature, while the colorized versions lends a more "3D" effect to the films, and as such much more "real", detracting from their hilarity.

IF I was forever condemned to watch ONLY colorized versions of the boys eps, I would eventually learn to enjoy them anyway, because watching them this way is certainly a novelty ... !!

[FineBari3]

I've recently purchased a copy of the 4 most reproduced episodes in Stooge history ...
Disorder in the Court, Sing a Song of Six Pants, Malice in the Palice and Brideless Groom ... which have lived lives on VHS and DVD in various incarnations.
HOWEVER ... the copy I recently purchased was a "colorized" version from Legend Films, and I have a pointed comment -

I now KNOW the reason why people who have seen colorized versions of the boys are so adamently against them. The black and white flatness of the films give them a much more cartoonish nature, while the colorized versions lends a more "3D" effect to the films, and as such much more "real", detracting from their hilarity.

IF I was forever condemned to watch ONLY colorized versions of the boys eps, I would eventually learn to enjoy them anyway, because watching them this way is certainly a novelty ... !!

BUT.....those are crappy prints and also a crappy production house!

Watch the Columbia colorized ones that came out last summer (and can be found real CHEAP at Media Play and elsewhere). These look like they were SHOT in color!

Yeah.....I know they take away from the asthetic beauty of B & W, but one can appreciate the technology used here! A really fantastic job of colorization was done!

[Giff me dat fill-em!]

If you consider the Legend Films offerings crappy, the Columbia ones must be fantastic, because I thought these colorized versions looked pertie-dern good.

[FineBari3]

Actually, I have not seen those colorized shorts yet! I meant that the prints WERE probably crappy to begin with. Ugh...insert foot in mouth!

HAS anybody seen the Columbia and Legend colorized shorts? Could you please post your comparison of the two???

[Pilsner Panther]

I absolutely refuse to watch, much less buy, any colorized Stooges shorts, or any other colorized B&W films. This is just a travesty, and it's nothing else. I was lucky in that I was able to buy most of the Stooges VHS tapes before they were discontinued.

Colorizing the films of that era is like putting an electric guitar solo in the middle of a Jelly Roll Morton record from 1926... or doesn't anyone get that?

 

[jrvass]

B&W films vs. Colorized B&W films... like

Myron Floren & Jimi Hendrix
Oil & Water
Cats & Dogs
New Orleans politicians & Common Sense 

James

[Giff me dat fill-em!]

Pilsner & jrvass  ... (but mostly Pilsner)

You sound like the guy who said "The Earth is flat and that's that!" or the fellow who said "The sound barrier will never be broken". Now, I'm not one to be actually advocating complete coloriziation of the boys eps, but you MUST admit that these recent colorized offerings are worth viewing? OR ... AT LEAST the efforts by the aforementioned Legend Films to restore the shorts to their best available elements before colorizing?

[Pilsner Panther]

Pilsner & jrvass  ... (but mostly Pilsner)

You sound like the guy who said "The Earth is flat and that's that!" or the fellow who said "The sound barrier will never be broken". Now, I'm not one to be actually advocating complete coloriziation of the boys eps, but you MUST admit that these recent colorized offerings are worth viewing? OR ... AT LEAST the efforts by the aforementioned Legend Films to restore the shorts to their best available elements before colorizing?

Well, Giff, I'll allow that restoring the shorts before colorizing them is a good thing, but why not leave it at that? I'll try making an analogy here, but maybe it's not the best one— suppose someone "fixed" the Venus De Milo statue by putting arms on her? No one knows what the original arms looked like, so it's at most, an educated guess. No matter how good a job the restorer does, they're still not going to be the original arms, and not what the artist intended.

I could easily render an 1890's cylinder recording of John Philip Sousa's band into "stereo" (I've got the software and the skills to do it with), but how does that "improve" it? No matter how convincing it might sound, it's still fakery, and there's no point to it.

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[Giff me dat fill-em!]

Thanks, Pilsner ... that's the exact rebuttal I was expecting. I agree with you whole-heartedly. HOW could these "colorizers" know for sure that, for instance, the walls in the hallway as Christine McIntyre walked down in "Brideless Groom" were actually pastel blue? ... or that the swimsuit worn by Gail Tempest in "Disorder in the Court" was actually a deep purple?

[Giff me dat fill-em!]

BUT.....those are crappy prints and also a crappy production house!

Watch the Columbia colorized ones that came out last summer (and can be found real CHEAP at Media Play and elsewhere). These look like they were SHOT in color!

Yeah.....I know they take away from the asthetic beauty of B & W, but one can appreciate the technology used here! A really fantastic job of colorization was done!

I've received my Soitenly Stooges 2005/2006 Winter Catalog over the weekend, and Lo-and-Behold, the very SAME colorized set of shorts I purchased at a discount DVD store are available at Soitenly Stooges for the paultry sum of $12.99 (see page 3 of the SS/Winter catalog) (I paid less)  Ergo ... Legend Films MUST be a C3 licenced creator of colorized 3Stooges shorts.

FineBari3, can there be a difference in a C3 authorized colorized version and a "Columbia"  authorized version?

[garystooge]

HOW could these "colorizers" know for sure that, for instance, the walls in the hallway as Christine McIntyre walked down in "Brideless Groom" were actually pastel blue? ... or that the swimsuit worn by Gail Tempest in "Disorder in the Court" was actually a deep purple?

This is a good point....the fact is that the colorizers DON'T know for sure. I recently met Stooges supporting actress Virginia Hunter and showed her the colorized version of "Sing a Song of Six Pants". She played Terry Hargan's girlfriend. Her dress is red & white in the colorized version and I asked her if this was the real color of the dress. She replied , "Oh no, it was actually a black & white dress". I said, "you mean it looks black & white in the original short?", and she insisted, "no, it really was a black & white dress", not the red & white that the colorizers had transformed it into.
Gary

[Giff me dat fill-em!]

I had a hunch that us viewers of colorized shorts were under the control of someone's idea of interior design and fashion. Without a detailed list of sets and costumes, its up to the colorizer to decide what looks good.

[FineBari3]

BUT.....those are crappy prints and also a crappy production house!

Watch the Columbia colorized ones that came out last summer (and can be found real CHEAP at Media Play and elsewhere). These look like they were SHOT in color!

Yeah.....I know they take away from the asthetic beauty of B & W, but one can appreciate the technology used here! A really fantastic job of colorization was done!

I've received my Soitenly Stooges 2005/2006 Winter Catalog over the weekend, and Lo-and-Behold, the very SAME colorized set of shorts I purchased at a discount DVD store are available at Soitenly Stooges for the paultry sum of $12.99 (see page 3 of the SS/Winter catalog) (I paid less)  Ergo ... Legend Films MUST be a C3 licenced creator of colorized 3Stooges shorts.

FineBari3, can there be a difference in a C3 authorized colorized version and a "Columbia"  authorized version?

Hmm...good question. I have no idea. I would imagine the Columbia colorized shorts were in coordination with C3. Are you talking about the public domain shorts or the Columbia DVDs that came out last year. If they are the PD ones, I would imagine you could color them pink and blue if you wanted to.....

[CURLYFAN]

I absolutely refuse to watch, much less buy, any colorized Stooges shorts, or any other colorized B&W films. This is just a travesty, and it's nothing else

Hey Pilsner Panther, I agree with you 100%

The 3 Stooges are in B & W and are meant to be viewed in B & W and i think the colorized stooges lose their authenticity, IMO

I saw the colorized Stooges in my new catalog and I wasn't impressed at all.

[Pat]

  I just turn the color on the TV set off, and enjoy the Stooges in glorious black and white.                                               

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        

[Giff me dat fill-em!]

The aforementioned Legend Films DVD has a "special features" selection that allows the viewer to see a side-by-side comparison (in split-screen format) of a "Legend Films Quality" versus a "Current Market Quality" print of the shorts that were colorized. Of course, the Legend side is crystal clear and wonderfully colored, whereas the "Current Market Quality" side is washed out and grainy ... yet the accompanying text to this special feature states that Legend Films sought out the best available elements before colorizing. But watching this side-by-side feature, I was convinced that they used the "Cheap -knock-off-available-elements" for their comparison instead of the current market quality elements, because I own one or two of those cheap-knock-offs and know how grainy and washed out they look.

Of course, this is just my humble opinion, and not actually based on any Stooge-related scientific research.