George Feltenstein announces the Warner Archive's six upcoming January 2024 Blu-ray releases. George provides background on each film, the remaster, and all of the extras that are included. There is no better way to learn about what is on the Warner Archive schedule than to hear directly from George.
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George Feltenstein announces the Warner Archive's six upcoming January 2024 Blu-ray releases. George provides background on each film, the remaster, and all of the extras that are included. There is no better way to learn about what is on the Warner Archive schedule than to hear directly from George.
MovieZyng AffiliateThe Extras Facebook page
The Extras Twitter
Warner Archive & Warner Bros Catalog Group
Otaku Media produces podcasts, behind-the-scenes extras, and media that connect creatives with their fans and businesses with their consumers. Contact us today to see how we can work together to achieve your goals. www.otakumedia.tv
Hello and welcome to the Extras, where we take you behind the scenes of your favorite TV shows, movies and animation and their release on digital DVD, blu-ray and 4K or your favorite streaming site. I'm Tim Lager host, and joining me is George Feltonstein to announce the January Blu-ray releases from the Warner Archive.
Speaker 2:Hi George, hey Tim, how are you today?
Speaker 1:I'm good and we're recording this right before Thanksgiving, so this is a terrific Thanksgiving treat for the listeners and fans of the Warner Archive to have these January titles released this early.
Speaker 2:Well, we're trying to make our announcements earlier so that there's plenty of time for everybody to get their planning done and know what's coming, and we're already working on titles for February and March and April and so forth and so on. So I hope we can keep this cadence going of being out in front a little more. And we're delighted to announce this lineup, because there is a very dedicated fan base for each and every one of these films.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm excited to dive into this, so let's do so and we'll kind of mix it up. Today, instead of going chronological or alphabetical, we'll just kind of go randomly here. Okay, let's see. And how many are we going to be talking about today? George Six, six. Okay, that's a robust amount. Well, first up, I thought we could just go with an all-time favorite actor, that is, ian the Prince and the Popper from 1937. What can you tell us about that title?
Speaker 2:Well, this is a really delightful film and is sorely in need of being on Blu-ray, because this isn't even one of those films where there was an old HD master floating around in digital from the DVD days. This is really the first HD master the company will have ever had, but it comes from a 4K scan of the camera negative and it's gone through a full restoration and it's really gorgeous. This film has such a wonderful spirit and Flynn is terrific and this was only made two years after his smashing debut as a star in Captain Blood and by this time he had already established himself as a totally magnificent, magnetic movie star and he really carries the film. It's a story that's been told many times because it's based on Mark Twain's novel and there have been several film versions and television versions. I don't think any of them can hold a candle to what Warner Brothers did with the material and one of the studio's best directors, william Keely, was the director, and you've got a phenomenal score by Eric Wolfgang Corn Gold and a great cast with Flynn playing opposite the great Claude Reigns, who was his nemesis in Robin Hood a year later, and we all love from so many great performances.
Speaker 2:And then the Prince and the Pauper are played by real life twin brothers, billy and Bobby Mouch, and they were terrific in this film and I know that the studio tried very hard to find other vehicles for them and they really didn't find anything out. They tried a couple of things but nothing really matched what they were able to achieve in this movie the Prince and the Pauper and it looks stunning. It's a wonderful presentation and we've added some classic 1937 Warner Brothers cartoons, all in HD, so you can recreate the experience of going to the movies in 1937. It's just a beautiful presentation of a wonderful film.
Speaker 1:So I've seen already online that it's getting a tremendous amount of excitement. Everybody loves when another Errol Flynn movie comes out and they anxiously wait for the next one, so this is a terrific release. And then next we have, from 1943, cabin in the Sky. What can you tell us about that one, george?
Speaker 2:This is a landmark motion picture for several reasons. Most notably, I think this was Vincent Menelli's Feature film directorial debut, and I specify feature film because he had done Supervision of various sequences at MGM before they gave him his first chance to be a director, came from the stage and he basically learned his cinematic craft, doing certain sequences for other films and then finally for cabin in the sky, he was given the opportunity to show that he could direct a feature film, and this was a very successful one in adaptation of a 1940. Broadway musical. And it's also notable, of course, for having a cast that is completely made up of African American actors and actresses. They are also, for the most part, legends of 20th century entertainment of the highest order, and we're talking about the great F O Waters, who recreates her stage role as Petunia, who's married to Joe, who is A well meaning guy who gets tempted by the forces of evil and ultimately good triumphs over evil in the story it's really kind of a musical fable. But Eddie Rochester Anderson, who is one of the most beloved character actors in the entertainment industry, he plays little Joe. And then you've got Lena Horne as the temptress Georgia Brown, and Lena Horne's big complaint about her time at MGM was that all she ever got to do was to come out, sing a song and then make a quick exit. I'm paraphrasing her own words, and that's entertainment three about what the studio did with her. In this case she got to play a role, as did all of the actors and actresses, and this isn't where they're playing maids and butlers and anything that is insulting. It's a wonderful story with phenomenal music. The Broadway score was aided and abetted by a few additional songs that were written by Harold Arlen and yet the team best known for writing the score for the Wizard of Oz. So MGM spared no expense in making this film a class A production. It got phenomenal reviews. You also have in the cast Louis Armstrong, duke Ellington and his orchestra, the Hall Johnson choir and Rex Ingram, who played opposite Ethel Waters in the stage version.
Speaker 2:Butterfly McQueen is in this movie. Mantan Moreland is in this movie. It is really a testament to the talent of all the people involved. The producer of the film was Arthur Fried, who would collaborate with Manelli again and again years in the future, and there are a lot of Oscars involved when it came to an American, paris and Gigi winning best picture for Mr Fried. But it all started the Manelli Freed connection with Cabin in the sky and one of the things I always bring up about this film that some people don't know but a lot of people do is this is a scene where there's a scene in the film where they reuse the cyclone from the Wizard of Oz. They reuse that special effects footage in this movie and there are a lot of extras on this disc.
Speaker 2:We have a wonderful commentary from Eddie Anderson's wife and daughter and Todd Boyd, who's a phenomenal cinematic scholar and also a black culture scholar, dr Duke Casper Faire Nicholas was still with us when this commentary was recorded for the DVD release, probably a little less than 20 years ago. Key of the Nicholas brothers, of course. It's really a very comprehensive look at the film and very entertaining commentary. We have a short subject studio visit.
Speaker 2:It's a Pete Smith short that has an outtake musical number in it that was cut out of Cabin in the sky when Lena Horne sings Ain't it the Truth? It was cut out of the film because she was in a bubble bath. The censors didn't like that. But putting in a short subject, nobody really paid attention. And there it was and that's how that number got saved, and then there is an audio version of that song with a different performance by Louis Armstrong and that's on the disc. So it's nicely packed with special features and, most importantly, the film looks amazingly gorgeous. Just a huge step forward from what we were dealing with in standard definition, and I think people are going to be very, very happy with this release as well.
Speaker 1:I was amazed to see this list of all of these extras. What a great batch to go with this movie. I'm really looking forward to seeing this when it comes out. Well, next up we're going to jump to something a little bit closer to us from 1991. And you've been releasing animation, it seems like on a pretty regular schedule here in the last three, four, five, six months, and this is called Rover Danger Field. What can you tell us about this film?
Speaker 2:Well, this is one of those films that didn't really it didn't really make much of an impact on its theatrical release, but a huge amount of audience learned about this film through video cassette in the early 90s and, of course, cable television and a lot of people that grew up as little kids watching this movie. They've never lost their enthusiasm for this movie and it's a childhood memory that holds up in adulthood because, of course, it's all about Rodney Dangerfield. This was Rodney Dangerfield's concept and he was very involved in the creation of this. So this film has a really built in fan base that represents three decades worth of diehard admiration, and a Blu-ray release just seemed like a perfect thing to do because we have been trying to address these animated features in the library that people really have a fondness for.
Speaker 2:Wolver Dangerfield made its DVD debut through Warner Archive years ago using an old master. This new master is just beautiful and it really does justice to the humor and the excellent animation. The guys behind the creation of this feature had done a film, I believe in the late 80s, called the Brave Little Toaster, and it was an independent animated feature that was just beloved by everybody who saw it and that's why they were selected to be the gatekeepers of bringing this motion picture to the screen, and it holds up wonderfully, especially if you're a Rodney Dangerfield fan, or if you're a dog lover or both, or you just love seeing exceptional animation. This film is beautifully, beautifully done. Of course it's the hand drawn animation before the days of computer generated imagery, and I think it's just a lot of fun and we're delighted to be releasing it.
Speaker 1:And it looked like, george, that you have some nice HD extras on here as well.
Speaker 2:Well, we do. We have a whole bunch of classic Warner cartoons, but they have a thematic tie. They're all about dogs and some of them have never been released on any form of Disc that I'm aware of, so that makes it a little bit some of them. I think that makes it a little more special and I think people are going to be very, very happy with this release as a great evening of entertainment the whole family can enjoy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it was just last month or two that you had the cats don't dance, and now we have a nice one for the dog lovers out there. I jest, of course, because it's really about animation lovers, and it's great to see some of these smaller films. As you said, part of the task of the Warner archive is to release these smaller titles that probably I don't know if they'll ever show up on a streaming service, so it allows fans to get it and own it and then build their animation library.
Speaker 2:Well, we, I sound like a broken record, but I'll just keep reinforcing the importance of supporting physical media is really, really critical right now, and the support that our fans have shown our releases has made an impact and is noted by our senior leaders, and that's how we communicate to them that physical media needs to continue and the fact that we have even more exciting plans for 2024 than the 62 films we had for 2023. That's very, very exciting for me, and January is just the taste of what's to come.
Speaker 1:Well, speaking of another movie that's not as well known but beloved by a small group of people, and I think they'll be very excited about this release. This is from 1996, and this is called Joe's Apartment. What can you tell us about this film?
Speaker 2:Well, actually a lot of people do know about this movie, not from theaters but, again, television exhibition and home video rental. I think this was still the days of Blockbuster. This film is a cult favorite and we get a lot of requests for this movie. And when we were releasing primarily, you know, earlier in the year there was a very distinct bend towards 30s and 40s movies and people were, as they are apt to do, on the internet, making, I'll just say it nicely Making their voice heard that they wanted to see more of their favorites of more recent vintage. Of course, this movie is 27 years old, but for us, when we're dealing with 100 and some odd years worth of film, this is a relatively recent release, but it is indeed a product of the late 90s and very much notable as the first feature film that was done under the auspices of MTV Films, and there was a tie between Warner Brothers and MTV in the very early years and I assume that that's how it ended up being a. It was a Geffen film's production. David Geffen had a production deal with the studio, so he got together with the folks at MTV and the result was this film, which is based on a short film that the director and writer, john Payson, had created, and I believe it was shown on MTV. I know that we have no rights to it. We wanted to be able to include it here, but the studio had a deal for this one picture, and that's what we have. And it's really about a guy who really wants to start his new life, young guy in New York, and it's all about the cockroaches. That's really what it's about.
Speaker 2:And the fans of this film, though what I'm talking about, jerry O'Connell is the star. He's terrific, it's a lot of fun and it's just insane. It's insane comedy. It's really a lot of fun. And here again we've added cartoons, but with a different bend. As the extras we have one cartoon called the Lady in Red. I believe it's from 1935. And it of course uses that famous song that was written for the Warner Brothers movie in Caliente, but it's a cartoon that has gotten virtually all cockroach cast. So I thought it would be perfect to be put on here when the other two cartoons, from Hair to Eternity with Bugs Bunny and Superior Duck with Daffy Duck they were both released in 1997 and 1996, respectively done by Chuck Jones when he returned to the studio to make new Warner Brothers cartoons in the late 90s and the early aughts. These films don't get seen enough. They're all in HD and I think this is going to be a terrifically enjoyable disc for a lot of people.
Speaker 1:Well, next we're going to jump back in time a bit, to 1932. And that's the film Faithless. What can you tell us about this film?
Speaker 2:Well, this is a real. It's a real obscurity, to be frank. This is a film that's very, very good but not very well known, but it has a lot going for it. It's a very beautiful cinematic showcase for the talents of Tallulah Bankhead and those of you who only know Tallulah Bankhead as a guest villainess on Batman TV show when she played the Black Widow.
Speaker 2:34 years later, or 35 years after this movie was made, tallulah Bankhead was a larger than life character in life and primarily did her work on the stage, but she did make occasional film appearances, and Faithless is one of her best. She's cast opposite Robert Montgomery, who's a tremendously underrated performer. He's a big star at MGM all through the 30s and into the 40s and he's been virtually forgotten, and I'm so glad that we're able to bring this film in a brand new Blu-ray. That looks remarkable because it really is also a dandy precode romance sizzler and it's based on a book called Tinfoil by Mildred Cram, and Tallulah and Robert Montgomery are terrific in this movie. It was directed by Harry Beaumont, who was the director for the Broadway Melody and many MGM movies of that time, and I'm just happy we want to get more precode out. There are so many to choose from, but I'm glad we have these coming on this release.
Speaker 1:And then, what can you tell us about the extras and the 4K scan?
Speaker 2:Well, the 4K scan is from our best preservation elements and this is not unusual I've talked about this before that many MGM nitrate films the original negative no longer exists, mostly due to a tragic fire that happened in 1978 at the film archive where the nitrate was kept. Therefore, although we don't have the original negative to work with, mgm did start converting its nitrate films to safety film in the early 1960s. At the time, the only other studio that was that forward thinking was Disney, and Because of MGM having made protection elements so early, this enables us to get as close to what the original negative would have been able to yield as possible In the very frequent Events when we find there isn't original negative available. So this is a second generation safety fine-grain that was made in the 1960s that we used as a source, and the results are really remarkable. It's quite beautiful.
Speaker 2:And then, in addition to the feature film, we added three high definition short subjects. We have rambling down radio row, and there were several of those made by Warner Brothers. This is a filled with stage and vaudeville entertainers, comedians and singers, and it's just a lot of fun in ten minutes. And then we have the transatlantic mystery and the symphonic murder mystery and they're both two realers 20 minute short speech that were part of a mystery series of shorts that Warner Brothers is doing around the time. They were all in HD and we don't have a trailer. It's not unusual not to have trailers on the early MGM films. They didn't really start to save them until a few years later, I'd say probably around 1933-34. They start to be very Abundant and available, but from like 1932 back we have very little. So Unfortunately there's no known trailer of this. But we have the film itself and some great shorts and it's gonna be a terrific disc.
Speaker 1:Well, that's five of the six for January, and I know there's a lot of excitement for this last one that we're gonna talk about, and that's because it's a Marx Brothers film, a day at the races, from 1937.
Speaker 2:This is something I had been waiting for for a very, very long time. This is actually my favorite Marx Brothers movie and I wanted to release a night the opera and a date the races together. They're usually always together, but at night. The opera came out two years ago and we ran into some difficulties with this that Delayed it, but we finally got everything straightened out and it looks gorgeous. It's beautiful.
Speaker 2:This is the second film the Marx Brothers made at MGM. They are first film and MGM night the opera was a huge success and it was Irving Thalberg, who is the famed studio chief, who believed in the Marx Brothers after their film career kind of took a nosedive at Paramount and they couldn't make movies there anymore because their movies weren't making money and accordingly, what they did was Irving Thalberg signed them to a very lucrative contract at MGM and it was because of Thalberg that the Marx Brothers Felt comfortable at MGM. And for a date the races they did what they did. For a night the opera. They went out on the road and did stage versions of the screenplay to test out what material did and didn't work with an audience, and Thalberg gave them that freedom. Heartbreakingly, thalberg died before the production was actually beginning to shoot, but his oversight was very much Still present in the final result.
Speaker 2:This film is very highly beloved. It's very funny. It has Groucho playing his favorite role as Dr Hugo Z Hackenbush, a horse doctor who is brought to a sanitarium run by Moreno Sullivan. What's gonna lose their? Basically they're losing money and predators are ready to step in. And Margaret Dumont plays this wealthy lady, mrs Upjohn, who'sa Hypocondriac patient there who has enough money to save the sanitarium. And stepping into the Zepo like role is Alan Jones, as he did in the night the opera, to provide balance for the Groucho, harpo and Chico.
Speaker 2:And there's really terrific music in this film. And, most importantly, there are some of the funniest bits the Marx Brothers ever did the Tootsie fruity ice cream, a routine between Chico and Groucho. There's the wallpaper sketch, there's the doctors examination sketch and then there's a wonderful Production number towards the end of the film, right before the climactic horse race, where Ivy Anderson, who is the lead vocalist for the Duke Ellington Orchestra, leads a whole group of people down in the barnyard near the racetrack doing all God's shown gut rhythm. And it's a wonderful, wonderful song with some spectacular swing, dancing and what isn't known publicly that well, but it was something I confirmed and discovered several years ago when I was releasing the song on a soundtrack. Cd compilation is Ivy Anderson was the lead singer for the Duke Ellington Orchestra and in fact the orchestral backup on that song is the Duke Ellington Orchestra. But they did get any billing because they did the work and it was at the contract that if the studio wanted to use Duke Ellington's name they would have had to pay a sizable amount of money to Mr Ellington. So he was just paid for his work recording the song with his vocalist. But you're seeing his vocalist, ivy Anderson, sing the song, but backing her up is the Duke Ellington Orchestra. So there's a little trivia for you.
Speaker 2:But this is really a celebration of the Marx Brothers. This is probably the last great film that they made. They made several after this, some of which are better than others, but Dave, the Race is superb and you've got great support, of course, from Groucho's inimitable foil, margaret Dumont. What's a Marx Brothers movie without Margaret Dumont? You know there are a few where she wasn't there and the film suffered for it. So I couldn't be more excited about this, especially because when we released the night the opera, people were so happy about it. It was such a big seller they were like where is it, dave? The Race is. Well, here it is now. It also comes with that commentary really terrific commentary by a Marx Brothers expert. He wrote the Marx Brothers encyclopedia. It was Glenn Mitchell. And then we did a featurette for the DVD release that's carried over here, called On your Marks, get, set, go, and that is behind the scenes kind of retrospective on the making of the film. Then we have MGM Short with Robert Benchley and I had the movies and some MGM cartoons from the era Gallop and Gall's Mama's New Hat, old Smoky.
Speaker 2:And then on the audio side we have three things that are very cool. We have Groucho Marx from a radio show singing a song called Dr Hackenbush which was written for this movie but never filmed. It was discarded early on and the rumor is that Groucho was perfectly content that it wasn't part of the movie because a big production number would have been a lot of work for him and he just assumed not have to deal with that kind of detail. But he did record the song commercially in the early 50s and he did perform it on radio, so one of the radio performances we've carried over, and that wasn't something we've ever been able to provide before.
Speaker 2:We also have Alan Jones doing a musical outtake that was filmed but the film no longer exists a song called the Message from the man and the Moon. That is a song that was originally supposed to be at the opening of the movie, but people decided that it would slow the film down, so it was cut before the final release. But we have the audio here and, last but not least, we have the Leo is on the air radio promotion really something we could call a radio trailer and then, of course, we have the original theatrical trailer as well, which is not audio only, so it's a packed disc. It looks amazing. Fans of the film are going to be very excited about it and we're thinking that we've got quite a good way to start the year off right, with a diverse group of all sorts of different films for different audiences, but they share one thing in common they're all really, really entertaining.
Speaker 1:And just as a follow-up to this Mark's Brothers film, there are more in the library. Is the sales of this one going to impact the ability to release others in the library or?
Speaker 2:To answer your question, yes, we would love to be able to release those other Mark's Brothers movies, but whether or not that will happen is really contingent upon how much support we get from the fans and how well this sells. And if it does as well as an idea opera, then I think it will pave the way for the other films. I know the Mark's Brothers fans are out there and we always appreciate it when people order early, because then that triggers to the retailers that they should stock up on these titles and make them available. So the support from the fans is really critical and we hope we've provided six releases for January that will please many, many, many of our fans.
Speaker 1:Well, it's a terrific lineup, as you said, so I'm excited for how it's kicking off the new year and the things that you've said and intimated on this podcast and other places about how you look forward to a great year in 24. And, of course, we're not at the end of 23 yet. We still have some great titles that you and I will be talking about and reviewing coming up, including the eight titles that are all coming out in December, but people can start to put these six on the counter for January and, when the pre-orders are available, purchase those as well. So, as always, thanks for coming on the podcast, george, and explaining and tell us about these great movies.
Speaker 2:It's my pleasure, Tim. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to get the word out to the fans of the Warner Archive collection.
Speaker 1:Well, the six Warner Archive Blu-ray is releasing in January, or a great start to 2024. There's more information about these films on our Facebook page and in our Facebook group, so you can find the links in the podcast show notes. Facebook is also the best place to get the pre-order links for these titles when they become available For those in the US. I wish you a great Thanksgiving holiday Until next time. You've been listening to Tim Mellard, Stay slightly obsessed.