The Extras
The Extras
5 for 2025: Warner Archive Year in Review
George Feltenstein joins the podcast for a Warner Archive 2025 Year in Review. We discuss 5 THEMES for the year PLUS we each share 5 titles to highlight. If you've been with us all year, you'll enjoy this look back at the Warner Archive's best year in quite some time.
Purchase links:
RHAPSODY IN BLUE (1945) [EXTENDED PRE-RELEASE VERSION] Blu-ray
THE BEAST OF THE CITY (1932) Blu-ray
MONOGRAM MATINEE VOL. 1 (1949) Blu-ray
LEAN ON ME (1989) Blu-ray
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse 1921 Blu-ray
CHEYENNE 1957-62 Complete Series Blu-ray
Gabriel over the White House 1933 Blu-ray
INTRUDER IN THE DUST (1949) Blu-ray
SPLENDOR IN THE GRASS (1961) Blu-ray
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Hello and welcome to the extras. I'm Tim Millard, your host, and joining me is George Feltenstein of the Warner Archive. Hi, George. Hey there, Tim. It's our first uh podcast recording of 2026. So I'm excited because it's gonna be a terrific year ahead. But we're actually gonna look back, George. Um, and it's a good time to do that here at the beginning of the year. And I thought before we get into a few of the specifics, I'm gonna kind of ask you a broad question. But the Warner Archive is wrapping up its 16th year.
George Feltenstein:That's correct.
Tim Millard:Yeah. And just for uh kicks and grins, how does this last 16th year compare to some of the the previous years?
George Feltenstein:I'd say the last three years have shown significant upticks, and each year uh we've been generating profit for the shareholders of this company to be able to have your business continue to grow, a physical media business when everybody says physical media is down. It's not for us. It's it's growing, and right now uh I just counted, not counting television, not counting animation, not counting uh special projects. We have over a hundred feature films that have been approved that are in the queue for this year, uh which is astounding. And the familiarity of what we have planned for this year, I've seen uh all over the internet and in our social media all these wish lists. And in the past I've seen these wish lists and gone, uh well, maybe some of those will happen. And it's been kind of something where I've been chuckling because I'm seeing that like anywhere from 60 to 70 percent of any given list consists of titles that we're in the midst of doing or have been approved to be done. Right. So um the recognition factor is going to go up a little bit of a notch. Yeah. And uh we will still have plenty of things that only serious Cinephiles will know about, and our goal is always to try to please different groups of people. And one of the other ways we're doing that within Warner Brothers as a company is what we're doing with the partners that we license to. There's going to be a lot of really exciting library activity between our own boutique label at Warner Archive and the other boutique labels that we deal with as partners. That gets more of the library out to the people that want it. And that's very exciting. And I'm involved in it all, so I see the whole picture. Yeah. And the picture is very uh encouraging for 2026.
Tim Millard:Well, every time we've talked recently, that number that you said have been approved kind of for this queue. Yeah, and and just to clarify for people, that doesn't mean they're all gonna come out in the next six months. They're being worked on.
George Feltenstein:No, they're that number two come out during 2026, and maybe some might not make it out till 2027. There's one movie that uh we thought we were done with, and then we found out that we didn't have the original end title or the original end title music, and we're able to get that. So that got delayed for three months, but it'll be worth it because it'll be authentic. Right, right, right.
Tim Millard:Well, I do know that in the years that you and I have been talking on the extras, this is by far 2025 the best year that we've had so much to talk about. And as a matter of fact, you and I have talked about how we're behind on our reviews because there's been so much that you've been releasing, on average, anywhere from six to eight, it feels like, looking back over the year.
George Feltenstein:Yes.
Tim Millard:Um, with only a few months maybe a little lower, and and and uh October, I think a little higher. So it's just been a uh a terrific year and the best uh that you and I have had to just talk about here on the extras. That leads me then to kind of our conversation today. And I thought we'd commemorate the year with five themes that I kind of saw and looking back, and then we'll follow that up with five releases that I've picked and five releases that you've picked, just to highlight. These are not a top list, but uh films we wanted to highlight looking back over the year, and uh, I think that'll make for a fun conversation today.
George Feltenstein:Completely agree. I think one of the reasons I wanted to do what you suggested was that thankfully there has been an enormous amount of attention to things like Hi Society in 4K or Tom and Jerry, the Golden Era Anthology, or the Looney Tunes Collector's Vault, you know, these mega important things that have just you know knocked it out of the park. But there are a lot of things that didn't get as much attention that I think it would be fun to discuss. Yeah. So we'll have at it.
Tim Millard:Well, let's talk uh this first theme, and you kind of just uh teased it right there. But uh the first one that I want to kind of highlight was this year, 2025, Warner Archive really established itself in 4K. And the searchers technically came out in December 20th, 2024. But in my mind, that kick started the year from day one because so much of the impact of that release fell in in 2025.
George Feltenstein:Because it had such a late December 2024 street date, uh, we missed a lot of the 10 best lists because people had already kind of locked that in before they got the disc. Right. But uh, you know, like Media Play News, which is a trade paper, you know, we we won five awards as the best release of the year, and so forth and so on. I wish we could be doing more, but we had some pretty impressive releases through 2025, just a few. I always said it was only gonna be any three or four or five 4K titles. That's not gonna change, but what we have planned for 2026 is uh very exciting.
Tim Millard:Yeah. Well, I'll I'll just run through a couple of the others or uh some of the others that released on 4K, and I I have to do that because I absolutely love your high society 4K release. This is one of my favorite releases of the year. I mean, obviously it's a acknowledged classic film, and then to see it looking and sounding so good, and the the presence of Grace Kelly and Bing and Frank and the music, I just absolutely one of my favorite releases of the year, the 4K with the remastered Blu-ray, of course, uh always in there as well. So that was fantastic. And then Git Carter on 4K, which came out in August, and that was that unique partnership with the BFI. I thought that was fantastic, and I hope it, you know, maybe uh means there could be more of that kind of thing in the future. Um, and then of course, most recently, The Curse of Frankenstein and that partnership with Hammer Films. And you, you know, we talked a lot about that, and you mentioned that Hammer is just going to be releasing and doing more with Warner Brothers, which is great news.
George Feltenstein:We're going to continue that partnership and make a lot of people very happy.
Tim Millard:Yeah, yeah.
George Feltenstein:So that was a and they are just I'll just be very blatant. Uh, I can't think of any partnership that has been more rewarding than working with the fine people at Hammer in the UK. They're just great.
Tim Millard:I I hope we get a chance to to talk about something in 2026 uh with them. Well, the second theme that I wanted to get into is something you touched on briefly with all the great releases this year that that drew some of the top headlines. But that's what I'm calling animation explosion. And I say explosion because it wasn't just, oh, you had two or three nice releases. You had two or three huge releases. Obviously, the Tom and Jerry in December, the Golden Era anthology, and then in the summer you had Huckleberry Hound, and then earlier in the year you had uh both the Tom and Jerry Cinema Scope, and of course the Looney Tunes Collector's Vault Volume One, which has kicked off that series. You've already mentioned there's a volume two coming very soon, and then and then just plethora of Hanna-Barbera titles throughout the year. I I just thought that was worth noting because I think it's led to so much uplift and interest in classic animation.
George Feltenstein:Well, and it's really wonderful as well that it's not just that we're doing this in a vacuum. There seems to be, and I think a lot of it, uh Jerry would be the first person to uh speak to this since he's involved there, uh, is the partnership that Warner Brothers Discovery has with Wigo Broadcasting in MeTV Tunes. Uh, the fact that people can see these great classic theatrical animation as well as television animation, and the demographic of that audience is very much the demographic of people who support Warner Archive. Personally, it brings me great pleasure to see you know things that I fought for five, six years ago, like the HD remastering of the true original Jetson series or Johnny Quest, when you know I couldn't get anybody to, you know, see that this was a great money-making opportunity and something people are really passionate about. Those things sold so well, and now they're finding an audience through a television channel dedicated 24 hours a day to great animation. I think people will be exposed to things on that channel that I hope they'll say, gee, I want to own this and have it on my shelf so I can see it whenever I want and it won't go away. We're amping up how much animation we're gonna be releasing in 2026. It will be probably unprecedented. Wow. And there are a lot of very cool ideas I'm trying to get approved.
Tim Millard:So well, I I've already had to remove some stuff on my shelves behind me here for those of you who are watching. And uh I'm gonna have to make sure and have more shelf space uh for this coming year for all of the animation. I've got a whole area. I've done I've had to basically double it in this last year with all the releases that you had. So uh it sounds like there's gonna be more, uh, which I'm looking forward to. Well, the third theme is one that it's not new to this year, but just worth calling out again. And that's what I'm calling the Technocolor Triumph. You just continue to put out these technocolor, fantastic looking films. Um, and it's it's just worth calling out because I don't think it should be taken for granted because these films look fantastic.
George Feltenstein:Well, we we have a proprietary technology that allows us to recombine down to the pixel. I've spoken about that before. All the work is done at Warner Brothers Motion Picture Imaging, and it starts with the evaluation of the element, the scanning, uh, the work done by their amazing colorists. But there seems to be, like, from things I've read, I think a lot of consumers are confused that like MPI has a restoration schedule and budget. And MPI is is the facility where we do the work that has nothing to do with you know what films are selected to undergo the process. That's a combined effort between myself and the preservation team. And um we will be amping that up. It has been increasing more and more, but we don't just look at this as uh what nitrate we have that is in jeopardy due to age. We have to look at safety film uh with the same fear of jeopardy due to potential vinegar syndrome problems with film elements. So we're being equal opportunity between nitrate and safety at looking at the technicolor and frankly looking at everything that we're doing. We're working on a big television series right now. It's in the safety film era, of course. Every once in a while uh we'll run into a problem that relates to vinegar syndrome, and that we have to go back to a different element. So, how wonderful that we're opening up those cans and making sure everything is appropriate for work. And um got a lot of exciting things in the hopper, I will tell you that.
Tim Millard:Well, the reason why I think this is so important is that sometimes people say, Well, why should I upgrade from my DVD to a Blu-ray? Is it really going to make that much difference? And I think when it comes to these technicolor, this is one where you say, No, you you absolutely need to upgrade because of the process that you have now to go back to make these look so much better than they did if they were released on DVD.
George Feltenstein:I mean it's dramatic. It's dramatic. It really is dramatic, and it also is dramatic because the older masters, even some of them that were, you know, done many years ago, but even if they were done in HD, you know, let's say 20 years ago, we could not put that on a Blu-ray. But also the interpositives that were made from the Technicolor negatives, a lot of them were done at bad labs, all of whom are now out of business. But the film elements that were considered okay were not. And they led to DVDs that were out of focus, out of register, and there were some good ones too. They weren't all terrible, but even the best ones can't compare to what we're able to do now by going back to the original negatives and scanning them at 4K, recombining them. Sometimes we're scanning at 8K. Right. Um, it's it's just incredibly rewarding.
Tim Millard:Yeah.
George Feltenstein:Yeah. And uh the net result is I think people are almost getting spoiled by the fact that when we do something, uh it's gonna look great. We're certainly not gonna backslide on our commitment to quality.
unknown:Right.
George Feltenstein:And let me just very, very important.
Tim Millard:Let me just run through a few of these just to remind people. You had Lily, you had A Date with Judy, the Master of Ballantre, lovely to look at, Two Weeks with Love, The Prisoner of Zenda, A Summer Place, The Iron Mistress, I Love Melvin, and I think uh San Antonio as well. I mean, I may have missed one or two in there, but wow, like one a month almost really. Here is what we're looking at in terms of just pure volume. Yeah. And I know that that means that so many people there at Warner Brothers are spending so much effort to bring these to people to fans.
George Feltenstein:It's like doing three movies, and just for uh purists and and getting everything clear, a summer place was actually Eastman Color Negative. It was color by technocolor, but it wasn't three-strip. But we were able to make it look phenomenally good, which is all the more a testament to the talented people at Warner Brothers Motion Picture Imaging because a 1959 Eastman Color Negative will almost certainly have some collapsed yellow layer, blue channel condition that could wreak fading and havoc in lesser hands. Right. And uh I thought a summer place came out so beautiful because they did such a great job with it. So the the laurels uh and the hardies, the laurels, the laurels really belong to my colleagues at at MPI, and they're artists and their work is sensational, and I feel so grateful to be working with so many talented colleagues.
unknown:Yep.
Tim Millard:Well, our next theme, the the fourth theme that I'm wanting to point out here is also not new to the work you've been doing, but I thought this year there were just a large quantity, uh, and it just showed your commitment to noir. And I'm a big fan of noir, and I love the fact that you had well, you had uh Mystery Street, Side Street, his kind of woman. I Died a Thousand Times, The Hard Way, Out of the Fog, The Racket. I mean, these are in totality make a terrific year for Noir fans, and I think you have good news for the future as well there.
George Feltenstein:We will have more noir in 2026 than 2025.
Tim Millard:Yeah, yeah. Well, I and I love that, but uh I just wanted to point out how much uh you released this year and how great they looked, and uh just wanted to bring that up as a theme I saw for the year. And then the fifth and last one, this is maybe just kind of me here, but I'm calling it the stars are out. And we all know the the the many stars of MGM and Warner Brothers, and almost every movie you release has great stars. But I thought there was some exceptional uh things to call out in terms of for Errol Flynn. You had just four of his films come out this year, I believe. Master of Ballantre, San Antonio, They Died with Their Boots On, an absolute terrific release this year. And then one I just watched the other night, Silver River. I loved it. We're gonna talk about those in more detail at some point, George. But you had Errol, you had several Betty Davis, uh it's Love I'm After, The Bride Came C O D, which I just watched the other night. So enjoyable. You had Joan Crawford, you had Powell and Loy. Multiple ones, multiple Jane Powell, Gary Cooper. Like there were just so many stars, but I love the fact that those fans who've been waiting for more Betty Davis, more Errol Flynn, really got uh their wish to uh come true this year.
George Feltenstein:And like I said about the Noir, there's even more in 26. So um that that's the exciting part for me, is I know there is some absolute top-tier A titles, very famous titles, award-winning films that mean so much to people that I've been begging for the opportunity to get to give them a new shot at a new master. And I got a lot of that approved. And a lot of films that have been heavily requested will finally be available, and people are going to hopefully be grateful and happy to be able to put these things on their shelves. So the goal is to make the shelves so cramped that you have to get another shelving unit.
Tim Millard:Yeah, well, that's what I've done. Uh big too. If anybody watches uh the video from a year ago, you didn't see all these shelves behind me. Well, now, George, I thought we'd uh talk about some highlights that you and I have both chosen for the year. And I picked five and and and you picked five. Well, you picked more than that, but we're we're just gonna limit it to five. So let's dive into some of those. And and I'll start here with a title that I just absolutely loved. I watched this film multiple times. You felt like you almost did this as a 4K, but this is Rhapsody in Blue, but it looks and sounds that good to me. Like it's a 4K. It's stunning, the restoration, the music. I mean, the the film was just filled with that wonderful music. And then the coup de gras, this additional 12 minutes of footage that you found and put into this uh film. I mean, it uh it comes off as something that I just really wanted to remind people and highlight I loved Rhapsody in Blue.
George Feltenstein:I I felt the same way about it, and it was a thrill to be able to, before the Blu-ray came out, by a few weeks, to introduce it at the TCM Film Festival, because I knew the extra footage had been shot. I had heard prerecordings uh of the Poor Game Best sequence and knew it had been twice as long. Uh, there had been documentation in in many different areas that when Irving Rapper finished the film, it was 12 minutes longer, not counting the 10-minute overture, which was just used in New York and Los Angeles. The fact that we were able to finally confirm all that footage did exist meant bringing in every single element because all the elements were mounted on 18 reels, regardless. And what they did was some of the reels would be cut down to just like 250 feet. Wow. Uh, they kept the reels the same, they just cut the footage out of the reels. So the original negative was the original running time, which I believe was 139 minutes, and we ended up at 151, not counting the overture. But we were able to release the film the way the director had wanted it, and I think I spoke at length about that when we did the podcast because we had to find uh the production records from Irving Rapper, the director, finished the film at 151 minutes. It went to the armed services before Jack Warner finally released it to the public in September of 1945. And our sound department really kicked uh Derriere with their fine balance of getting rid of any external cracks and pops, but keeping the frequency response of the music for an optical mono track to sound that uh dimensional, if you will, is kind of remarkable. And I happen to think that the Warner Brothers sound, and this goes this is not genre specific, and it it carried through from I would say the mid-30s all the way to Bonnie and Clyde. Um you always knew the sound of a Warner Brothers movie. Uh, there was something that they did in the sound department that made their audio tracks distinct. Whether it's Rap City and Blue or a great Bugs Bunny cartoon, you hear the sound of the music stage, and it's very distinctive and quite wonderful. Yeah. And very proud of that release, and I'm so grateful that you mentioned it.
Tim Millard:Yeah, I uh you should be. It's uh I I just like I said, I watched it, listened to it multiple times after receiving it. Well, let's go to your first highlight, and that is a TV series, Cheyenne. Tell us why you picked that.
George Feltenstein:Well, I was particularly thrilled that we were able to bring a really integral piece of the company's history, the first Warner Brothers television hit series. Uh, it began within the Warner Brothers Presents Anthology series, which was the company dipping its toe into the television water. The Warner Brothers Presents Anthology series was basically a failure. Uh, but the Cheyenne episodes were not, and it became its own series over the course of seven seasons, all inclusive. And the fact that we could put those out scanned in 4K from the camera negatives with the bumpers that still existed within the negatives, and to be able to package each season in its own case and not subject a consumer to one of these big blobby cases where the discs are stacked, or whether they're, you know, you open it up and it all falls out on the floor. Uh, Warner Archive will not do that. And I think it's a beautiful package, and I have a personal affection for the series, which I had not seen at all, because it was already off the air by the time I was, you know, able to watch television and remember it. It was really the release of the series on DVD at the beginning of the Warren Archive Collection's DVD activities. Season one had been released to retail stores. We did seasons two through seven in our early days. And I think I spoke about this when we released it, that I developed a close telephonic and once or twice in person relationship with Mr. Clint Walker and his lovely wife, Susan. I will always treasure the memory of when he would call and when we would talk. And he was so delighted that we had the whole series out on DVD. But the difference between what it looked like on DVD and what it looks like now, uh, with those beautiful Blu-rays, and it's a very handsome set. I see it's right behind you.
Tim Millard:Yep. I've had it up I've had it up on all year.
George Feltenstein:Very proud of that. And uh we got so many very, very nice uh, you know, we get letters in the mail sometimes with a stamp and an envelope and everything. Uh but uh also through messaging, social media, people are just thrilled with the release and it it sold very well, and uh it has opened the door for more of the same.
Tim Millard:That's that's great news. Yeah.
George Feltenstein:It is great, it is a wonderful release to celebrate, and uh, we look forward to its successors. Right. Yeah, yeah.
Tim Millard:I I so enjoyed it, and and as you mentioned, I've had it up on display all year because I love the packaging and how well you put that together. Well, let me go to my second one that I wanted to highlight here. Sure. And that is The Beast of the City from 1932. And you didn't have as many pre-codes this year as you did of some of the other genres, but this one I really enjoyed. And I mean, I'm a sucker for these pre-codes anyway, because the restorations make them so accessible. And I love the fact that because they're pre-code, they feel more modern in terms of the uh the grittiness, the modern sensibilities, uh, just the way they handle sexuality. Like there's just so much to the pre-codes that are accessible to a modern audience if you can get past poor image quality, poor sound quality, and uh your Blu-rays help us do that. And of course, this is an early Gene Harlow. She's fantastic in it. And it's also kind of nice to mention because you've got another one coming out here in just a matter of weeks, red dust. So it's gonna be fantastic to get another one. But I thought this one, The Beast of the City, was worth highlighting. I really enjoyed this film.
George Feltenstein:I think the world of it too, and uh as with other things we've been talking about, there will be more pre-codes in 2026 than there were in 2025.
Tim Millard:That's fantastic news. All right, well, let's go to your second one, George, and that is also a bit of an older film, and that's Gabriel over the White House.
George Feltenstein:Well, we released this, I believe, if my memory is correct, it came out at the end of January of last year. I think the last Tuesday in January. That's usually when we do our releases, is the last Tuesday of each month. And it was a very prescient film and remains so today. It is basically about a president who decides that he's going to basically be a dictator. But a dictator for good. It is a political allegory. It is jaw-dropping when a lot of people see it because they can't believe a film was that far-reaching. Uh, I don't recall it running on local television in New York. My first exposure to it was in film school. Uh, this is a tremendous film from Gregory Lacava, the director of Stage Door. Walter Houston is amazing in it. You have to see it to experience it, to believe it. It's remarkable. And it is a film that couldn't have been released uh a year and a half later because the production code was enforced after July 1934. It's very much a pre-code movie.
Tim Millard:Yeah.
George Feltenstein:Um and and it looks tremendous. Yeah. And what we had previously looked like garbage. Right. So it needed the upgraded, it needed the TLC, and I'm very proud of it.
Tim Millard:Yeah, and I I kind of wanted to bring that up right after uh The Beast of the City, because it was literally the next year, fits that same era. And the restoration on that one as well, because of the age, really makes it accessible. And uh I really enjoy that film. I I agree with you. The you know, the topicalness after all these years still works, still stands when you watch that movie, and the performances were were really good. So um, well, let me jump here to my third film I wanted to highlight. And uh this one, some people might have missed this one. I don't know, and that's part of why we want to highlight these. But this is Bright Leaf. And this stars Gary Cooper, Lauren Bacall, and Patricia Neal. I mean, right there. You know, that should get your attention. But this is an absolutely stunning restoration. It's uh uh Southern melodrama about the tobacco industry. It brings the goods. This is uh directed by our friend Curtiz. And I just think that it's worth bringing back up because I'm a sucker for a good epic film that uh doesn't pander to the audience, but it it keeps you gripped. And then at the end, it doesn't make it all easy. It's a real hidden gem in my mind. It's worth rediscovery for people. I know it didn't necessarily get the best reviews when it came out in the day, but I think it's an absolute gem of a film, and the the restoration you bring to it really highlights how good the directing, the acting, and the script is in this film.
George Feltenstein:Every year we kind of have a huddle with the Film Foundation, and we find out what films of ours they would like to see us work on. It's then something that is the promotional support of the Film Foundation. So we do the work, we fund it, but occasionally on some of the Film Foundation projects, we have a champion director that loves a specific film, as uh Mr. Spielberg uh did for the searchers and sat in with our colorist. Uh, with Bright Leaf, there was no one individual that was involved. But the Film Foundation said, we really would like to see you do a restoration on Bright Leaf. And we said, that's an excellent idea. We've been thinking about it ourselves. And we went back to the negative and scanned it at 4K, and it was a gorgeous master. And with Curtiz behind the camera and a cast like that, you really can't lose. And a lot of films that didn't quite ring the bell in their initial release are worth rediscovering. Yeah. And Brightleaf was certainly one of those.
Tim Millard:Yeah, yeah, yeah. I I definitely recommend people, if they want to do a blind by, all the ones we're highlighting are there, but this uh this Bright Leaf, don't let it fall off your list. All right, uh, third for you, George, and it was on my list too here, but uh I I love this release from earlier in the year, and that's four horsemen of the apocalypse from 1921.
George Feltenstein:Well, this was a project. I think I spoke about this when we released it. This was over three years of work. Yeah. Um, and this was during its time in 1921 when it was released. It was a huge blockbuster at the box office. And it made a star of Rudolph Valentino. But the film had gotten a photochemical restoration through the good people at Photoplay. Kevin Brownlow and his associates worked with Turner Broadcasting, who at the time owned the pre-86 MGM Library, before we bought Turner Broadcasting in 1996. And uh I wanted to bring this 1921 film into the 21st century. The last master had been made in 1993 from that special 35 millimeter print that the Photoplay people had worked with and had shown theatrically as well as it had been on TCM. The master was standard definition, its origins were PAL. It was basically uh only something we could use as a guide. And uh incredible music score written by the late great Carl Davis. And this is the film that made Rudolph Valentino a star, directed by Rex Ingram, an underrated director who in the 20s did many impressive films. We have so many great silent films in our library. We would like to release more of them. And uh I'm hoping that people who haven't yet gotten their copy of Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse will do so so that we can bring more silent films. It's making everything as possibly perfect as it can be. And I think there were a couple of skipped frames in the material, but other than that, we were able to restore the image in a full-throttle way. There are other silent films that come to the market that still show signs of film damage and breathing and and other things that are very distracting. I think the better that you can make a film look like it would have when it came out, the better chance you have of engaging a modern audience. And I think this presentation does that. And I'm hoping that we're going to be able to follow it with more.
Tim Millard:Well, the word superior comes to my mind. It's superior than most uh, if not all, releases of films from that era, 1921. When you watch it, when you look at it, you hear the sound. And you've you've gone into great detail about why that is, uh the partnership that uh that you had on that.
George Feltenstein:So it's uh We made sure that we were going back and forth sending things to London. We wanted Kevin's approval and sign-off. He is, I can't even find the right word, the oracle of the silent cinema. I I think so highly of him, and I respect him and like him so very much, and I'm so grateful for all that he has done for all of us who love classic film. I wanted to be able to put his name on it, photoplay's name on it, uh, with their blessing, and that's one of the reasons what took so long is you got people 6,000 miles away with a notion in between, and you want them to be able to see it under the best possible circumstances, hear it under the best possible circumstances, and have them bless it. And that's what we were able to do.
Tim Millard:Yeah, yeah, yeah. If uh if you haven't checked that one out, it is fantastic. Okay, we'll go to number four for me. And uh this one might catch people by surprise, but I really wanted to highlight this monogram Matinee Volume One that you released. And my take on this is the package, the three films that you put in there. And these films could, you know, they could easily be forgotten if it isn't for the work that you, the Warner Archive, does to keep these and bring these back to people. This uh Mississippi. Rhythm with Jimmy Davis. I thought that was especially good. I love the music. I love that old-time music that's in there and the performances. The film is entertaining as they go down the Mississippi River. That's one fact I love about these old films. I wasn't alive at this time, you know, but I get to see what the world looked like, at least through the lens uh of the story and the music of that era and everything. I thought this one was uh worth highlighting for that reason. The other two films with Johnny Mac Brown and Whip Wilson, they have their moments. The stunts and horsemanship in those are superb.
George Feltenstein:I love seeing you get clean cowboys. Notice that in these cowboy movies, nobody's ever got a dirty shirt or pair of jeans. You know, they all look so pressed and uh but I I I joke. Um the thing that I'm happy to say about monogram Matinee is we said volume one, and I was hoping it wouldn't be one and done. I was hoping we could do more, and it looks like we'll probably have at least one, if not two, possibly three. And you said forgotten. These films, by and large, were forgotten. I have documentation going back to the days when Allied artists was still in business and owned this library, Allied artists and then Lorimar, who bought them, and even Warner Brothers television from the early 90s memorandums from executives involved saying the Warner Brothers memos didn't say this, but the Lorimar and Allied Artists' memos did. It's like uh there's not much potential here. It's okay to let these rot. We don't have to worry about preserving them. Um, it in fact was Warner Brothers that made the commitment to preserve them and is continuing that commitment. There are some really terrific films just on the monogram matinee side, not to mention some of the great noirs and other dramas that they did. So there's more monogram coming in 2026.
Tim Millard:That's great news. That's great news. And uh I think people will enjoy them. You know, here, you you probably haven't heard most of the the titles for these films. Don't see that as a negative, see that as something fun, something to uh to purchase and enjoy. I got uh great, great entertainment value out of these. The nostalgia alone was fantastic. And uh they've been priced, I think, for what you're getting very reasonably as well. Well, let's go to number four for you, George, and that is Intruder in the Dust from 1949. What caused you to want to highlight this one?
George Feltenstein:I think this film deserves to be better known. Once I discovered it, which was probably I guess probably sometime in my twenties, I had uh I had seen it on television, and I just couldn't really believe what I was seeing because it was a very modern take on addressing prejudice and uh racial uh issues, sociological issues, but also in a way that was responsible cinema. Clarence Brown had been a director at MGM for over 20 years, starting in the silent era, when he went to the MGM management and said, I want to make this film. It's based on a novel by the amazing William Faulkner, and it deals with uh a black man who is accused of a crime he did not commit. A theme that would be revisited and to kill a mockingbird. It was shot in the South. It was shot in Oxford, Mississippi. Uh MGM shot on location, which was a rare thing for them to do. Phenomenal performances by Ju Hernandez, who I love like in everything I've ever seen him do. I just can't more people need to know about him. And he's phenomenal in the movie. David Bryan is terrific in the movie as the lawyer who's going to defend him. And the great, late, he passed away this past year, which was heartbreaking. Uh Claude Jarman Jr., who's more famous than anything for being Jody in The Yearling, which was made three years before Truder in the Dust, he was a in his mid-teens when he did this film. He's terrific in it. And uh Elizabeth Patterson, who most people recognize as Mrs. Trumbull from The I Love Lucy show, she's wonderful in this movie, too. They're really the key figures in telling the story. And the film takes no prisoners, it is not afraid. Everybody associated with this movie was very proud of it. It wasn't the kind of film that was designed to be a light-hearted MGM box office hit. It was made to make a statement about social injustice, and that's a timeless thought. And I I heartily urge anyone who hasn't seen this movie to see it. Hopefully, add it to your Blu-ray collection. You won't regret it. And it is the kind of film that you can watch more than once, because each time you see it, you'll find it's so meticulously nuanced in its production that it is overwhelming in the quality and care of the finished film. I just can't say enough good things about it. Uh, we did put it out early in the Warner Archive remastering program on DVD, uh, which did not have the kind of budget that allowed us to go back and do what we were doing for the Blu-ray, go back uh and scan at 4K and make sure that every frame was immaculate. We did a lot of films in the early days where we didn't have those kind of budgets. And when we can go back and revisit them and do them right with 2026, 2025 technology, it's incredibly rewarding. So I'm really glad that we're talking about this film. It can't be, I can't say enough good things about it.
Tim Millard:Yeah. Well, it's another terrific example of what the Warner Archive can do within being within the larger Warner Brothers, being that boutique label that can bring films like this, uh, and all the ones really that we're talking about, but something like this that would be difficult wouldn't be large enough for the uh the the the bigger home entertainment group to release, and yet it's such a fantastic film. And then, of course, with the the uh the remastering that you're doing on these, how accessible they are to uh to watch now. So uh terrific film. I really uh everything you said uh I enjoyed for the exact same reasons. Uh it's a terrific film. Well, we'll finish up here with mine and and then we'll go to your final one. But uh we're gonna jump to uh a few decades ahead from from the ones we've been dealing with here, and that is for me from 1989, Lean on Me, now out on Blu-ray. I couldn't believe that it hadn't been out on Blu-ray, considering how it's you know called an important film of the time when it came out with an important actor, Morgan Freeman, playing the high school principal, Joe Clark, uh, with themes and something that has been from the 90s, uh, 2000s. This film has been mentioned over and over again. So it's great that it finally came out in HD, looking as good as it does, and now available for people to revisit, or if they've never seen it, to see it for the first time looking this good because the story, the acting, everything really endures.
George Feltenstein:I couldn't agree with you more. And uh 2026 marks the 20th anniversary of the Blu-ray disc. So Blu-ray has been a viable format and remains a viable format for exceptional quality and film viewing, and of course, 4K UHD Blu-ray builds upon that for even finer quality. But for certain films, like Lean on Me, when we scan the camera negative at 4K, as we did, and have a beautiful master that is faithful to the film. It looks like it did when it opened. What they used to do would they would make a print off the camera negative for one theater in Los Angeles and one theater in New York, and that would be like the super duper places where you know executives and people involved in the film could see it projected with that kind of quality. In regular mass theater runs, the prints would be made off an internegative that was made from an interpositive that was made from the original negative. So you were a couple of generations away. This brings you as close to what it would look like if you saw a release print made in 1989 off the camera negative. It feels very filmic, feels very organic. It has the proper amount of film grain you would have seen on a first generation print.
Tim Millard:Right.
George Feltenstein:And uh I'm delighted we were able to get it out. With our library being as huge and vast as it is, the amount of films that still linger in standard definition is staggering. And we're trying to eke away at that to finally make progress. And with some films that never made it to Blu-ray, we can go the extra step like we did with iSociety and make it available on Blu-ray and 4K if the visuals and the very nature of the film require it. It's just very exciting what is in store that we're able to uh build a library that isn't just focused in one particular decade or genre, but span many decades and many genres and many different kinds of films. There were other films this year like Clean and Sober had never been on Blu-ray, and Michael Keaton's performance, if people only know him from you know his recent work like Birdman or Back to Batman in 1989. I mean, the man was incredibly gifted, talented, and uh he will always be Beetlejuice, too. So, like, it's endless what he is capable of. And Clean and Sober was really the first film he did that showed the dramatic side. Everybody had known him from Mr. Mom and Johnny Dangerously and all these, you know, light-hearted films. It is also one of the best films I know of that deals with addiction. And it's really, really important. And uh, I bring that up just because we're not just focused on the 30s and the 40s and the 50s. We want to address films from more recent decades as well. And the mothership takes care of the big A titles and the blockbusters that are going to be of greater mass appeal. But we're there to be the boutique within the VMoth and look back at the jewels in the library and bring them back to audiences or bring them for the first time to new audiences. That's what we're here to do.
Tim Millard:Yeah. And the Warner Archive, because of that, so many of your films are the gems of the library. Yes, they're not the brand new, you know, uh four quadrant uh blockbuster that's going to be out there that may or may not survive 10, 15 years of uh look back. A lot of these, like lean on me though, they're standing the test of time, and it's great that they're coming out to Blu-ray. Let's finish up with your fifth one here, George. It fits right into the discussion of what you just said, too, because it it goes back to 1961, but that's considered maybe a little bit more of the modern era. And that's uh Splendor in the Grass. Why did you want to highlight this one?
George Feltenstein:Well, this is one of those films that people were saying this was a very, very acclaimed uh box office hit. It was Natalie Wood's first substantial adult role, and it was the first film to introduce Warren Beatty to the big screen, and it was directed by Elijah Kazan and written by the uh the great William Inge. How this was not on Blu-ray 18, 20 years ago when they were doing the first, you know, runs of Library Essentials to be on Blu-ray. I don't really understand what everybody was thinking around here, you know, and I would raise my voice, hey, what about, and they're like, go away, kid, you bother me. You know. So we were trying to do this for a long time, but it meant going back to the original negative. Uh, this film has a very decided look to it, and we needed to give it just that level of perfection. There already was a high-definition master of this floating around for television and so forth and so on, that just did not do the film justice. And um, there was a rush to do a lot of high-definition masters 20 years ago, 22 years ago. Most of those masters are not acceptable. They're not acceptable to my standards for what we were going to release as a Blu-ray disc or as a 4K disc. So if the opportunity arises and I'm able to get a title approved, and I've gotten a lot of titles approved for 26, we're able to do justice and do things right that may not have been possible with the technology of 20 years ago. People were still working with CRT monitors in those days. Our technology is moving in such an impressive speedy direction that even something we did four or five years ago can be better now. We're using all of our resources within the company to continue to improve and really do justice to what I consider to be undoubtedly the most impressive library within the entertainment industry by far.
Tim Millard:Yeah.
George Feltenstein:So it's our honor to be stewards of that and to bring it to the people so that there's a disc on their shelf with a nice package that they can be proud to own in their library.
unknown:Yeah.
Tim Millard:Well, George, we only picked five each. That's true. You had how many releases did you have this year of films and animation and TV? It's close to 80?
George Feltenstein:I think we're somewhere between 75 and 80 for 2025. Yeah. Um not counting our multi-feature set.
unknown:Right.
George Feltenstein:We had started to do that before the pandemic, and then it kind of wasn't possible to reignite the flame, but we've reignited it big time, and we're doing two or three of these a month as a way for people, if they haven't got an Errol Flynn movie in their library, they can get six movies for $59.98 less price. And sometimes they go on sale for even less. Um we're going to continue to do this so that it provides an entry point into a particular genre, particular director, particular star, particular writer. We've got all sorts of additional volumes planned. If someone is going to buy, hesitate to buy a film when it comes out because they think, like the Thin Man movies, they think, oh, well, they're all going to be together in a set, so I'll wait. Don't wait because there may never be a set. We have to have a film be in profit in order to put it into one of these collections. I mean, fortunately, almost everything we do becomes profitable within six months to nine months. And so the world of what is possible for these multi-feature sets is wonderful. What I'm hoping is that people who aren't as aware of films that were made before their time, that they will find a way. Oh, this film noir set looks really great. It's got four films in it. Oh, this Hitchcock set looks really great. It's got four films in it. And the price is very attractive. And the Bogart and Bacall set, which was one of the first we did, that was before the pandemic. It's an entry point, and then you're going to start saying, well, now I want to try this and this and this. And so uh for those who have yet to jump into a particular genre or performer or director, uh, the multi-feature sets provide a very economical way to build a home library of beautiful Blu-rays. So that will continue as well as the new releases. I really want to make clear that when we put these multi-features out, it's not taking a release slot away from a new title. It's a totally separate process, and um nothing is going to interfere with us having loaded months. Once we get past the kind of semi slowdown that occurred around the holidays, we should be back up to snuff and ready to rock and roll for an amazing year this year.
Tim Millard:Well, there's no way we could go through all of the fantastic releases from this year. I'm glad we were able to go through Through at least ten of them and then mention a few of the others as well. We did talk about pretty much everything, so if people want to hear more, they can go back and check the older podcast with the announcements and other things if they would like to check those out. Those are always available. But this is a fun, fun episode, George, looking back and revisiting some of this. So uh always appreciate it when you come on the extras and we're able to do these. So thank you again for doing that.
George Feltenstein:Thank you. It's a pleasure, and thank you to all the people who are supporting the Warner Archive collection. Words can't describe how much we appreciate your support. It keeps us alive and thriving.
Tim Millard:It really was a terrific year for the Extras to be able to talk with George about so many high-caliber releases. So I really am thankful to him and to Warner Brothers for allowing us to do that. If you have uh interest in learning more about these, I'll put in some links. Obviously, I can't put in links to every single release from the year, but I will put in links to the ones that we discussed in this podcast. I'm sure many of you who have actively been buying the Blu-rays this year have your own top five, and maybe on Facebook we'll ask you guys to share what some of your favorites were from this year coming up soon. So if you're not on our Facebook page, you can find the link for that if you'd like to join either the Warner Archive and Warner Brothers group or our animation group, which is also available as well. Well, looking ahead to 2026, George did mention that there is a lot coming for Noir fans, for animation fans, and of course for classic TV and film fans. That pretty much covers the whole uh shebang, so I think there'll be something for everybody coming up. You may want to subscribe if you haven't so that you don't miss any of our podcasts as they come out when we're talking about these great releases. Until next time, you've been listening to Tim Lard. Stay slightly obsessed.