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Author
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Topic: Tati's PLAYTIME restored
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Ron Keillor
Expert Film Handler
Posts: 166
From: Vancouver, B.C. Canada
Registered: Jul 2003
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posted 10-08-2003 04:35 PM
DVD's seen on a home TV set will never be the equal of a 70mm. theatre presentation, but not every 70mm. film makes it to all areas, and even more rarely as a revival. The new restoration of Jacques Tati's PLAYTIME as a 2-disc (DVD-9) set is particularly welcome since the Criterion edition went out-of-print almost immediately on its issue last year. Some shots that had been cut have been slightly lengthened following Tati's working notes, one reel needed repair and the sound track touched-up. And it now runs 119 minutes!
Repeat viewing was even funnier than the first; there is so much detail that gets missed.
As usual from France, no subtitles, The sound track is multilingual, stereo. Disc 2, the Bonuses are all in French. There's a trailer, a 20 min. biography of Tati, 6 minutes of production shots - the building of "Tativille", a 20 min. analysis by Stéphane Gaudet, an extract on the restoration from the book, "Playtime", by François Ede, coverage of the tribute to Tati at Cannes in 2002 and more, about 90 minutes worth.
Released by Warners in France, recommended to anyone with a multi-zone player. (I got my copy from alapage.com)
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Per Hauberg
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 883
From: Malling, Denmark
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 10-10-2003 07:04 PM
quote:
Too bad we will never see the original first run version
Richard: The Cannes presentation (celebration) 2002 was the original full-length version - 155 minutes 70mm DTS. The print went from Cannes to Paris, where it has been running since, and as far as I know, still runs continously in various theatres. The succes has been so great, that yet another 70mm print has been made, which is circulating all over the world (--for how long ??).
I almost had the deal in house to run it last winter, but my single-theatre deal was dropped by the french distributor, when somebody (a Swedish distributor, i think) wanted to buy the rights for all Scandinavia. I do not think, anybody has heard or seen anything to it in Scandinavia yet - Absolutely not in Denmark. The 70 dts has been made in two versions, the dolby way wih three front channels, and one in the Todd-AO way with all five front channels and one surround, the latter to be run with some extra dts gear, i believe.
PLAY TIME only works in 70mm with stereo sound - and then, maybe on dvd - not here yet. I saw it a couple of times in 70mm in the early 70ties, but have only been running it in 35 and 16mm myself. The one 70mm print in Denmark was junked before I got my projectors... Stupid distributor ! - Same distributor made no difference, when the film was booked in 35mm - still the same poster and same add blocks were delivered to cinemas, saying "Great fun on the giant screen" blabla
p
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Jeffry L. Johnson
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 809
From: Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Registered: Apr 2000
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posted 06-23-2004 08:15 AM
The Cleveland Cinematheque plans a bus excursion to the Thursday show. I plan to attend either Friday or Saturday.
Cleveland Cinematheque 2004 July/August
quote:
CinemaTrek. Cleveland is a terrific movie town and you can see a lot of great films here. But one of the city's deficiencies is that there is no projection booth with two working 70mm machines. The CWRU Film Society used to have this capability, but doesn't now, as far as I know. A number of theatres have one 70mm machine hooked up to a platter, so 70mm films ‚ a wider film gauge (twice the width of standard 35mm film) used mostly for large-scale epics like Lawrence of Arabia and 2001: A Space Odyssey ‚ can be shown here. What can't be shown are special or archival 70mm prints that must be projected reel-to-reel on two machines, with a changeover every 20 minutes. Unique or rare prints are not allowed to be cut and spliced, which is what has to happen if they are projected from a platter.
Now, to be frank, there aren't a lot of 70mm prints that would require this special treatment. But in May I traveled to the American Film Institute's Silver Theatre in Silver Spring, Maryland, to see one of them: an original 70mm print of Sergei Bondarchuk's seven-hour, Oscar-winning 1960s epic War and Peace. Another is the new Janus/Criterion print of Jacques Tati's 1967 French comedy Playtime, which has been struck from a newly restored French negative and is about 20 minutes longer than the 108-minute version released in America. To show this print of Playtime, you need not only two 70mm machines but a 70mm DTS reader for the digital sound. (This is a different from a 35mm DTS reader, which many theatres have.)
So no one in Cleveland can project this new 70mm print of Playtime. But someone in Columbus can, and on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, July 29, 30, and 31, the Wexner Center for the Arts at OSU is going to do just that.
This screening is worth a trip to Columbus; Playtime is one of my all-time favorite films. Playtime was the third of four movies in which Tati played his bumbling alter-ego Monsieur Hulot. Hulot, a gawky, genial, pipe-smoking klutz in hat, overcoat, umbrella, and too-short pants, is constantly, hilariously in conflict with the trappings, gadgets, and "conveniences" of modern life. Tati also directed his Hulot films, and they contain lots of long shots and very little dialogue. One perceptive critic called them "comedies of motion." Playtime is Tati's grandest vision -- a spoof of soulless modernist architecture for which Tati constructed mammoth sets of concrete and glass that completely obliterated traditional Paris and its quaint, beautiful buildings (the Eiffel Tower is seen only in glass reflections). Then he turned Hulot and a bevy of American tourists loose in these structures and observed them like ants in an ant farm. The result is a wry and spectacular goof on contemporary urban life, with some of the best gags ever committed to celluloid.
If you'd like to see this movie in Columbus with me, you can. On Thursday, July 29, the Cinematheque is taking its first-ever "CinemaTrek." We've chartered a luxury coach that will leave the Cleveland Institute of Art at 3:45 pm sharp for the 7:00 pm show of Playtime at the Wexner Center. We will return to the CIA around midnight. The cost for the round-trip, including film admission, is only $20 per person. If you'd like a box supper to eat on the bus, add $9 more and we will order one for you. Send checks to the Cleveland Institute of Art Cinematheque, 11141 East Boulevard, Cleveland, OH, 44106. Be sure to include your phone number or e-mail address so that we can confirm your reservation. We need to receive all money by Monday, July 19. Seating is limited, so act now. And if we don't get enough reservations by that time, the trip will be cancelled.
It would be great to have a Cleveland delegation go to Columbus for this film. It would demonstrate that, even though we don't have the equipment to show the 70mm Playtime, we have an enthusiastic and sophisticated audience that can't be beat. Besides, it will be fun. Playtime indeed.
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