NEW DIRECTORS CUT

[dave jenkins]

Why did they rush it to Cannes 2012 if they may soon have more material?

As I've mentioned before, the film's 30th anniversary is in 2014. Getting it to Cannes this year makes it possible to get out a new DVD/Blu-ray to all markets by 2014. If there is then additional material that can be used for a "restored-restored "version, there is still time to make the deadline for the 35th anniversary of the film.

Drink, Warners and the Leone family don't love you, they love your money. They are very happy to sell you the same title as many times as they can.

[stanton]

Or the other scenes are in an even worse condition.

Restoring a film in pieces would be indeed a new idea to sell films. Perfect would be every year a new Blu with one additional scene.

[drinkanddestroy]

Drink, Warners and the Leone family don't love you, they love your money. They are very happy to sell you the same title as many times as they can.

the Leone family and Scorcese love Leone's works

[Groggy]

Yeah, Jenkins. How dare you accuse artists of wanting to make a buck! Obviously they're above base concerns like money.

[drinkanddestroy]

I really don't think that Scorcese's Film Foundation was established for money-making purposes. Not that there would be anything wrong with it if it was

[Groggy]

More likely they're trying to find a happy medium between art and commerce, like everyone else in the movies.

[Derbent 5000]

Extended Scenes (before restoration)













































well i guess you can see condition of the scenes, but i hope maybe when releasing on video blu-ray they might highlight these extended scenes fix up liitle, color, contrast, and other things so it will mathch up with restore print a bit, with today software and technology anything is possible, but even if not i am still glad that we going to have longer version, story is now have more to explane than it was before

[drinkanddestroy]

if the color of the new scenes is so bad, maybe they should just release the whole movie in black and white 

[drinkanddestroy]

I don't know if it is a Leone thing or an Italian film industry thing but this kind of thing comes up a lot in SL's films. I remember watching the trading post scene in OUATITW for the first time and enjoying what was obviously the non-diegetic harmonica music, only to have the camera suddenly reveal that Harmonica was playing the harmonica in the scene. An American film would never have done the scene like that; American soundtracks always assign different "sonic values"--for lack of a better way to put it--to diegetic and non-diegetic sounds. Thus it is never possible to confuse the two in American films. I've often wondered whether Leone was even aware of the diegetic/non-diegetic issue in the trading post scene, or if he was in fact aware of it but was purposely playing with audience understanding of where the music was coming from.

In the case of the crypt scene, there is no performer to pan to, and there is no visual representation of where the sound might be coming from. But it is now obvious, due to the inserted footage in the scene, that Leone intended us to understand that music was playing in the vault. I have seen the film many times since 1985, in cinemas and home video, and have never read the scene that way. And I have to say, the scene has been diminished in my eyes because of this over-explicitness. Until Groggy told me how he read the scene, I was happy to believe that the sene was about something else--that Noodles is having an epiphany of sorts, that he is contemplating the Ineffable, perhaps, or the Thingness in things, or whatever. But to find out that he's just checking out the sound system in the crypt is rather deflating. Without the new footage, it could still be a matter of interpretation. Groggy could read the scene his way, and I, while acknowledging the validity of the possibility of that reading, could have still read it my preferred way. But no more. Possibilities are closed off by the explicitness, thus impoverishing what had been a very rich scene.

I don't think Leone was trying to trick us into thinking the music in the mausoleum was non-diegetic; I think Leoen tried to make it clear that it was diegetic all along, with the bit with the music starting and stopping on what was some sort of sensor as De Niro opened and closing the door (and as he looks around I think he sees some sort of vent where it is "piped in.") And Leone couldn't know at the time of filming that he'd be forced to cut the scene with Louise Fletcher (explaining the origin of the tape) due to timing concerns. Therefore, I don't think Leone ever intended to make it ambiguous as to whether the music was diegetic. Maybe for just a moment, yes, as it started as soon as Noodles opens the door; but as soon we realize it starts and stops as Noodles opens and closes the door, it's clear that it is diegetic, so I certainly don't think Leone intended it to be ambiguous enough that we wouldn't figure it out by the end of the scene, cuz he figured we'd see the scene with Louise Fletcher.

Either way, if he was trying to make it ambiguous, it's a careful line to straddle between making these ambiguous, and breaking the rules. And Leone may have landed on the wrong side of that line when he made the music in the mausoleum on the same track/"sonic value" as the rest of the score. And more importantly, what is really unfair is how that music of Cockeye's theme segways into the main theme of OUATIA -- on the same track/sonic value -- as Noodles is looking at the names on the graves of his buddies. Since that music is definitely not playing in the mausoleum but is just meant to represent Noodles's memories (the same music was used during Noodles's flashback to the his childhood in Bailey's study), it should not have played on the same track/sonic value as the diegetic Cockeye's Tune.....

But THEN AGAIN, I guess this only applies if you look at everything as really happening as we see it ion the screen.
Once you consider the whole fantasy element of OUATIA, you can really argue that in fact, this whole merging of the music represents the point of this miovieo: the mixing of fantasy and reality, of dreams and cinema and time. etc. Just like the famous shot of Noodles looking at the 30's cars just after the garbage truck passes in 1968.... or is it 1933? That scene where it seems to be 1968 and 1933 at the same time basically sums up the theme of the whole movie. Well maybe the music in the mausoleum is making the very same point in sound that that the scene with the 30's cars in 1968 is making in visuals: the diegetic Cockeye's Tune merging into the non-diegetic Main OUATIA Theme as Noodles looks at the names of his friends, representing the jogging of Noodles's memories)... the mixing of dream and reality, of fantasy and truth, of memories of time. The dream of cinema  

[Derbent 5000]

Restoration process























The extended scenes doesn't look that bad after all, they highlighted new scenes color corected brightness contrast and all that, well all we have to wait for the blu-ray release and see.

[Novecento]

In the case of the crypt scene, there is no performer to pan to, and there is no visual representation of where the sound might be coming from. But it is now obvious, due to the inserted footage in the scene, that Leone intended us to understand that music was playing in the vault. I have seen the film many times since 1985, in cinemas and home video, and have never read the scene that way. And I have to say, the scene has been diminished in my eyes because of this over-explicitness. Until Groggy told me how he read the scene, I was happy to believe that the sene was about something else--that Noodles is having an epiphany of sorts, that he is contemplating the Ineffable, perhaps, or the Thingness in things, or whatever. But to find out that he's just checking out the sound system in the crypt is rather deflating. Without the new footage, it could still be a matter of interpretation. Groggy could read the scene his way, and I, while acknowledging the validity of the possibility of that reading, could have still read it my preferred way. But no more. Possibilities are closed off by the explicitness, thus impoverishing what had been a very rich scene.

Actually I'm glad that it has been clarified (although I am of course yet to see the restored scene). Without any real indication (apart from Noodles looking around) otherwise, it has always come across to me as an artificial and quite stilted use of background music. Happily this is now clearly not the case.

[Noodles_SlowStir]

I don't think Leone was trying to trick us into thinking the music in the mausoleum was non-diegetic; I think Leoen tried to make it clear that it was diegetic all along, with the bit with the music starting and stopping on what was some sort of sensor as De Niro opened and closing the door (and as he looks around I think he sees some sort of vent where it is "piped in.") And Leone couldn't know at the time of filming that he'd be forced to cut the scene with Louise Fletcher (explaining the origin of the tape) due to timing concerns. Therefore, I don't think Leone ever intended to make it ambiguous as to whether the music was no diegetic. Maybe for just a moment, yes, as it started as soon as Noodles opens the door; but as soon we realize it starts and stops as Noodles opens and closes the door, it's clear that it is diegetic, so I certainly don't think Leone intended it to be ambiguous enough that we wouldn't figure it out by the end of the scene, cuz he figured we'd see the scene with Louise Fletcher.

I agree.  There was a really great thread on the mausoleum and that amazing door.  We talked about how Noodles kept handling that door.  Sometime after that I rewatched the film and this scene clicked for me.  You're right that there is visual evidence within the scene that makes it very clear that the music is diegetic.  When Noodles looks above at various angles, he actually sees the speakers that are built in the columns in at least three different locations.







That being said, I really don't care for the Fletcher scene. I'm not a big Louise Fletcher fan and really don't find her acting in that sequence too impressive.  I like it the way it is.  It's very clear that Noodles has been summoned back and that he's thinking through everything right from his first contact with Moe.  The Fletcher scene takes away from the subtlety of Noodles' process of understanding and piecing everything together.  I think with the editing issues of the last three films, one of the things that resulted is that SL has quite a bit of things happening off camera.  I think it's a brilliant consequence. It makes his cinema more interesting and involves the viewer more and allows for different interpretation.

[drinkanddestroy]

That being said, I really don't care for the Fletcher scene. I'm not a big Louise Fletcher fan and really don't find her acting in that sequence too impressive.  I like it the way it is.  It's very clear that Noodles has been summoned back and that he's thinking through everything right from his first contact with Moe.  The Fletcher scene takes away from the subtlety of Noodles' process of understanding and piecing everything together.  I think with the editing issues of the last three films, one of the things that resulted is that SL has quite a bit of things happening off camera.  I think it's a brilliant consequence. It makes his cinema more interesting and involves the viewer more and allows for different interpretation.

Whether or not you like that restored scene in the cemetery, I think Louise Fletcher's acting in that scene is wonderful.

---

With the part in that scene involving the limo and the license plate (plus the later scene with it blowing up), this movie really seems more like a PI story; in the 229MV, while there of course is the whole element of mystery involving who sent Noodles the letters, I think it seems like much more of the internal, dream-like mystery. For some reason -- maybe it's just cuz I am not used to that scene -- I feel that maybe the limo and writing down the license plate makes it too much of a regular, literal PI story. There are other elements of the scene that I feel are important (eg. some of the stuff with Fletcher,  and the limo blowing up explaining why Noodles cares so much about the news story on the tv at Fat Moe's), but maybe that part with writing down the license plate is a bit overdoing it.

I'd still like to see every minute of deleted footage put back into the four and a half hour or so version of the movie that Leone originally wanted 

[depp91]

Restoration process























The extended scenes doesn't look that bad after all, they highlighted new scenes color corected brightness contrast and all that, well all we have to wait for the blu-ray release and see.

Where did you find these pictures, Derbent5000?

[dave jenkins]

That being said, I really don't care for the Fletcher scene. I'm not a big Louise Fletcher fan and really don't find her acting in that sequence too impressive.  I like it the way it is.  It's very clear that Noodles has been summoned back and that he's thinking through everything right from his first contact with Moe.  The Fletcher scene takes away from the subtlety of Noodles' process of understanding and piecing everything together.  I think with the editing issues of the last three films, one of the things that resulted is that SL has quite a bit of things happening off camera.  I think it's a brilliant consequence. It makes his cinema more interesting and involves the viewer more and allows for different interpretation.

Another thing to consider: in 229, immediately after Noodles takes the key that's hanging on the crypt wall, there's a cut to him opening the locker in the train depot; this transition is now spoiled by the inserted material with Fletcher.