{"id":13842,"date":"2016-07-04T07:58:14","date_gmt":"2016-07-04T11:58:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=13842"},"modified":"2016-07-04T08:16:33","modified_gmt":"2016-07-04T12:16:33","slug":"george-orwells-1984","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=13842","title":{"rendered":"George Orwell’s 1984"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before I get into the nitty-grittty details of the latest review, a big Happy Fourth of July to American readers and the amazing indie labels who\u2019ve not only nurtured the release of forgotten, marginalized, and undiscovered genre classics, but released more than a few classic CanCon titles which have been largely ignored up here.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s putting out old fill screen transfers, and then there\u2019s doing it right by creating HD transfers from original camera masters, restoring the colours of films unseen in their full glory since their original and very brief theatrical runs. Same goes for the fine soundtrack labels who continue to put everything into making the most definitive editions any anyone, because perhaps more than stars or directors, film composers aren\u2019t defined by geography, but the quality of their work.<\/p>\n

Next: crazy wave of sudden filmmaker deaths this past week. Robin Hardy, director of The Wicker Man<\/strong> (1973), perhaps the finest British horror film on record; and Michael Cimino, controversial auteur whose career was given a huge boost with the Oscar-winning The Deer Hunter<\/strong> (1978), and went into the crapper after the disastrous Heaven\u2019s Gate <\/strong>(1980).<\/p>\n

Both filmmakers will retain very distinct mystiques, but I\u2019ve always felt they made far too few films in their lengthy careers.<\/p>\n

\"19841984_BR\"Now then. What started off as an intended comparative review between Michael Radford\u2019s 1984 and Michael Anderson\u2019s 1956 film versions of George Orwell\u2019s dystopian sci-fi classic 1984<\/strong> kind of turned into an essay, which explains the delay in posts this past week.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s rare when this occurs on my end, but sometimes a review grows as you dig into related materials and new information forces a reorganization of focus. What\u2019s been posted is still a review of Twilight Time\u2019s recent Blu-ray edition of Radford\u2019s definitive edition, but there\u2019s a preamble, a breakdown of plot points, and a lengthy comparison of the 1953 Theatre Guild on the Air<\/strong> radio play, the 1953 Studio One<\/strong> teleplay, the 1954 BBC Sunday-Night Theatre<\/strong> teleplay, Anderson\u2019s 1956 film, and the 1984 Radford film, plus a wrap-up.<\/p>\n

Why go bonkers on 1984? I don\u2019t know. Call it a longtime fascination with post-apocalyptic sci-fi dramas, a genre I call British Bleakism, and a mania to compare various adaptations by filmmakers. In this case it was too good to be true: a radio show, a pair of live teleplays, and two features films whose own release history on home video\u2019s been very wonky.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll revise the piece some day (perhaps in an expanded book form) with more details from the novel, but in its current 8,000 word state (yes, it\u2019s longer than my chapter in The Canadian Horror Film: Terror of the Soul<\/a><\/strong>), it\u2019s enough. In a future related piece I\u2019ll do a comparison between the original Dominic Muldowney and Virgin-imposed Eurythmics music (both of which I love), but for now this is what I offer<\/a>. Just brew a pot of coffee and have a whole sandwich instead of a morning espresso and baguette to kill time.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m finishing up on the visual component to my podcast with Nima Fakhrara, and fingers crossed the next renderings won\u2019t cause Premiere to hang and crash. Here are some frame grabs of the midsection which supports the End Titles piano piece from The Girl in the Photographs<\/strong> (2016). Like the stills from The Mask<\/a><\/strong> visual podcast, these are frames from a slow but constantly moving mass of blue matter.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Girl<\/p>\n

\"Girl<\/p>\n

\"Girl<\/p>\n

\"Girl<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Also coming very shortly:<\/em> reviews of Deepa Mehta\u2019s Beeba Boys<\/strong> (Mongrel) + Anurag Kashyap\u2019s amazing Gangs of Wassypur <\/strong>(Cinelicious Pics), and modern noirs Hickey and Boggs<\/strong> (KINO Lorber) from Carl Franklin + Devil in a Blue Dress<\/strong> (Twilight Time) from Robert Culp.<\/p>\n

Cheers,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Mark R. Hasan<\/strong>, Editor
\nKQEK.com<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Comparative review \/ essay on the 5 attempts to dramatize George Orwell’s dystopian sci-fi classic 1984: the 1953 radio play, 1953 Studio One teleplay, 1954 BBC teleplay, 1956 film version, and the 1984 film version recently released on Blu by Twilight Time. Hey, it’s only 8,000 words…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13860,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[4505,4515,2562,2563,4521,4508,427,4514],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/19841984_featured.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-3Bg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13842"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13842"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13842\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13871,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13842\/revisions\/13871"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13860"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}