{"id":6797,"date":"2013-07-01T03:44:46","date_gmt":"2013-07-01T07:44:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mondomark.com\/wordpress\/?p=4110"},"modified":"2013-07-01T03:44:46","modified_gmt":"2013-07-01T07:44:46","slug":"lost-horizons-part-i-the-films","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=6797","title":{"rendered":"Lost Horizons, Part I: The Films"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In the early 1970s, it was important that all actor hair be windy, and a film's narrative strands flow out in graphic detail from someone's giant head or from under a wide skirt.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Yes, it\u2019s Canada Day, but instead of a tongue-in-cheek review of native-made fromage, I\u2019ve got bigger fromage: the 1973 musical remake of Lost Horizon<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Now before we get into some basic facts and the review links, let me jump back a little.<\/p>\n

When I was a movie-hungry teen, someone told me about The Golden Turkey Awards, one of the most hysterical chronologies of bad movies, written and first published in 1980 by brothers Harry and Michael Medved \u2013 the latter kind of lost his marbles in the nineties and advocated with religious groups not only an overhaul of America’s MPAA movie ratings system, but include brandings like \u201cEvil.\u201d<\/p>\n

(The book in fact lists Tobe Hooper\u2019s Texas Chainsaw Massacre<\/strong> as a worth <\/em>Turkey, describing its special effects as \u201cdisgusting\u201d \u2013 a portent of Michael\u2019s pre-existing dislike for things horrific and visceral.)<\/p>\n

Within the pages of this still Holy Book of Cinematic Awfulness (many titles remain unavailable on video anywhere) are nominees for the Worst Musical Extravaganza in Hollywood History: Peter Bogdanovich\u2019s At Long Last Love<\/a> <\/strong>[M<\/a>] (1973), Ross Hunter\u2019s production of Lost Horizon<\/strong> (1973), Robert Stigwood\u2019s production of Sgt. Pepper\u2019s Lonely Hearts Club Band <\/strong>(1978), and Andrew L. Stone\u2019s Song of Norway<\/strong> (1970).<\/p>\n

Pepper<\/strong>‘s been <\/strong>available on video for years, but the winner, At Long Last Love<\/strong>, was recently produced for Blu-ray by the Twilight Time team for Fox (and is currently available as an Amazon exclusive), while TT itself released a gorgeous BR of Lost Horizon<\/strong>, the Turkey nominee which had never been available on DVD until a recent MOD disc from Sony in 2011.<\/p>\n

TT\u2019s BR features full HD extras, and fans of Burt Bacharach and Hal David\u2019s music will be able to enjoy this Panavision spectacle in full DTS and HD.<\/p>\n

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Pre-release poster prior to drastic edits and optical changes where Ronald Colman was originally a giant white man wreaking horrific destruction on trembling Asians with his clod-hoppers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Now, sometimes a problem film deserves a bit more examination than a long heralded masterpiece, and given the musical version is a remake of a Frank Capra classic, I\u2019ve scribbled two very long comparative reviews to address the pros & cons of both versions: the restored 1937 roadshow version<\/a> [M<\/a>] released by Sony way back in 1999, and the 1973 musical<\/a> [M<\/a>] from TT.<\/p>\n

Why is this called Part I? Because this segment deals with the films, and Part II will address the scores (although I will NOT be reviewing the \u201973 version\u2019s song soundtrack album for reasons clearly addressed in the review).<\/p>\n

As for the last member of the aforementioned Turkey quartet, I\u2019m scared of Song of Norway<\/strong> because it stars a singing & dancing Florence Henderson (“Mrs. Brady” from <\/strong>TV’s The Brady Bunch<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

Still, if it ever gets a release, I have to see it<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Why? Because Andrew Stone was an important indie director-producer who made a set of notable crime films – The Steel Trap <\/strong>(1952), The Night Holds Terror<\/strong> (1955), and Cry Terror! <\/strong>(1958) \u2013 the latter made with wife Virginia Stone, often credited for a superior use of cross-cutting between converging narratives of kidnappers, cops, and those caught in between the crime carnage.<\/p>\n

Stone\u2019s career eventually decelerated to overblown musicals in an era when overblown, classic-styled musicals were dead \u2013 his last film was The Great Waltz<\/strong> (1972) \u2013 but he\u2019s a forgotten filmmaker who deserves more spotlight on home video besides his best-known work, Stormy Weather<\/strong> (1943), and the water-borne disaster film The Last Voyage<\/strong> (1960), of which stock footage was appropriated for the CanCon fromage classique Death Ship<\/a><\/strong> [M<\/a>] (1980).<\/p>\n

Coming shortly:<\/em> soundtrack reviews + composer interviews, and another weird & wacky piece of surreal video at Big Head Amusements that resembles fleshy blue marble with pink fire ejections shooting from the peripherals in surround sound.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m serious.<\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mark R. Hasan<\/strong>, Editor
\nKQEK.com <\/strong>( Main Site<\/a> \/ Mobile Site<\/a> )<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just uploaded after lengthy research & scribbling are two lengthy comparative reviews of Frank Capra’s 1937 film version of James Hilton’s classic novel Lost Horizon (Sony) and Twilight Time’s stunning Blu-ray of the problematic 1973 musical remake, produced by Mr. Gloss himself, Ross Hunter. Yup, you’ve got almost 4000 words to discover the pros & cons of these two depictions of ordinary folks who succumb to the kind world of Shangri-La. Go!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[6,5],"tags":[1340,549,2100,2098,2094,2093,2097],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-1LD","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6797"}],"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\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6797\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}