Zappa.com

I still have my original VHS, hermetically sealed in an airtight, waterproof, radiation proof, kevlar lined case. I wasn't sure if we might go for THE BIG ONE at some point so I figured I better keep it safe. Actually it isn't quite my original VHS, that one got eaten by a defective VCR, this is it's replacement.

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"Whose foot is to be the measure to which ours are all to be cut or stretched? Is a priest to be our inquisitor, or shall a layman, simple as ourselves, set up his reason as the rule for what we are to read and what we must believe?" T.J.

ha! i keep my VHS copy in my fire proof safe as well!

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Who's this dude with his hair straight back?
His new white socks, 'n his pants all black
His T-shirts rolled His watch is gold
A '55 Chevy that his brother just stoled

I ripped my VHS to a DVD and I've got 2 copies of it, one to play and one to keep with some other movies I want to keep safe.

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You gotta give the people something good to read, on a Sunday

How's the restoration work done, TIB, does it look spiffy? No artifacts, judder or 16:9 gimmickry? I wonder how they could get sonics improved with the audio presumably being taken from an age-old 35mm print or simply the 1997 MGM silver disc (?!?)

I taped my version from a sub-titled Cable-TV broadcast in around 1992, which still (kinda) looks phantastic, couldn't stand being fed with a Voiceprint-ish sub-standard release riddled with digititis from beginning to end

buff.

Tony Palmer claims to have access to the masters so his implication I guess is that this release is produced using those masters. If not, why brag about having them?

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The way I see it Barry, this should be a very dynamite show.

The Different Covers
Warner Home Video PEV 99498 VHS (UK), as seen on eBay:

I got that one Luck a guy knocked my house with it brand new then saying he likes Zappa but that film was a little odd for his blood so he give it too me.
ARRF

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Arf you out of your fucking mind.

Yepp, seems though he doesn't have access to the original multitrack sound recordings, since they happen to sit in the vault underneath Woodrow Wilson Dr., according to geee zeeee, no? And what's a 2010 digital 200 Ms re-release without drastically improved, state-of-the-art visuals and high-res. /cleaned-up acoust-nicks?! A semi-official bootleg /grey market affair, seen a hundred times at ebay in the last couple of lustrums --

Ya see, my expectations turn out to be somewhat muffled, also judging from the cobbled-together, scan-and-add-preset-typeface aroma of the artwork 'n stuff - this, to me, is looking more like a low-profile private release, but hey, what do I know?

Hope they gonna prove me wrong, though, maybe this is a top-notch dts 5.1 hunk housed in some nerdy shareware CGI exterior.

EDIT



16:9

Ouch! This one's hurtin'

I knew it was crap! Jeeeez, if this is true: Don't buy that shit!!!!

I didn't expect those clowns to be that ignorant

I've always been under the impression it was one of the masters FZ never owned. Might be wrong.

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Nelda baby, Nelda baby surf along with me.

Thought they were working on a high-res (4-D [??]) transfer of at least the orchestral portions of 200 Motels. This is at ZFT headquarters, of course. Or maybe I dreamt that up..

...anyway, I got my copy today. Not blown away, largely because the sound is still murky, but the commentary is interesting, partly because Tony isn't really enamored with Zappa and basically doesn't really get modern classical music. He does however like The Beatles, who are geniuses, obviously. On the plus, I guess this is probably as good as the picture is going to get - I can't see HD making any difference since it was filmed on video.

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Nelda baby, Nelda baby surf along with me.

Well, that's a no for me then.

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You gotta give the people something good to read, on a Sunday

Cheapo transfer -- don't touch me, go away..

Thanx for the overview, evildick -- Did they really have the nerve and chop the entire thing up into 16:9?


Don't egree on this, evidick, I've seen video-, 16mm and even early 20th century film pioneering material transferred to HD, and it's looking gorgeous! Nothing's looking bad enough not to fundamentally benefit from a HD transfer, I tend to believe.

Not sure why 16:9 - which is universal to high-definition television and European digital television - makes this 'crap', buffalo_voice. On my HD TV, it looks the same (size & shape) as The Drummers Of FZ DVD. As Evil rightly says, though, the sound is still murky and the picture quality not amazing. But I think this is the best we're gonna get for the forseeable future. Worth it for the commentary alone, I'd say - you wouldn't get that on a ZFT approved version.

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"Well of course, everything looks bad if you remember it. Now where are my chili boots?" - HOMER SIMPSON

http://www.idiotbastard.com

'Cause it's a 4:3 movie with some moron adding a matte on both ends of the screen to make it look 'modern', thus sacrificing roughly 1/4 of the material's visual information for ABSOLUTELY NO REASON other than complete ignorance--

PATHETIC NONSENSE, imho
You wouldn't buy a remastered version of a 40'00'' album which now is abruptly terminating at 27'40, would you? C'mon . . . .


And -- for a punchline -- it isn't even HD <rimshot>


Now, this was shot in 16:9 for a website in...uh...dunno...2006 -- can't see how this relates to a 1971 theatrical release --
This is not to say it's not better than nothing, no doubt I would enjoy it myself, simply because the material itself is hilarious


Thinman, please help me --

Well, I admit I'm no expert Mr Buffalo Voice. I'm just of the opinion that the original 'old school' video technology was a bit clunky and HD might just heighten the imperfections. Hopefully one day we'll find out and it will look miles better! I agree with the Idiot though; the commentary is interesting if a bit meandering.

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Nelda baby, Nelda baby surf along with me.

The '97 Ryko CD edition apparently only sold 10,000 copies worldwide and has been OOP for a few years now. So the fact that we're even getting a DVD release of this movie is a miracle and is probably the only semi-official or official release that will be issued, guys...

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ONE NATION UNDER SOCIALISM



Because of Obamination's spending & socialist BS, America and much of the world will endure one of the worst depressions in history in 5...4...3...2...

..butchered to 16:9, AAAAHHHWGGHHH --


I'm pretty much of a low-tech sort, e.d., yet after my -4,5 dpt. lens-encrusted eyeholes spied a mile-high difference even on age-old, threadbare material , I'm sure we'd both be drooling over a HD, 4:3 '200 Motels' with remastered sonics

buffalo_voice, is it really a 4:3 movie? According to IMDb, it's 1:66:1. Perhaps you're saying we should see the original 2 inch video footage before it was transferred to 35mm and 'butchered' for cinema release? Forgive my ignorance on this, but I really don't think Tony Palmer has produced a crap DVD here. While I agree it would be great to see an HD sonically enhanced version, what are the chances of that happening in our lifetimes?

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"Well of course, everything looks bad if you remember it. Now where are my chili boots?" - HOMER SIMPSON

http://www.idiotbastard.com

Ever was.




Also as far as I remember, it wasn't 'matted' during 35mm production, could be a very slight matte, though, like 1,37:1, I'm not exactly sure....
Definitely not 1:66:1 (or 15:9), which is only a smidgin away from standard widescreen format

I dont know if it a myth that film directors prefer too Film mabye(video)in 16.9 for many years and slap it too 4.3 for viewers

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Arf you out of your fucking mind.

I had that impression too.
If the ZFT have it, it doesn't sound like that's what Ryko used on their release.

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Bill

...Uh, wish I could remember where, but didn't I read somewhere that the ZFTs are working on (or are considering working on... ) an new (5.1?) mix from the original orchestral multitracks? I always understood that these were sitting in the vault, as opposed to the MGM-owned master tapes ... but, again, what do I know as a softcore-zappa-guy?!?

Okay, here's a still from the new Palmer DVD:



Doesn't look like there's very much missing (comparing this to the YouTube screenshot above).

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"Well of course, everything looks bad if you remember it. Now where are my chili boots?" - HOMER SIMPSON

http://www.idiotbastard.com

Strange...that's looking like a 4:3 image squeezed to 16:9 due to a wrong tv setting (panorama zoom etc.) more than anything else -->note the incorrectly rendered proportions, Jeff's looking kinda fat etc.

Yes, I did wonder if they'd stretched the image in some way...which I guess counts as butchering!

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"Well of course, everything looks bad if you remember it. Now where are my chili boots?" - HOMER SIMPSON

http://www.idiotbastard.com