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DVD available from Warner -- on-line only

posted 15 years ago by hobnob53
18 replies | jump to latest

The Big Circus is one of 150 titles just made available by Warner Bros. in their new Warner Archives series. In its original widescreen format for the first time ever. (Only complaint is that the print used contains the recut theme music over the opening credits; part of the music soundtrack appears to have been lost many years ago, so a portion of the music was spliced back into the film and is heard twice, to make sure the music ends simultaneously with the credits; I guess the complete original theme is gone forever.)

These are made-on-demand DVDs (not compatible with DVD recorders), burned, not pressed, but using what Warners says is new and better technology, and the disc and picture are of good quality. Warners controls its own library, plus most titles from MGM, RKO, and AA, so the fact that they're making these films available is great news.

Each title comes in its own snap-case like a regular DVD. No extras (except for the theatrical trailer, where available -- it's not on The Big Circus), but then this is common with many standard releases. $19.95 per title.

Warner plans to add 20-30 titles a month to this series, films which otherwise might never have been released on standard DVD, at least not for a long time. Mostly older films, but some 1980s stuff as well. While a full, normal release would have been best, these DVDs are official releases (not bootlegs) of good quality and at least bring these movies to the market.

Go to WBshop.com and click on the Warner Archives button for the full roster of available films.

[–] littleboze 14 years ago

It's currently available at the Warner Brothers Store (above website) for just $14.95.

[–] hobnob53 14 years ago

That's for the MOD version. Several of the Archives films are available on both DVD-R as well as in the less expensive MOD format. The former is $5 more but I think a better product. The Big Circus appears to be one of the series's biggest sellers.

[–] Eightythreeyearoldguy 13 years ago

This is the version I borrowed from the local library and will be showing to my movie group on Saturday. I previewed it and it should quite please the others.

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

[–] hobnob53 13 years ago

Possible spoilers, people.

So, how did it go over, 78? My Thursday-night movie group loved it when I ran it last summer. They all thought Vincent P. was the bad guy, so had a neat surprise!

[–] Eightythreeyearoldguy 13 years ago

Ah, my group loved it and even applauded at the end...they do that sometimes. I do think that Vincent Price and Peter Lorre were both deliberately cast as red herrings. Vincent was better, because by that time, Lorre was to pudgy to convey the menace that he once did. I learned as a teen that any stars like Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi along with Price and Lorre were never murderers in who-dun-its, but were red herrings cast because of their previous menacing roles.

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

[–] hobnob53 13 years ago

There was talk in 1959-60 of Lorre's being nominated for an Academy Award as Best Supporting Actor for his performance in this film, but the competition in '59 was tough and it didn't happen. Remarkable an actor as he was, Peter Lorre never had a single Oscar nomination.

My audience applauded this film too. They also really liked the Niagara Falls sequence.

[–] Eightythreeyearoldguy 13 years ago

The Niagara Falls sequence was great. BTW, do you know if there was any medical reason for Lorre's becoming so chubby late in his career? I can't believe an actor would have allowed himself to get that overweight just by eating a lot. It did destroy that menacing look he had and made him seem more of a buffoon. I remember a scene in the musical, RED STOCKINGS, where Lorre as a russian was purposely clumsy during one dance number.

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

[–] hobnob53 13 years ago

The musical was Silk Stockings (not "Red" -- maybe you're thinking of the film Red Garters?!).

I know Lorre had heart and other problems in later life that, between the effects themselves and I presume any medication he was taking, caused him to get so fat. He died of a heart seizure in 1964 at 59. But I'll look around to see if I can find out anything more specific.

Silk Stockings, which was a musicalized remake of Ninotchka, was Fred Astaire's last true musical. In 1959, when Fred made his first dramatic role in On the Beach, a lot of people thought he deserved an Oscar nomination for his performance. In fact, many people still believe he was nominated. He wasn't -- but should have been. Imagine both Astaire and Lorre competing against each other! (For the record, the five nominees for supporting actor in '59 were: Hugh Griffith in Ben-Hur , Arthur O'Connell and George C. Scott in Anatomy of a Murder, Ed Wynn in The Diary of Anne Frank, and Robert Vaughn in The Young Philadelphians. Griffith won. Like I said -- a tough year.)

[–] Eightythreeyearoldguy 13 years ago

I actually knew it was SILK STOCKINGS, but somehow got RED in my mind. LOL I might've been thinking THE RED SHOES. LOL

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

[–] hobnob53 13 years ago

Shoes, stockings, garters...someone should open a Red Dress Shop in Hollywood.

[–] Eightythreeyearoldguy 13 years ago

I don't know of any way to confirm this, but I have the feeling that "red" appears in more film titles than any other color. "Black" and maybe "green" are also common, but I doubt they are more popular than the color red.

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

[–] hobnob53 13 years ago

I would have said black, so just for fun I looked through Maltin's Classic Movie Guide (films only up through 1965), and checked out a few colors -- obviously only films beginning with the color, not trying to find a color stuck in the middle of a title (so, for example, The Bride Wore Black wouldn't be included in this rough count -- besides which, it's a 1966 film).

Anyway, I counted 18 green, 26 blue, 26 white, 36 red (I added a title I know that they don't have in the book) and black 59. (I found one title called The Red and the Black, which I only counted under red!) Of course, as I said, a color can appear someplace other than at the beginning of a title, but this gives us some idea. Maybe the numbers shift for post-'65 films.

A friend and I once did this for entries starting with "man". I checked those out too in the guide -- 130! Fun idea to play around with.

[–] Eightythreeyearoldguy 13 years ago

I'm surprised there are that many movies starting with the color blue. Actually, I guess Black doesn't surprise me. One needs to consider the associations one has with each color, and black often signifies doom, death, menace, and the like.

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

[–] hobnob53 13 years ago

Doom, death, menace...the stuff that movie dreams are made of.

Given which, it's odd that none of those killer-on-the-loose-in-a-circus films was ever titled "The Black Circus".

[–] Eightythreeyearoldguy 13 years ago

Yeah, that would be a natural title. The one movie of that sub-genre that I recall is Circus Of Horrors. Somehow, I had it in my mind that it was a Hammer film, but just checked and it wasn't.

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

[–] hobnob53 13 years ago

There were a lot of movies in the 60s and 70s that used circuses as the venues for all sorts of murder, torture and mayhem, and they all seem to have been made in England. Circus of Fear/Psycho Circus, Vampire Circus, Berserk.... I liked Circus of Horrors best -- it was certainly the sexiest.

I guess American circuses are more chaste and sedate -- they're just "Big" or "The Greatest" or the like.

[–] Eightythreeyearoldguy 13 years ago

I remember reading a paperback reprint of a pulp magazine novel featuring the Phantom Detective using a circus setting and a series of murders of spectators at circus performances. The character who had his own monthly magazine was a ripoff of the magazine version of the Shadow who was a master of disguise but didn't, as his radio counterpart, have the "power to cloud men's minds". The circus ringmaster turned out to be the killer, having used trickery to make it appear he was in plain sight at the time of the murders. As the circus generally suggests lots of fun and laughs, it makes a natural background for the contrast of horror and/or mystery. Just like clowns have always made prize villains, from the Joker through Stephen King and beyond.

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

[–] hobnob53 13 years ago

So much of a contrast that the notion of drama and mystery under the big top has become a hoary cliche. Both The Big Circus and The Greatest Show on Earth have murder and mayhem in their plots, that latter even including a massive (toy) train wreck. Another US circus picture is Ring of Fear, a lesser movie from (but not starring) John Wayne's company. Wayne himself starred a decade later in Circus World, a turgid drama with its own "disaster"climax. But outright big-top horror seems to have remained a British preoccupation.

I read once that when Irwin Allen left Fox for Warner in the mid-70s, after his spectacular run of over 15 years at the former studio, executives there were talking with him about another circus project he had in mind. But Allen's films at WB ended up being big flops and by 1980 he was out, so that circus picture never materialized. I doubt he'd have done anything better than The Big Circus, to which I'm sure unfavorable comparisons would have been drawn had the new film ever been made.