Sorry for being late folks but not until very late last evening (March 3 @ 10:59pm) did I stumble across an airing of this "epic" on HBO. I recorded the show. Ran a little over 7 hours. Not sure if HBO will be showing anytime again soon but do keep an eye out for it on HBO.
HBO list this movie as: The Godfather Epic in their Schedule Guide.
Good luck!
Oh man! Was it in HD? How did it look? I LOVE this version!
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Mark,
It is shown in HD and picture is probably not BluRay quality but, it looks great! Sharp & clear.
Do keep in mind that since this was actually made for TV (in a sense) it is "full screen" vs widescreen and/or letterbox. Nonetheless - GREAT viewing and do enjoy!
HBO's GF Epic* is not exactly the old 1977 NBC TV version called GF Saga.
Like Saga, it does add deleted scenes and runs chronological. Saga was 434 minutes, and HBO Epic is 424.
Why is it the better version of the 2? Because Epic is remastered -- so it is HD and the sound is 5.1 dolby.
But most importantly - Epic isn't censored like Saga was, and of course doesn't have commercial breaks.
*The opening credits of HBO's version referencesThe Godfather 1902–1959: The Complete Epic -- which was a reduced, 386 minute version of The Godfather Saga (434 minutes) that was released to video in 1981. TV censorship was NOT placed on this VHS video version, so it had some appeal. But because of the extra minutes, HBO's version is probably a morph of the VHS piece and the NBC Saga.
This is exciting and fascinating to me because I've always enjoyed this version (along with "The Triogy 1901-1980"), although I recognize that it's not the definitive way to watch the movies, sometimes you're just in the mood to see the same thing done in the different way.
It's fascinating becuase how was this turned into HD? If it has all those deleted scenes that I've only ever seen in a $hitty standard definiton full screen presentation, how did they manage to update it to widescreen and HD? Did Coppola work on this with them?
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