Author
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Topic: Pardon Us ("Jailbirds") Blackhawk super 8 feature
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Osi Osgood
Film God
Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005
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posted January 11, 2017 12:32 PM
Being that we are having fun with these reviews of our beloved "Lads", I thought I'd give one of my standard 8mm sound print.
This was they're first (I believe) feature, with Stan and Ollie as unsuccessful "Bootleggers" (Stan sells a cop some beer because he thought the fella was a streetcar conductor!), and they end up in hoosegow with a number of rough customers.
This film has always had a soft spot in my heart. There are some very good routines (the "dentist office", for one), though there are not as many fans of this one, possibly due to the black-face routines in it. Ollie sings "lazy Moon" (nice voice Ollie!), Ollie tries to go on a hunger strike (good luck with that Ollie) the classroom routine (complete with "Little Rascals" or "Our Gang" theme in the background) and the lads do get out of jail, we think, or do they, as Stan then tries to sell the warden some beer!
This print is on 3X400ft (the film runs approximately 55 minutes, though on my laserdisc, it runs about 70 or so minutes), and the image quality is nice and sharp, in my opinion, much better than most of thier features on super 8. My only slight complaint is that this specific print run seems to have been printed just ever so slightly bright, not quite as much contrast as one would like ...
but still, a fun film that doesn't take up too much time to watch but then, anytime spent with the Lad's, is time well spent in my opinion.
I'd like to hear from folks who have the super 8 Blackhawk print of this, as to how good the quality, especially if someone has the "Silver Box edition, as that would have been made from new and potentially better negative material!
Long LIve Super 8!!
-------------------- "All these moments will be lost in time, just like ... tears, in the rain. "
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Osi Osgood
Film God
Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005
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posted January 13, 2017 11:21 AM
I'm not much for "restored" versions as a general rule, but i do like what I found on youtube awhile back, as it had another 5 or six minutes not even on the laserdisc in which Stan and Ollie rescue the damnsel in distress (the Wardens daughter) from a fire AND the manin thug that they deal with in prison and, until i had seen that youtube video, I'd never even SEEn that footage.
I believe some of it had lost the original soundtrack, so they added fire effect or just "cut and pasted" audio from other parts of the film, but it did work.
-------------------- "All these moments will be lost in time, just like ... tears, in the rain. "
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Osi Osgood
Film God
Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005
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posted February 09, 2017 11:34 AM
I just wanted to add that i purchased, quite a few years ago, a laserdisc copy of this film, which also had the bonus of a short with it as well, "The Chimp' (one of my least favorite shorts of the Lads), but it is quite interesting, in that wherever they found thier source material, must have been a pretty good site!
It was released by "3M" laserdisc, and no mention of the Blackhawk archives anywhere, so i can't be too sure that this was from Blackhawk archives.
it also hyas some curious differences, one of which is that, when they are put in the "sultry confinement" (as Stan says), they stay on the shot for an extensive period of time, then you hear a lot of clanking about in the cell, (everything unseen), and then a big crash, then Stan crying and the prison guard (off screen), yelling at them to shut up. one of the differences. it doesn't have the whole saving the wardens daughter bit, though.
Oh, also, the running time of this version of the film, on laserdisc is 1 hour six minutes, and that's without that whole extra ending of saving the Wardens wife. After having watched it again, i must say that I had forgotten how sharp this copy of the film is. It had to have been taken from 35MM, no way this was 16MM. The contrast is very good as well, deep grey tones throughout.
it would be awesome to take this version plus the other versions of this and compile a complete (so to speak) version of this film! [ February 10, 2017, 12:38 PM: Message edited by: Osi Osgood ]
-------------------- "All these moments will be lost in time, just like ... tears, in the rain. "
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