8mm Forum: The Dawn of Cinema Sound

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Topic: The Dawn of Cinema Sound

Paul Adsett
Film God

Posts: 5003
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2003

posted January 09, 2008 05:40 PM

Anybody purchased the new 3-disc edition of 'The Jazz Singer'? According to the reviews, the extras include an 85 minute documentary on the development of cinema sound from Edison to digital, plus loads of history on Warner Brothers and the Vitaphone, and many Vitaphone shorts not seen since the 1920's. Sounds really fascinating, I must get this one.

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Claus Harding
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1149
From: Washington DC
Registered: Oct 2006

posted January 09, 2008 07:20 PM

Looks great, Paul; seemingly a case of where the compilers of the set really "learned their history" and knew what would complement this groundbreaking film.
I wonder who worked on the documentary?

Claus.

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Osi Osgood
Film God

Posts: 10204
From: Mountian Home, ID.
Registered: Jul 2005

posted January 10, 2008 12:33 AM

I wonder if among the Vitaphone shorts, those early Max Fleischer cartoon shorts are included, as they are still known to exist.

In Leanard Maltins, "Of Mice and Magic", (on the history of the american animated cartoon), he writes about Max Fleischers first ventures into sound, which were 1924, a good four years before Disney made "Steamboat Willie", and these cartoons had synchronised sound talking, which Disney didn't even do in Steamboat Willie.

These were sing a long cartoons. In one cartoon, the cartoon charatcer turns to the audience and with perfect lip synching says,

"Follow along with the ball everybody" (the ball that bounced to each word of the song).

Unfortunately, though Max Fleischer was a technical wizard, he didn't know how to cash in on his first uses of things, (sound, multiplane 3D camera effects), and Disney, did.

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Paul Adsett
Film God

Posts: 5003
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2003

posted January 12, 2008 06:52 PM

Went out and bought this movie last night. What a package! The extras are unbelievable- Vitaphone promotional material, a 5 x 7 folder of many pictures of Jolson, a Warner Bros promotional booklet reproduction about the film, a telegram from Al to Jack Warner, etc, etc. The three discs are even made to look like the original Vitaphone 33 1/3 sound discs with numbered boxes to tick off the number of plays (the original Vitaphone discs were replaced after only 20 plays- hopefully the DVD's will last longer than that!)

Absolutely fabulous, Warners have outdone themselves on this one. Al would be proud.
This review says it all better than I can:

http://www.bullz-eye.com/mguide/reviews_1927/the_jazz_singer.htm

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Lee Mannering
Film God

Posts: 3216
From: The Projection Box
Registered: Nov 2006

posted January 13, 2008 06:08 AM

And what about "The Child Wonder" on disc 2 Paul. Looks like Al gave her some singing lessons.

A good set this but what a shame the quality of the trailer was not better. The Super 8 trailer for Jazz Singer was much the same def but had less splices in the master than that of the DVD transfer copy. One up for 8mm at last.

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Paul Adsett
Film God

Posts: 5003
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2003

posted January 13, 2008 10:04 AM

Yes some great stuff on these discs Lee. I found the 85 minute film on the history of sound on film most fascinating. It was amazing to see that sound clip of Edisons Kinetephone experiment from 1913! And a lot of things I thought were true were completely debunked by this documentary:
'The Jazz Singer' was NOT the first talking picture, not by a long shot.
Theodore Case was the true genius behind Movietone optical sound on film, NOT Lee DeForest who claimed all Case's work as his own and even got an Academy Award for it!
Silent film star John Gilbert did NOT fall from fame because he had a squeeky voice.
It is also amazing that the recording disc speed utilized by the Vitaphone process was 33 1/3 rpm, the same speed adopted by LP records in the 1950's!

Most of all you realize when watching all this stuff how miraculous sound on film really is, and how the best scientists in the world struggled for decades to get what we now take for granted every time we run our little super 8 sound projectors.

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Graham Ritchie
Film God

Posts: 4001
From: New Zealand
Registered: Feb 2006

posted January 13, 2008 03:15 PM

Paul
It looks great will keep an eye out for this one when its "hopefully" released here.

Regarding "The Jazz Singer" is this the one that has been restored by the by the BFI?, as I remember in one of Keith Wilton's tapes "cant remember which one" a visit to the BFI, which showed the on screen comparison, print and sound between the original and restored 35mm, very interesting.

Graham.

Ops,..Made a mistake [Eek!]

the film shown at the BFI was "Rhapsody in Blue" not "The Jazz Singer"

[ January 13, 2008, 05:48 PM: Message edited by: Graham Ritchie ]

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Paul Adsett
Film God

Posts: 5003
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2003

posted January 13, 2008 06:47 PM

Graham, as far as I can tell this is a brand new restoration done by Warner Bros. themselves, and it is really stunning. Hard to believe you are watching a 1927 film.
I am really enthusiastic about this new DVD release. It really is a great boost to my existing collection of Jolson memorabilia, which includes the S8 excerpts from 'The Jolson Story' and 'Jolson Sings Again, 'A quarter to Nine' from 'Ready Willing and Able' and the screen sound dubbing tests that Al did for Columbia for 'Jolson Sings Again'. Plus of course the supplemental material on film sound is utterly fascinating.

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Maurice Leakey
Film God

Posts: 5895
From: Bristol. United Kingdom
Registered: Oct 2007

posted January 15, 2008 04:58 AM

In the UK "The Jazz Singer" has been released as a Region 2 double disc set.

Does anybody know what's not on this release that was on the Region 1 3-disc set?

Maurice

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David Kilderry
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 963
From: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Registered: Feb 2006

posted January 15, 2008 05:17 AM

A friend of mine has an original vitaphone disc from The Jazz Singer, none of the boxes have been crossed off, so in 2008 it is still brand new!

David

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Lee Mannering
Film God

Posts: 3216
From: The Projection Box
Registered: Nov 2006

posted January 15, 2008 07:15 AM

It's funny you mention how miraculous sound on film really is Paul as I was cleaning some super 8 features last night and the stripe on King Kong is still perfect under the eye glass. Then I dug out some of my 1971 audio cassette tape home recordings and decided to play these to see how these held up today and yes they still play OK. Good to note some of the old tech still works as in the Vita system eigh.

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Paul Adsett
Film God

Posts: 5003
From: USA
Registered: Jun 2003

posted January 15, 2008 10:20 AM

Hi Lee, yes looking at all the problems that they had getting Movietone and RCA Photosound to work, really makes you appreciate S8 optical sound! Here is the back of the 3-disc special edition just released in the USA, listing all the special features and packaged extras:

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