And Now The Return of Another New Slideshow (Sort of), Part 2 [**Now featuring alternate versions of scenes - see replies #18,#21,#23,#49,#64,#69,#76,#88,#90,#100,#105,#107,#115**]

[Mysterious Benefactor]

I thought yesterday's first capture where Jeff looked like he'd had one too many Vodka Collins at the annual staff holiday party and Willie was looking at him all like "Is this bitch for real?" was a hoot.

Yes, that's an apt description for this capture:

 

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Since no one seems to have any idea what I'm getting at as far as the blooper in Scene 230 goes, I'm posting the following capture as a clue:

[Uncle Roger]

Is it the way that Roger's shirt seems to be buttoned around the Stake?

[Mysterious Benefactor]

That's not quite it. But it's definitely moving in the right direction! 

 

[dom]

Stake in wrong side of chest, or no blood?

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Now things are getting really, really hot!! 

[dom]

Last guess - didn't use crossbow to stake him? (don't remember any details from the movie anymore)

[dom]

Okay, one more guess - Wasn't wearing ascot when staked?

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Not either of those two - BUT it DOES involve the ascot!! 

[Gothick]

From today's capture, I'd say that again, this scene was graded TOO DARK in the "Blu Ray" iteration. I remember being able to see Jeff's face on previous viewings.  Though I think the last time I watched this movie was nearly a decade ago, and memory does cheat.

It's really odd to be complaining that I can't see Roger Davis's face. *tired laugh* It brings back memories of a screening I attended at the Brattle theatre a couple of years ago of the HORROR OF DRACULA Blu-Ray.  That had been graded so dark--with the trademark BD slightly bluish tinge to many scenes--that half the movie was nearly invisible, since a lot of it was shot day for night. In the sequences where the image was clear, the lighting had been graded very cold with a very muted, slightly blue color palette. Given how so many film critics made Hammer's "garish" use of Technicolor/Eastmancolor such a talking point over many decades of discussion and review, it's been curious to see fans arguing that the recent "restoration" was "exactly the way Jack Asher wanted the movie to look."

For anyone still following along at home, apparently one can correct this problem if one owns equipment that has a "sports" setting for the display. It pops it up in some fashion so that it actually looks the way it is supposed to.  This seems to have created a lot of tension in fandom in recent years, since people with this type of equipment and display insist that the BD "looks great" while the rest of the population complain that it's too dark in all the nocturnal scenes.

To quote Hermione Gingold on her infamous LP, "isn't technology ghastly?" A fact of which the Xmas smilies remind me, poignantly, whenever I attempt to post here now...

G.

[Uncle Roger]

  Does dead vampire Roger's reflection show in the mirror?

[Gothick]

Lovely capture today.  And I remember, MB, that you said today's is your favorite line in the film. Because Barnabas was finally about to be united with his Josette after all his horrors.

By some strange coincidence, on Wednesday night I watched episode 281 (script by Joe Caldwell, who I really think was one of the best writers for the show), which starts out with the seance at the costume party, at the point where Vicki has been possessed by Josette. Later in this episode there's a scene where Barnabas goes to Josette's room (where little Sarah has been carefully laying out her own party frock).  Barnabas broods over the past (via voiceover). And in a passage I'd completely forgotten which resumes the theme of Barn's first visit to the ruined Old House at the start of his storyline, Barnabas decides that he needs a woman of this time, not the ghost of Josette. "So never come back... any of you!" he admonishes the silent room with its unseen spirits.

Of course, in the longer scheme of the series arc, Barnabas was far from being done with Josette. But Frid played the scene wonderfully well and it was a strong moment for that particular episode and story sequence.

G.