I checked Spectrum TV and got a screen stating that my browser is too outdated to run the channel.

I hope you enjoy the series if you do watch.

G.

Also, to note that ornate grandfather clocks show up in all the grand manor houses in all the Gothic films of Hollywood yesteryear... so, it was certainly one of the significant elements that Sy would have sought out when working on the sets. I've wondered just where he bought the furniture and some other props... and what happened to them afterwards.

There's actually a list of a bunch of furniture and props from the Canadian soap Strange Paradise that were sold at an auction sometime around June or July 1970, if I recall aright... I can look for it and post it in this thread, if people are curious. Inventory lists of this kind are often curiously fascinating to peruse.

G.

A friend just wrote to me that every episode of DS is available on Tubi now, for free. They run commercials, which can be a little difficult on streaming because usually the ads are inserted randomly rather than during the actual commercial breaks.

G.

That is very cool. It was great seeing Thayer and Clarice in this, and I think that actress who played Hallie/Carrie Stokes was one of the children in it.

G.

"Sarah" (if it really is Sarah) has dialogue today that makes her sound like a New Age guru.

Again, I'm glad this "book" is coming to an end soon.

G.

This old thread used to involve NoDS. So I'll just write a little note to say that last night, I finally watched the DVD issue of NoDS. It is actually the first time I have sat through the entire film in around three decades, I think. I used to fast forward through a lot of it when I'd get out the videotape (please don't take away my fan card).

I really felt as if I were watching it for the first time because the picture was so crisp and the color, outstandingly, was far superior to my old tape which was derived from a 1990s laserdisc. I thought the DVD aspect ratio was superior as well to the laserdisc version.  The movie was just stunningly beautiful to watch, even though the story about two thirds of the way through dissolved into an incomprehensible mess.

I found myself more baffled than ever by the state in which this was released to the public. The MGM suits bear full responsibility for their ridiculous demand that the Dan and Sam re-edit the movie over a weekend. If they'd been given more time to re-edit, it's possible that the result would have been more coherent. I think the movie starts to fall apart at the point when it gets to the titular "Night of Dark Shadows," when Claire and Alex have come back from NYC with the old portrait of Charles (I'd forgotten that was ever seen in the movie at all). There are some startlingly sloppy edits in the movie from that point on--looks as if the tech was re-cutting it with the end of a very blunt razor blade.

As the movie further unwound and the numerous narrative drop-outs accumulated, I became acutely aware that the average viewer must have had no idea at all what was going on. I don't have the energy to enumerate all the missing material that results in the whole point of the story simply being removed. Darren's done incredible work documenting all of it.

The most puzzling gaffe for me were a couple of really abrupt edits/shot switches in the sequence of the ghost Angelique's attack on Alex. I think those must have been the result of some technical difficulties in filming the sequence that Curtis ran out of time to resolve. But who knows? Maybe they removed something significant that happened in the sequence. And the result was those weirdly off-base edits. Hackwork.

Another odd note--I don't really have time or opportunity to check, but I'm sure a brief music cue was missing from the DVD print. I remember it occurring when Quentin and Tracy have arrived at Collinwood at the beginning, and the p.o.v. switches to somebody (presumably Angelique's ghost) looking down from an upper window. On that shot, there used to be a brief cue that was heard. The shot played in silence on my disc.

Thanks to the fact that I watched it from beginning to end for once, I saw many beautiful shots of Grayson I didn't recall from those long-ago sessions with it. That was maybe the best gift of all. I'm so sorry that the climactic moment of her performance in the movie is gone now.

But there's always the trailers...

cheers, G.

For fans of the 1991 series-- this message was sent to me from a friend who has been digitizing his MPI videotapes (I think he is mainly focusing on the "extended" material, but he may be doing all of it--not sure). He writes:

While I was tinkering with the MPI Home Video extended cut of the DS ’91 pilot, I noticed a small blooper I had never spotted before.  Was particularly amused, because it actually occurs while the opening credits are rolling.  The credits are displayed across several shots, including Juliana McCarthy’s first appearance on the show.  She walks down a hallway in Collinwood, then enters a room and speaks to Elizabeth.  Seconds before Juliana utters her first line in the entire series, a boom mike very clearly passes through the shot at the top of the screen.  Seems almost appropriate that a reboot of DS would include this sort of gaffe within its first 90 seconds!

Out of curiosity, I viewed the same sequence in the DVD release of the episode, and the gaffe is not there.  Even though I have the DVD set which presents the series in the correct aspect ratio, they cropped the image in that shot just slightly to excise the errant microphone.  And, honestly, I don’t blame them.  While I’m a big proponent of presenting programs exactly as they aired, one of the goals in preparing prints for DVD release is to give them the best presentation possible.  When possible, this would include removing any editing errors (provided doing so doesn’t substantially impact the presentation of the episode).  So, the folks behind this DVD release actually did a very good job.  Still, I wish they had left the gaffe in, as it’s almost an homage to the original DS (unintentional as it may have been).

G.