The Power & The Glory

[sethb]

Caught this great movie on TCM a few nights ago. Just shows how important a good story is, and when it's backed up with an imaginative presentation and fine actors like Spencer Tracy, you have a great show. It was quite something to watch the "American Dream" become the "American Nightmare" for Tracy's character.

But it was a shame that the print qualilty didn't match the excellence of the story. Lots of splices, and many that obliterated chucks of important dialogue, too. I'm guessing that this print was probably cobbled together from the best existing secondary sources, and I wonder why. Another tipoff was that the original main and end titles were missing, replaced by generic ugly lettered panels. Anyone have more information on the provenance of this film?

My guess is that many of the Fox features made prior to the studio's changeover to 20th Century Fox (like DANTE'S INFERNO (1934), also starring Tracy) suffered the same fate of poor preservation. I also believe there were a few serious vault fires at Fox which likely destroyed many original elements. SETH

[Jack Theakston]

Most of Fox's pre-1935 negs (and apparently other studios' material) were destroyed in a fire in 1937. In some cases of films from that period, apparently what exists are work prints. I know this is the case with JUST IMAGINE and SOUP TO NUTS.

[LouieD]

The copy of "Sunny Side Up" which has been circulating for years (and is the one shown on TCM) suffers from bad splices, lots of pops on the soundtrack, and a wavering volume from high to low. The MoMA preservation corrects all these problems and looks stunning, so a restoration is possible, but without the $$$$$ to do this properly, this is probably the way The Power & The Glory" will always be seen.

[moviepas]

I thought The Power & the Glory was a preservation project long before I knew of Nitrateville. A workprint of From Soup to Nuts(1930 Three Stooges) is an excellent DVD that nearly slipped thru the cracks for me and discovered it by accident. It looks too good to be a workprint. Those New Jersey fires(1937 & 60s) have been discussed before and the first involved the distributed titles from Son-Art World Wide & Educational Pictures(The Spice of the Program), and possible widescreen versions of some Fox titles. But it also destroyed the master fine grains as well in the same vault. A fool thing to have stored them altogether in the same vault. But they never learn. They were stored there because California had a tax on the vault material values or whatever at the time.

Love them or hate them the Fox Depression musicals are wanting in existing materials. Warner(& First National), for all of that 1930s fire that, quote, 'destroyed ALL their 1927-32?" films, has a better existing rate of their musicals and some other material, including shorts. As for Fox, the late Alex Gordon(twin of Richard) worked at preserving at least 50 titles from this era including Zoo in Budapest, Liliom & Cavalcade. Cavalcade is from the British release print. There was the Century 50 series that came from this and some got an airing in Australia on a network once associated with Rupert M & his associated companies. A Sunday late night treasure these were in my state. Gordon also worked at preserving the Gene Autry output which Autry bought the rights from his Republic & Columbia titles and good preservation copies were achieved. Had the Autrys, made by Columbia, remained at Columbia, I guess their preservation would have been as good going by the great state of the Columbia/Sony MOD releases of other product of the era.

One title from Fox that I want to see and own is their 1933 original State Fair. I have seen great restored footage of scenes in Fox documentaries but no complete film has passed my eyes. I hold my breath that they might release a Blu Ray of the State Fair Trilogy that, of course, would include this title. Fox also had a TV anthology series in the 1950s that was, I think, was 60mins(less time for ads) and wrapped around new footage with then actors with scenes from original films they made. I believe the series was called Century Theater or similar. Don't recall it in Australia but read about it. State Fair with Will Rogers was one of the episodes. I would welcome Fox MODs of the earlier material but, at the present time, I only hear rumors and rumors.

[Brooksie]

Going off topic, an interesting piece of 'State Fair' memorabilia for sale, for those who have the clams: http://www.ebay.com:80/itm/VINTAGE-1933 ... 0727233127

[IA]

Caught this great movie on TCM a few nights ago. Just shows how important a good story is, and when it's backed up with an imaginative presentation

And an extremely innovative presentation too, since Sturges scrambled the chronological sequence of events for corrosively ironic effect. The viewer is able to leap across decades of time in a cut and see how the characters have lived up to--or more often failed to live up to--our (and the characters') expectations. Welles was a drinking buddy of Herman Mankiewicz, and the latter was quite likely influenced by P&W when he scripted Citizen Kane. Sturges himself would later return to his pantomimic "narratage" technique (having a scene narrated by voiceover, with no other dialogue) for his final movie, The French Are a Funny Race, a hardly-seen but underrated comedy about cross-cultural misunderstandings.

[didi-5]

The Power and the Glory, even in the poor print which has been showing on TV for years now, is an excellent film, and one of Tracy's best performances. I'm just glad it has survived in any form - the same can be said of Dante's Inferno, also a very good film.

[IA]

I also forgot to add that anyone interested in the film absolutely should read the script, reprinted in the book Three More Screenplays by Preston Sturges (http://www.amazon.com/Three-More-Screen ... 54&sr=8-13). Why? Because it contains the original ending, which is even nastier and darker than the movie's.

The book also contains the script for Remember the Night--though Mitchell Leisen made a fine film from it, Sturges was upset over Leisen's cuts, though some were quite justified.