Blog – Page 9 – By The Gods!

Artus Films to release two titles…in DVD format…

Artus Films is churning some interesting titles, including THE MIGHTY CRUSADERS (1958) starring Sylva Koscina and Gianna Maria Canale, REVENGE OF THE CRUSADER (1964) starring Alberto Lupo and Stephen Forsyth. Those were announced months ago but now they added two new titles to their roster: TIGER OF THE SEVEN SEAS (1962) starring Gianna Maria Canale, and THE LION OF ST MARK (1962) starring Gordon Scott and Gianna. Both movies directed by Luigi Capuano. No information yet on the audio options (if English will be included).

Update: Amazon.fr has both movies listed and audio options are limited to Italian and French only, no English.

I wonder why so many European distributors are suddenly releasing titles on DVD and not on BD. I’m happy for these releases but HD is the way of the future.

As I already noted here at BTG, Artus Films is also scheduled to release both Steve Reeves’ HERCULES movies on Blu-ray.

Not many titles in the foreseeable future…

If you check Blu-ray.com, there are *no* upcoming PEPLUM titles listed. Not one. SAMSON VS THE VAMPIRES is still missing in action but that’s been on-going for nearly a year and a half. The only new titles are from Germany in a two pack DVD set with REVENGE OF THE GLADIATORS (1964) starring Mickey Hargitay, and SEVEN REBEL GLADIATORS (1965) starring Roger Browne. Both films will only have German audio option.

THE SIGN OF THE CROSS 1944 re-release

Cecil B. DeMille’s THE SIGN OF THE CROSS (1932) was a rare PEPLUM movie of the 1930s. It was a success and 11 years later, the movie was re-released for the second time (it was also re-issued in 1938). New footage was added to the 1944, which can be seen in the trailer posted below. For decades, this version was the only version available. The original pre-code 1932 cut, with all the naughty stuff, was too racy once the Hayes code was set in place. All the cuts scenes were eventually restored in the 1990s and the 1944 version disappeared even if for many people it was, with the WW 2 angle, the one they saw on television.

The question is: will this 1944 version ever be available again?

Comparison between the new HERCULES AND THE CAPTIVE WOMEN Blu-ray…

I’ve made an extensive comparison of the new HERCULES AND THE CAPTIVE WOMEN (1961) Blu-ray with two other versions. It’s at the main PEPLUM TV blog.

Read the review here:

Article of the week: HERCULES AND THE CAPTIVE WOMEN (1961) Blu-ray review

Weird image in French DVD of SAMSON & THE MIGHTY CHALLENGE…

As a collector of all things PEPLUM, I often acquire DVDs or Blu-rays faster than I can view them. I often set them aside, after making MKV or MP4 copies of them, scan them quickly and add them to the hundreds of other titles of my collection, to be viewed at a later time. I also watch them entirely, certainly with Blu-ray releases, but for the most part I reserve them for a future movie night. Well…I bought the French DVD of SAMSON AND THE MIGHTY CHALLENGE (1964) weeks ago and only now noticed some terrible image quality. For a brief moment the image becomes totally washed out, almost ghost-like. It’s an odd issue I’ve rarely seen before. Here are some screengrabs.

Nadir Moretti and Conrando San Martin look odd…

Carlo Tamberlani looks like a ghost…

Moira Orfei looks odd…

The movie eventually becomes normal again. For the most part the image is pretty clear and sharp.

Something odd happened during the transfer.

That DUEL OF THE TITANS German Blu-ray…

I’ve purchased the German Blu-ray of ROMULUS & REMUS (1961). It’s traveling halfway across the world right now. In the meantime, a great friend of mine sent me a digital copy of it while I wait impatiently for it to arrive.

The German BR has audio in Italian, German and *English*. Since I just received this HD print, I haven’t watched it from beginning to end but needless today it’s a thing of beauty. Here are some screengrabs.

Gordon Scott and Steve Reeves with cast. Very sharp image.

Crowd scene. Everything is so clear. It’s beautiful.

Another crowd scene, with Jose Greci, Virna Lisi and Jacques Sernas, and Franco Volpi (seated)

Virna Lisi

I’ll have a review of it in the near future.

HERCULES AND THE CAPTIVE WOMEN Blu-ray pre-order…

HERCULES AND THE CAPTIVE WOMEN (1961) Blu-ray is now available for pre-order.

AMAZON.COM

AMAZON.CA

The official page includes beautiful screenshots of this upgrade. As stated at the website, the new 4K transfer is from a 35 mm print, not a Technirama print.

They even restored the original US trailer.

This looks like a great release!

The Film Detective

Transferring movies to digital…

Here’s a comparison of two good prints of COLOSSUS OF THE STONE AGE (1962), aka Fire Monsters against the Son of Hercules.

In this comparison, we see Reg Lewis and Luciano Marin. The screen grab at the top is from a German TV broadcast. The bottom screen grab is from a recent HD Italian Broadcast. Now the HD one is beautiful. It makes all the difference in the world to see such a crisp image at such a high resolution. But in transferring the movie, the end product is often too smooth or non-film looking. In comparison, the German TV broadcast looks like a movie. Personally, I like both. I love seeing old movies in a crystal clear state but sometimes the transfer is so good it doesn’t look like film anymore.

A good example would be the MESSALINA Blu-ray I posted about in the previous post. It looks clear and beautiful but it still looks like film.

MESSALINA French Blu-ray…

This is not a review of the Blu-ray or of the movie. I just wanted to share some screngrabs of the French Blu-ray release of MESSALINA (1960). The BR was available from back in 2018 and had I known this I would have bought because it’s really beautiful. If you’re capable of playing region B Blu-rays, from a stand alone player or from your computer, this edition is really worth it, certainly since it includes the English track. Here are some scenes from the movie.

Belinda Lee as Messalina

Spiros Focas and Belinda

Gorgeous production!

Belinda looks amazing!

Is the movie historically accurate? Does it matter? Enjoy it for what it is, one heck of a PEPLUM directed by Vittorio Cottafavi.