Alpha

Message

unclehulot · #26 Post by **unclehulot** » Thu Feb 22, 2007 10:44 am

Gordon wrote:This thread at DVD Maniacs covers the best releases by Alpha, Brentwood, etc as well as their new and future releases.

Alpha's disc of The Big Combo is pretty good for the price and presents Alton's awesome lighting better than any other tape or disc.

I compared the Alpha to the Image disc (which seems to be OOP, unfortunately), and I must say I don't think the Alpha is worth even the modest price! The image is comparitively washed out, has no real detail to speak of, and the sound is both distorted and muddy compared to the Image disc. It rather looks like Alpha took the Image release and noise-reduced the hell out of it....removing any high frequency video AND audio information. Thankfully Half Price Books took a return on this......personally I'm STILL waiting for a single Alpha release I can stomach that is NOT a rip-off.

HerrSchreck · #27 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 7:34 am

There's plenty of them, and theyve been gone over already: THE BRAIN THAT WOULDNT DIE, PHANTOM PLANET, DETOUR, CHILD BRIDE, MARIHUANA, HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME, CARNIVAL OF SOULS, are mostly digital transfers (as opposed to the analog tv transfers we're used to seeing from them) bought from co's that oop'd their discs. BRIDE & MARIH are very clear analog dvd=r like the kind you'd make at home off cable via vhs. For 2 1/2 bucks a shot the idea of being ripped off runs pretty thin wouldntcha say?

I just gladly snapped up Roland West's CORSAIR based on Kehr's enthusiastic review and the fucking thing, despite the muddy analog transfer (it's bad, lets face it) gives one a chance to peek at a very early sound killer of a flick from an obscure old master. This was one wierd, sinister filmmaker. West's neglected canon, and the state of the elements on some of his films, considering their contemporary popularity, is a shame. THE BAT & CORSAIR deserve far better than the alpha discs they currently represented by, and ALIBI is a bizarro experimental earliest sound masterpiece that should be prompting a global vault-scouring for better elements than the 16 used in Kino's heroic attempt to make the film watchable and audible on their old vhs.

I also grabbed MURDER IN THE DARK HOUSE from alpha, another super rare film from the UK in 1939... part of the series of horror films directed by George King and starring the legendary (but now forgotten mostly, outside of his homeland) Tod Slaughter... and it doesn't disappoint. Not the total gem of THE FACE AT THE WINDOW from the same pair, but freaky, ghoulish and finely directed nonetheless. I wish more of these old UK horror films and especially the ones with SLaughter were available. I can't vouch for the Alpha FACE AT THE WINDOW as I have the ten year old Kino vhs of it (damn good at that, with a great Ub Iwerks Flip toon).

But this is what makes alpha worth paying attention to. You get some very VERY rare film viewing under your belt. You get to see stuff nobody has ever, or probably WILL ever put out on any home vid medium. You expand the library of your brain and you deepen your understanding of what this or that director or actor etc were doing over a grey or lost period of time. That gets my 2.50 or four bucks (depending on the outlet) any time. Ive never felt ripped off. Think of it as polite covering the expenses of a total non-friend who you heard had a film you thought youd never ever get to see in your life. You found out this stoical stranger has it in his old-days taped-off-tv collection going way way back, and so you offer him three or four bucks to make you a dupe.

That is literally what alpha is-- and I'm very glad they're there. My collection has many of them. For god sakes they have TERROR OF TINYTOWN! And the transfer is actually pretty good!

unclehulot · #28 Post by **unclehulot** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 10:40 am

Thanks for the further recommendations.

All I was saying is that The Big Combo was NOT the best digital representation of the film, as previously opined here, and that it was a wasted (near) purchase for ME, and that if any one else had the OOP Image disc already, you might as well save your pennies. I agree a certain sense of adventure is necessary to find the gems in this (often) pigsty of a label. I'll try some of the other suggestions when I get the urge. Meanwhile, I have Alpha discs of both versions of The Student of Prague, which are $6 doorstops......they're not watchable, and this is why I have been wary.

To each his own attitude.

devlinnn · #29 Post by **devlinnn** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 7:13 pm

HerrSchreck wrote:I also grabbed MURDER IN THE DARK HOUSE from alpha, another super rare film from the UK in 1939... part of the series of horror films directed by George King and starring the legendary (but now forgotten mostly, outside of his homeland) Tod Slaughter... and it doesn't disappoint. Not the total gem of THE FACE AT THE WINDOW from the same pair, but freaky, ghoulish and finely directed nonetheless. I wish more of these old UK horror films and especially the ones with SLaughter were available.

Schreck, over here. It's been on my 'to buy' list, but have been trying to catch up with too much other stuff.

Gregory · #30 Post by **Gregory** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 8:51 pm

Scheck wrote:That gets my 2.50 or four bucks (depending on the outlet) any time.

Is that at brick-and-mortar places in New York? I never find Alpha titles for less than $5 shipped. Not quibbling with you, just trying to find out if there are better places I can buy these than Amazon.com or DVD Pacific.

Scharphedin2 · #31 Post by **Scharphedin2** » Sat Feb 24, 2007 4:33 am

I have been looking for a web site for Alpha's releases, and came up with this. As it says: "Oldies.com is the direct source of Alpha DVD releases," and has the entire catalogue (1500+ titles) on display.

HerrSchreck · #32 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Sun Feb 25, 2007 2:08 am

Thanks for the tip devlinn, that's excellent.. surprised THE FACE IN THE WINDOW isn't in there.. but since I already have it in a decent vhs, I'm not gonna cry. I'll be grabbiing that w my next UK order.

Greg, yes, you can get alpha's 2 x $5 on sale from their site sometimes. I grabbed a load of exploitation films from them the one time I ordered from them. Most times I grab em for 4 or 5 bucks a piece in stores.

waxy · #33 Post by **waxy** » Fri Mar 02, 2007 4:12 am

Silentera.com has reviews/comparisons of some of the Alpha silents. Rather than digging thru the site itself too much, I did a google search. They seem to do a good job of pointing out VHS vs film transfers

Ashirg · #34 Post by **Ashirg** » Fri Sep 19, 2008 10:44 am

Don't expect remastered transfers, but Alpha is releasing a number of silents not available on DVD.
F.W. Murnau's The Haunted Castle
Robert Wiene's Crime and Punishment
Bela Lugosi in Daughter of the Night

HerrSchreck · #35 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Fri Sep 19, 2008 10:49 am

HAH! That's Raskolnikow by Weine, one of the most important Expressionist titles never available on home video. If it's anywhere near an improvement on the green blob floating around back channels for 15 years now, (there's a beautiful green tined print I saw in some documentary somewhere-- this is actually a very good film and a good version fo the Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Great Novel) then I whoop for joy.

I know it sounds crazy since it's Alpha, but it doesn't take much to improve on The Green Blob.

Jonathan S · #36 Post by **Jonathan S** » Fri Sep 19, 2008 11:25 am

I have two copies of Wiene's RASKOLNIKOW on VHS (both poor as they are two or three generations from the original tapes). One is from an 8mm print of the US release version, the other from a Russian print with Italian subtitles. They are completely different cuts, among other differences the Russian one having the axe murders in more detail than the US (which was presumably censored) and the addition of two dream sequences. It will be interesting to see which cut Alpha use - probably the shorter US one.

The high quality documentary clip you mention was probably the one in Cinema Europe.

Tommaso · #37 Post by **Tommaso** » Fri Sep 19, 2008 2:09 pm

Oh my, I never thought I'd buy anything out of my free will from Alpha again, but I just ordered the Murnau. VOGELÖD!! Man.... I only hope it's at least watchable, well, somehow...

HerrSchreck · #38 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Mon Sep 22, 2008 9:03 am

Probably will look something like the NY Film Annex VHS (my source for years) if the film with the english/german title cards transferred to dvd-r.

Tommaso · #39 Post by **Tommaso** » Mon Sep 22, 2008 9:42 am

That's what I fear, too. Anyway, I haven't ever seen the film, and it's so cheap that it's worth a try (German/English cards would be at least SOMETHING). I'll report back once it's here.

Re: dvd-r. Have Alpha generally switched to this format? The only Alpha I have ("The Mechanical Man", dead funny, btw, though the image is a disaster) was factory pressed, but that's an older disc from them.

denti alligator · #40 Post by **denti alligator** » Mon Sep 22, 2008 9:58 am

Please post screen caps of these if/when you get them. Curious to see if they're better than my boot copies (somehow I doubt it).

HerrSchreck · #41 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Mon Sep 22, 2008 10:02 am

Tommaso wrote:Re: dvd-r. Have Alpha generally switched to this format? The only Alpha I have ("The Mechanical Man", dead funny, btw, though the image is a disaster) was factory pressed, but that's an older disc from them.

Every one of their discs I have (and I do have a few) have been geenrally genuine dvd5's.

As for the dvdr comment, I just meant in terms of image quality.

They do have some genuine digital transfers here & there.

Tommaso · #42 Post by **Tommaso** » Tue Sep 30, 2008 7:57 am

I guess we can forget about the Alpha Murnau, because of THIS!

And they also released "Großherzog" at the same time!! (Note: couldn't help posting this in the Silent Film on DVD thread as well...)

Well, another five Euros wasted on Alpha, but who cares....

HerrSchreck · #43 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Tue Sep 30, 2008 9:41 am

Important films to make connections in his ouevre-- especially for completists-- but despite some interesting moments (and some nice camerawork in Finanzen by Freund and in Vogelod by Wagner) you'll probably find the two films minor works. Nice that the restorations are finally seeing light of day. I wonder who'll bring them out in the english speaking world first.

My guess is Kino.

Tommaso · #44 Post by **Tommaso** » Tue Sep 30, 2008 11:35 am

HerrSchreck wrote:I wonder who'll bring them out in the english speaking world first.

My guess is Kino.

Most definitely, yes. Though after "Phantom" is no longer MoC#65 and they announced 'More Murnau' for 2009, I could well imagine a sort of "Unknown Murnau"-set from MoC, too. Which would render these Spanish discs futile, of course. But I'm surely not in the mood to wait

I have in fact already ordered the discs from dvdgo, and even received a despatch confirmation right now. I suppose they will be here even before the Alpha is.

I assume I will share your views on these films, but when it comes to Murnau, I'm surely a completist...

Tommaso · #45 Post by **Tommaso** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 8:27 am

Okay, simply because someone was asking in the Silent Film thread whether the Alpha "Vogelöd" might at least be an alternative for those who need English titles and thus have no use for the divisa disc. I'd say: WAIT FOR KINO! DEFINITELY!

Honestly, I didn't expect much from the Alpha in the first place, but even for this company, "Vogelöd" looks truly awful. It is indeed the VHS version with English/ German titles that Schreck has mentioned, but I'd say this must be from a sixth-generation copy of that VHS. The image is almost constantly blurred with VHS artefacts in abundance, and the screencap below doesn't even tell the whole story; it looks even worse on the big tube and in motion.
The other film on the disc, "Wolf Hound" doesn't seem to be any better. It looks like a very bad divX file taken from somewhere on the net. Even at the cheap price: avoid this disc! It's basically unwatchable.

HerrSchreck · #46 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 8:41 am

Wow, that is bad, even for Alpha.

Did you get the Wiene of Raskolnikow?

Tommaso · #47 Post by **Tommaso** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 8:46 am

No, I didn't. And unless someone convinces me that it is substantially better than the Murnau, I surely will avoid it.
Did your VHS of "Vogelöd" look much better, then? I had the impression that you were not totally unhappy with it.

HerrSchreck · #48 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 10:20 am

Muuuuuuuuch better! Definitely watchable.. kind of along the lines of, say, the Kino Ballad of Gosta Berling as far as quality goes... definitely better than the Sjostrom Outlaw disc.

It's an analog vhs of a decent 16mm. Kind of what used to be par for the course for a silent film devotee back in the day before dvd & all these restorations started happening.

Dang! I thought you'd preorder the Wiene and smoke out it's quality.

My guess it'll be no improvement on whats been floating around back channels for ages-- probelm is whats been floating around is a turd in the toilet water.

But it is borderline watchable-- agonizing though to see the state of the element that exists somewhere, on one of these Kino docs featuring expressionism, you see what this film could look like on dvd.. it's torture.

One of my favorite novels of all time too.

Tommaso · #49 Post by **Tommaso** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 12:00 pm

HerrSchreck wrote:Muuuuuuuuch better! Definitely watchable.. kind of along the lines of, say, the Kino Ballad of Gosta Berling as far as quality goes... definitely better than the Sjostrom Outlaw disc.

Oh dear, than it is indeed Alpha who are to blame for the mess (at least inasmuch that they obviously didn't care to unearth a copy of the original VHS but went for a copy of a copy of a...).

HerrSchreck wrote: agonizing though to see the state of the element that exists somewhere, on one of these Kino docs featuring expressionism, you see what this film could look like on dvd.. it's torture.

Yes, I never understood why Kino did not opt to put "Raskolnikow" out alongside "Orlac", which would have been an ideal chance for a dedicated Wiene box set, together with "Rosenkavalier" perhaps and the unavoidable "Caligari". And I don't believe anyone else will do it, apart from Filmmuseum, in about the year 2016...

tojoed · #50 Post by **tojoed** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 1:36 pm

Thanks for the caps, Tommaso. They look terrible, there are boots around that must be better. I'll wait for Kino for now.