Displaying items by tag: The Alamo

As promised, we’re kicking things off today with Bud Elder’s new View from the Cheap Seats column, in which he details the history of John Wayne’s The Alamo and the sad state of affairs regarding MGM’s apparent lack of interest in preserving the film properly. It’s well worth reading and includes some new technical details on the condition of the film from Robert Harris. Don’t miss it.

Also today, Todd Doogan checks in with this week’s Doogan’s Queue, running down the latest Blu-ray and DVD titles in stores today. [Read on here…]

Anybody know a good screenwriter? Here’s true scenario that would offer a perfect studio pitch.

And it’s a thriller, in a way, with a determined adventurer racing against time to seek justice for a hero from a past generation – one who sacrificed finances, reputation and goodwill to slay a dragon that was, in the long run, perhaps beyond even his reach.

This story is about John Wayne. This story is about Robert Harris. This story is about America and the importance of its cultural maintenance. And, ok, it’s also about personal obsession. Duke Wayne did what he said. No backing out. No cutting corners. No half assed. [Read on here...]

We’ve got some interesting odds and ends to talk about today… nothing major, but a few things worth touching out.

First, remember that story we posted last week about the contract kerfuffle between Amazon and Warner Home Video? Turns out it got picked up by The New York Times yesterday and both the Wall Street Journal and CNN Money today (among others – the story has basically gone everywhere today, but our thanks to NYT, WSJ and CNN Money for mentioning our involvement in breaking it). I should tip the hat to our very own Jeff Kleist who first sniffed out that something might be going on there a couple of weeks ago, thus setting me on the case with our industry sources. It’s funny how these things go viral. I didn’t think it was that big a story, but it turns out that Amazon is also in similar disputes with various book publishing companies too, including Hachette, so the sum of this story became bigger than its parts. [Read on here…]

[Editor’s Note: The section of text below regarding The Alamo has been updated on 5/31 to reflect important corrected information. Please give it another read to ensure that you have the most accurate/updated info.]

We’re closing out the week here at The Bits today with some big announcement news for you Marvel Universe fans, as well as an update on the situation with The Alamo.

But first, our own Bud Elder has turned in a new View from the Cheap Seats column in which he talks about location scouting in his native Oklahoma and takes a look at a great new book on John Wayne. He also spotlights some of the better recent classic film releases on disc from Olive, Twilight and more. By the way, you can listen to quick movie reviews from Bud on 104.5 KRXO radio in Oklahoma City. So don’t miss the column and be sure to give Bud’s Movie Minute a listen on the radio and online. [Read on here…]

So... you might recall that last week I had dinner with film restoration expert (and former Bits contributor) Robert A. Harris and some other friends. (You can find a complete archive of his work on the original Digital Bits website here.) Robert, as it happens, is in town working on another fine classic film restoration project which will be announced in due course. But during our conversation last week, Robert alerted us to the fact that another beloved classic film is not faring nearly so well. That film, as you might already suspect, is The Alamo (1960), directed by and starring the legendary John Wayne. [Read on here…]