ford/earp/doc/tombstone - the other version?

[jaime marzol]

for ford fans:
for ages i've been looking for the other version of clementine. ford had to reshoot a shorter ending. now it seems a longer version will be showing. below is the schedule from www.tv-now.com it says, 'premiere,' and lists it at 130 minutes. has any one seen the longer version? many years ago i remember seeing a version that showed the clantons before the gunfight, before dawn, drinking and acting like mongoloids at the coral. the version i now have just shows walter breanan looking up as the sun rises. can any one shed some light on this?

also, it has been written that ford and earp in the silent days drank, and hung out together, were party monsters. not true. by ford's account, he was just a kid. earp was on the set. ford would pull up a crate for earp to put his feet on, and earp would spin tales.

My Darling Clementine
130 minutes- USA, 1946, Premiere, BW, Video

Directed by John Ford and starring
Henry Fonda, Victor Mature, Walter Brennan
Linda Darnell, Ward Bond, Cathy Downs
Tim Holt, Alan Mowbray, John Ireland, Jane Darwell

John Ford's account of the infamous gunfight at the O.K. Corral between the Earps, Doc Holliday and the Clantons.

Tue Nov 26 10:00P TCM- Turner Classic Movies

[Jeff Wilson]

TCM's web site lists it at 97 minutes. They say "premiere" when the movie is debuting on TCM, so it probably is just the film as released. It is supposedly coming out on DVD next year, so maybe they're going to do something special for it at WB then.

[jaime marzol]

................

yeap, i looked at tcm's website also, 97 minutes. the tv-now listing was for tcm, and amc. the 130 minutes must be the amc running time with commercials. so it's the same old copy i have now.

hopefully they'll do what they did with Hawk's The Big Sleep, they included the release version, and the pre release version. though the release version is the one to have, the pre release version is a great treat for a fan of the film. all that extra footage is great.

[Welles Fan]

I never knew a longer version of Clementine was made. As this is one of my favoerite films, I'd dearly love to see a longer version. However, I wouldn't be surprised if the missing footage is in the same packing case as the footage of Ambersons.

[jaime marzol]

..............

if clementine is one of your favorite films, i have good news for you: the missing footage is not with ambersons, it's alive and well. i had it. taped it off cable. when i got the digital dish i rerecorded most of my tapes because cable looked so bad and the dish copies looked great. in the case of clementine, i taped the shorter version over the longer version. a terrible tragedy. not long ago tcm showed them back to back and i didn't find out about it till after the fact.

i didn't realize there were 2 versions, and that i now had the shorter version. i just kept thinking, "man, i remember there used to be more to this ending." i attributed it to me getting clementine mixed up with another film. then my friend, ric, the walking film encyclopedia, told me i remembered right. the studio made ford shoot a different ending.

there was drunken mongoloid action at ok coral filmed at dusk, a less conventional shoot out, and ric mentioned some differences in the chase towards the end. he also said that the differences between the 2 versions were not vast. i agree the differences were not vast time wise, but to me the longer version was vastly better.

you see the difference between ford, and welles. ford was told to reshoot the ending, and he did it. today not many know about it, and we don't have 5 books written about the great controversy. same with huston. when dory shary (spelling?) destroyed RED BADGE OF COURAGE, huston just smilled, said it looked great, took his money and went on his way.

welles' tried to be truer to his films, but we only have 13 to look at. ford was at the director's plate at least 125 times by andrew sarris' account, 150 times by tcm's account.

wouldn't it be something if we had 100 welles films to look at today?

if ford bent over so easy, imagine the revolving doors guys like curtiz, and walsh must have been.