WELLESNET MESSAGE BOARD

Le Chiffre wrote: Thu Aug 22, 2024 5:12 pm Yes, it is an attractive bootleg, depending of course on whether the picture quality is as good as they claim. The 75-minute version sounds especially interesting, although the original version submitted to RKO was said to be about 90 minutes. There was an 81-minute restoration done in 2015 by the Munich Museum, and that version was shown on July 24th at Munich's centennial Welles fest, as indicated in this Wellesnet writeup at the time:
https://www.wellesnet.com/munich-film-m ... -rarities/

I wonder whatever happened to that?

I believe the Journey Into Fear reconstruction screened in 2015 was the version the Munich Filmmuseum completed in 2005/2006 which combined footage from the two extant edits, re-sequenced the available scenes so they matched the original chronology according to a cutting continuity for the 90 minute preview version, and used existing frame enlargements/production stills in combination with on-screen text to represent deleted footage. I provided assistance on this reconstruction by researching the production history of the film at the Lilly Library and reporting my findings back to producer Stefan Drössler. It's possible the reconstruction was updated for its screening in 2015, but I haven't heard of any further work being done on it. As with nearly all of the Munich Filmmuseum's Welles projects, you have to catch them at festivals or retrospective screenings hosted by the museum, although I would love if these projects could receive home video releases.

Thanks for the info, Roger. They should have given you a copy of the finished product for your assistance.

As with nearly all of the Munich Filmmuseum's Welles projects, you have to catch them at festivals or retrospective screenings hosted by the museum, although I would love if these projects could receive home video releases.

Yes, I remember Stefan Droesler saying in an interview that there's nothing wrong with having to go to a movie theater to see a Welles film. I can sympathize with that sentiment to some degree, but I haven't heard of any theatrical or festival showings by Munich in recent years. Of course, it's questionable whether copyright law would allow them to show the JIF restoration in America anyway.

‘Journey Into Fear’ arrives on Blu-ray in the U.S.:
https://www.wellesnet.com/journey-fear-blu-ray-us/

I hope some company releases both versions. I first saw JOURNEY INTO FEAR on UK TV so this may be the 71 min. version as I've not gone into this film as deeply as I should have.

Just got the Journey into Fear blu ray and was really impressed! The quality of the transfer was excellent. Better than any blu ray of The Stranger, for instance.

Very bare bones disc with the only extras being three Mercury Theater radio broadcasts, but the sound quality of those was excellent as well.

By the way, I noticed a very reasonably priced copy of the Estambul Spanish DVD on Ebay. So far as I know this is the only legit release of the alternate European cut of Journey into Fear. Worth picking up if you can play Region 2 DVDs.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/296825065006