Stranger in Buckskin

Wells to Paramount Home Video: 14 months ago (i.e., January 11th, 2012) a highly knowledgable source told me off-the-record that George Stevens Shane (’53) had undergone a high-def restoration and will probably be released sometime this year to meet this classic film’s 60th anniversary. The source was very specific and told me exactly what needed to be done, and said the work would almost certainly be completed by the end of 2012 or at the very latest early 2013 in order to make the anniversary.

Since then I haven’t heard a peep out of Paramount Home Video about this. Not a word, not a hiccup. Nothing.

The 60th anniversary of Shane‘s New York theatrical opening will happen on April 13th. Obviously that’s going to come and go without notice but will a Shane Bluray come out anytime in 2013? Why do all the three-strip restoration and the high-def tweaking and then just let it sit there, right?

I hope Paramount isn’t going to follow the path of Sony Home Video’s experience with From Here to Eternity, which opened four months after Shane. Sony’s Grover Crisp restored it beautifully and made it look better than ever before (I just saw it on high-def on TCM a few weeks ago), and yet FHTE never came out on Bluray and isn’t to my knowledge even available as a high-def download via Netflix or Amazon.

I wrote George Stevens, Jr. and asked what he knows, but he’ll probably blow me off. The levels of secrecy and deathray vibes and bureaucratic chess-playing in the home video realm are not to be believed. You have to go back to the Leonid Brezhnev era in Soviet Russia to find a similar mindset.

Update: It was announced on 2.13 by Turner Classic Movies’ Heather Sauter that Shane will play at the 2013 TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood (4.25 through 4.28). Films that are shown at that festival are almost exclusively ones that have been digitally remastered and upgraded for Bluray release.

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  • http://nevermindpopfilm.blogspot.com/ Colin “Fitz” Biggs

    This is one of the few Westerns that left me with the feeling that I should have left it at the book.

  • http://www.hollywood-elsewhere.com/ Jeffrey Wells

    What kind of stupid crack is that?

    • http://nevermindpopfilm.blogspot.com/ Colin “Fitz” Biggs

      The book is better. Don’t know what else to say.

  • http://robertcashill.blogspot.com BobCashill

    Paramount is largely indifferent to its catalog on home video, though this week it did release SAMSON AND DELILAH (49) on DVD only. Unless it’s farmed out to Criterion or Olive, which has been putting a lot of Paramount titles out, SHANE’s not going anywhere.

  • Guest

    I personally love Shane, but even those who don’t have to admire the awesome, Oscar winning cinematography of Loyal Griggs and mis-en-scene of director Stevens. Shane is an all-time giant that deserves a proper blu-ray release. Here’s hoping it happens in 2013.

  • Mr Sheldrake

    Shane is an all-time giant and deserves a proper blu-ray release if only for Loyal Griggs awesome Oscar winning cinematography and director Stevens mis-en-scene. And Palance is THE bad ass, bar none. A classic that deserves some love. Here’s hoping it happens in 2013.

    • Stewart Klein

      I Knew Jack Palance (nee Walter Palanski) all my life. would see him often around town or at his sister’s bar. Nice guy, always friendly even though he came off rather odd in interviews.One particular time I remember in the late 70′s, I was tending bar at a local Holiday Inn when Jack came in and said he was coming back in an hour with two other guys and wanted a quiet place to talk. An hour later he came back in with Charles Bronson and Mohammad Ali After he died his family auctioned off a lot of movie memorabilia.

      • Mr Sheldrake

        Awesome story Stewart. Must have been a memorable night.

  • http://twitter.com/sdcinerama San Diego Cinerama

    I’m thinking that your questions should be directed towards Olive or Warner Home Video. Olive is distributing the lesser know Paramounts (and doing a pretty good job of it) and WHV has the rights for more popular hits.
    I’m not sure what Paramount even controls anymore. Be an absolute coupe if Criterion had a disc in the offing…

  • http://www.filmjerk.com/ Edward Havens

    Don’t know if I would equate the release of a movie on home video to Stalinism, but I will throw my support towards a proper release of Shane on Blu-Ray.

  • bill weber

    Shane is not one of the 100 best westerns.

  • http://www.hollywood-elsewhere.com/ Jeffrey Wells

    I just posted the following: “Update: It was announced on 2.13 by Turner Classic Movies’ Heather Sauter that Shane
    will play at the 2013 TCM Classic Film Festival in Hollywood (4.25
    through 4.28). Films that are shown at that festival are almost
    exclusively ones that have been digitally remastered and upgraded for
    Bluray release.

  • Bob Hightower

    SHANE is the best Western ever made.