Universal's PreCode collection

srowley75 · Post by **srowley75** » January 21st, 2009, 10:05 am

http://www.classicflix.com/universal-pr ... ff8e2e6f86

Someone pass me the smelling salts.

TCM Movie Morlocks · Post by **moira finnie** » January 21st, 2009, 10:37 am

Oh Boy, Stephen!

The Cheat (1931)
Merrily We Go to Hell (1932)
Hot Saturday (1932)
Torch Singer (1933)
Murder at the Vanities (1934)
Search for Beauty (1934)

These are some of the pre-codes I've always wanted to see. And all for under $35. This is great!! Perhaps April will not be the cruelest month this year.

Dewey1960 · Post by **Dewey1960** » January 21st, 2009, 11:58 am

I can only speak for those I have seen:
TORCH SINGER (one of my favorites!!)
SEARCH FOR BEAUTY (one of the raciest ever!)
MURDER AT THE VANITIES (a total hoot!!!)
Great news, indeed!

srowley75 · Post by **srowley75** » January 21st, 2009, 12:13 pm

I still feel lightheaded. I never thought these films would ever be released to DVD. I'm especially surprised that a Tallulah Bankhead film was one of the six.

I already have four of the films, but I'd still buy the set just to encourage more releases of this type from Universal. Or better still, buy several and give them away as Christmas gifts. Maybe we'll get a volume two complete with Night World and The Story of Temple Drake.

(By the way, I can also vouch for Torch Singer and the Riefenstahl-esque Search for Beauty. Any movie fan should definitely see both.)

MissGoddess · Post by **MissGoddess** » January 21st, 2009, 1:00 pm

Excellent news! I've seen both The Cheat and Torch Singer and really enjoyed both.

Finally.

charliechaplinfan · January 21st, 2009, 2:18 pm

It's great news, just in time for my birthday.

knitwit45 · Post by **knitwit45** » January 21st, 2009, 2:29 pm

Alison said:

It's great news, just in time for my birthday.

And that would be???

myrnaloyisdope · Post by **myrnaloyisdope** » January 21st, 2009, 2:58 pm

Great news, though the absence of Island of Lost Souls and City Streets is an oversight.

coopsgirl · Post by **coopsgirl** » January 21st, 2009, 3:39 pm

I don’t anything about any of the films listed but I’m buying it just the same in the hopes that Universal will keep ‘em coming!! This definitely gives us a little hope that maybe they are finally beginning to realize what gems they have locked away in that vault.

srowley75 · Post by **srowley75** » January 21st, 2009, 3:49 pm

myrnaloyisdope wrote:Great news, though the absence of Island of Lost Souls and City Streets is an oversight.

I visit several message boards and can vouch that many have cried out for a DVD release of Island of Lost Souls for some time. I'd love to know why there's been such a holdup on that particular title when the same film was easily available for a long time on VHS. For a while I thought that perhaps it was simply an oversight by Universal, since the film didn't have a place on any of their earlier Universal Monsters collections, yet enough has been made of the omission that the studio is surely aware of it by now.

I'm hoping and praying that this enterprise is successful for Universal, and I'm sure many other precoder fans are as well. If it's a hit, the studio could easily compile 2 or 3 more gem-packed volumes of precoders alone, most of which unavailable even during the VHS era (I believe at least half of these now-scheduled films weren't).

UPDATE: It looks like they've already got the artwork online as well:
http://www.classicflix.com/artwork-adde ... ff8e2e6f86

-Stephen

feaito · Post by **feaito** » January 21st, 2009, 8:12 pm

Awesome News!!! Hot Saturday!!

Ann Harding · Post by **Ann Harding** » January 22nd, 2009, 7:58 am

OMG! That's super! But you're right City Streets is really missing. But, I am lucky, that film has just been broadcast on TCM France and I have now a gorgeous print of it.

coopsgirl · Post by **coopsgirl** » January 22nd, 2009, 8:38 am

Oh Ann, you're so lucky to have a good copy of City Streets. I hope Universal will indeed keep more of their Paramount precodes coming b/c there are so few of Gary's early films out on dvd and the bootleg copies often leave a lot to be desired.

srowley75 · Post by **srowley75** » January 22nd, 2009, 2:53 pm

coopsgirl wrote: I hope Universal will indeed keep more of their Paramount precodes coming b/c there are so few of Gary's early films out on dvd and the bootleg copies often leave a lot to be desired.

Somewhat OT:

I also hope to see Universal release a Claudette Colbert collection. They've already scheduled a 75th anniversary edition of Cleopatra, and I wish they'd have just gone ahead and compiled a tribute to Colbert and included Manslaughter, Maid of Salem, Private Worlds, The Big Pond, Arise My Love, No Time for Love, Honor Among Lovers, Secrets of a Secretary, The Wiser Sex, Tonight is Ours, The Gilded Lily, and/or several others.

myrnaloyisdope · Post by **myrnaloyisdope** » January 22nd, 2009, 3:11 pm

I'm not sure why City Streets has been neglected for so long, I mean it has a big star in Gary Cooper, it's a gangster film, and it's directed by Rouben Mamoulian, throw in Sylvia Sidney, and the pre-code element and the DVD would surely have an audience.

But then Island of Lost Souls is even better known and has been ignored.

It's a shame that Paramount/Universal has this great backlog of films, but seems at a loss to how to release them.

Don't get me started on there silents (or lack thereof).

The Silver Screen Oasis

The Silver Screen Oasis

Universal's PreCode collection

Universal's PreCode collection