Reviews of silent film releases on home video.
Copyright © 1999-2024 by Carl Bennett
and the Silent Era Company.
All Rights Reserved. |
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Wine of
Youth
(1924)
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This Metro-Goldwyn comedy-drama, directed by King Vidor, stars Eleanor Boardman, William Haines and Ben Lyon, with William Collier Jr., Pauline Garon, Eulalie Jensen, E.J. Ratcliffe, Gertrude Claire and Robert Agnew.
When Mary Hollister (Boardman) can’t decide if she is ready to marry either of the two young gentlemen she recently met (Haines and Lyon), a scheme is hatched to try a trial honeymoon to discover which would make a better, more dependable husband. Will the social experiment work out?
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 Alpha Video
2020 DVD edition
Wine of Youth (1924), black & white, 73 minutes, not rated.
Alpha Home Entertainment, distributed by Oldies.com,
ALP8349D, UPC 0-89218-83499-7.
One single-sided, single-layered, Region 0 NTSC DVD-R disc; 1.33:1 aspect ratio picture in full-frame 4:3 (720 x 480 pixels) interlaced scan image encoded in SDR MPEG-2 format at 6.6 Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to 30 fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 mono sound encoded at 384 Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; 8 chapter stops; standard DVD keepcase; $7.98 (raised to $8.98).
Release date: 25 August 2020.
Country of origin: USA
Ratings (1-10): video: 3 / audio: 3 / additional content: 0 / overall: 3.
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This DVD-R edition has been mastered from an analog videotape transfer of a very-good 16mm reduction print, which is responsible for the occasional videotape glitches and the soft image details throughout the film. The print itself has a common amount of dust, speckling, schmutz, emulsion scrapes, and other minor print flaws. Some of the intertitles can be tough to read due to the sometimes dark print and the video transfer runs at a slightly faster-than-natural pace.
The film is accompanied by a soundtrack roughly compiled from preexisting low-fi orchestral music recordings.
Not a great presentation, and the film certainly deserves better than this, but at least the disc looks slightly better than the SHOFE edition noted below (and doesn’t cost anywhere near as much).
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USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
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Canada: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition from Amazon.ca. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
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This
Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available directly from . . .
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 Silent Hall of Fame Enterprises
2019 DVD edition
Wine of Youth (1924), black & white, ? minutes, not rated.
Silent Hall of Fame Enterprises, 202, unknown UPC number.
One single-sided, single-layered, Region 0 NTSC DVD+R disc; 1.33:1 aspect ratio picture in full-frame 4:3 (720 x 480 pixels) interlaced scan image encoded in SDR MPEG-2 format at ? Mbps average video bit rate (capable of progressive scan upscaling to ? fps); Dolby Digital (AC3) 2.0 mono sound encoded at ? Kbps audio bit rate; English language intertitles, no subtitles; chapter stops; slimline CD jewelcase; $32.99 (raised again to $44.99).
Release date: 2019.
Country of origin: USA
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This DVD+R edition appears to have been mastered from a VHS videotape copy of a video transfer from unknown gauge print materials. The publisher-provided still frame above shows the low-quality characteristics of VHS: the smeary picture details and the over-emphasized edge sharpening.
We think that this bare bones DVD+R edition is indefensibly overpriced for its low quality. If you want to settle for a substandard home video edition, you may as well save some money and gamble on the Alpha Video edition noted above . . . at least it comes in a DVD case.
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USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD+R edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
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Other silent era KING VIDOR films available on home video.
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