The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (1980)

[William_Calhoun]

Title: The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle
Country: USA
Region: 1
Releasing Studio: Shout Factory
Case Type: Keep Case
Aspect Ratio: 4:3
Anamorphic?: Non-anamorphic
PAL or NTSC?: NTSC
Soundtracks: English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo; English Dolby Digital 5.1 surround
Subtitles (are they optional?): None
Cuts: Theatrical (100:07)
Commentaries: With director Julien Temple and rock writer Chris Salewicz
Extras:
* Interview with Julien Temple by rock writer Chris Salewicz (18:59)
Notes:
Easter Eggs: None
Amazon ASIN (UK, French, German, USA releases only): B0008G2748
Source: I own it

Posting this in hopes of getting specs from other releases.

[Alister_Manson]

I have the Australian release of this, will post specs on the weekend

[Jari_Kovalainen]

William, this review ( http://www.digitallyobsessed.com/displa ... hp?ID=7211 ) list the running time as "100:17" and two bonus trailers. Is this info incorrect?

Also can you clarify the "theatrical version" note? Do you just mean that it's not the original version before the BBFC cuts?:

"To receive an 'X' certificate the BBFC required cuts to the final print. Full-frontal shots of 'Sue Catwoman' in Malcolm McLaren's bathroom were optically enhanced to remove images of her lower regions (banned under the Protection of Children Act) and a long shot of her was cut by adding black panties to cover up the offending area. The cinema scene was also cut by removing shots of Steve Jones's genitals during the sex scene with the Brazilian girl and Mary Millington's visible pubic area in her sex scene with Jones. A shot of Sid Vicious waving a flick-knife was moved back into the sequence to avoid equating sex with violence. The BBFC also demanded the inclusion of newspaper headline footage referring to the deaths of Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen. All later releases feature this same print."
(IMDB)

[Alister_Manson]

It's unlikely that an uncut print even exists. This DVD looks like a VHS tape, absolute rubbish. At least the PAL version has a PCM stereo track, so it doesn't sound too bad. The 5.1 track is a hackjob, it seems to have just been randomly panned with no actual thought given to creating a proper surround field.

[Jari_Kovalainen]

It's unlikely that an uncut print even exists.

Yes, probably. Point was that if we add "theatrical version" to the cut notes then some people might think that the "director's cut" or "uncut version" is out there somewhere. We probably add this with "no cuts (see notes)" and then we add the IMDB notes about the BBFC.

[Alister_Manson]

Some people claim to have seen uncut versions, but then again the same can be said of the Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot.

[Jari_Kovalainen]

I guess the question is that what happened to the original print (before the BBFC)? Any work prints etc around? Not sure has anyone done any real research.

Here is one random interview:
http://sabotagetimes.com/reportage/the- ... l-swindle/

[Alister_Manson]

It's probably rotting in a Transyvanian salt mine...

[William_Calhoun]

William, this review ( http://www.digitallyobsessed.com/displa ... hp?ID=7211 ) list the running time as "100:17" and two bonus trailers. Is this info incorrect?

Also can you clarify the "theatrical version" note? Do you just mean that it's not the original version before the BBFC cuts?:

"To receive an 'X' certificate the BBFC required cuts to the final print. Full-frontal shots of 'Sue Catwoman' in Malcolm McLaren's bathroom were optically enhanced to remove images of her lower regions (banned under the Protection of Children Act) and a long shot of her was cut by adding black panties to cover up the offending area. The cinema scene was also cut by removing shots of Steve Jones's genitals during the sex scene with the Brazilian girl and Mary Millington's visible pubic area in her sex scene with Jones. A shot of Sid Vicious waving a flick-knife was moved back into the sequence to avoid equating sex with violence. The BBFC also demanded the inclusion of newspaper headline footage referring to the deaths of Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen. All later releases feature this same print."
(IMDB)

Sorry for the late response. Actually, time according to VLC and my Insignia is 1:40:07 and 1:40:13 according to PS3. And those trailers are on there (oddly, I didn't see them in VLC, even checked the titles, but they play before the menu on the PS3 and the Insignia). As per it being the 'theatrical' version, I just kind of assumed it was since the case didn't state otherwise, sorry about that.
Out of curiosity, how do you know the PAL version is NTSC-to-PAL and its not the other way around?

[Alister_Manson]

That's actually a good question. According to a lot of sources the actual run time of the film is 103 minutes, so with PAL speedup it would be around 99 minutes. So it's possible that the US disc is a PAL-to-NTSC conversion. Then again, 103 minutes could just as easily be the original runtime before the BBFC cut it. I'm pretty sure the PAL VHS I had back in the day also ran for 100 minutes, in fact this DVD is barely any better than that tape.

Also, the Australian DVD has the Shout! Factory logo on the back cover and it's also displayed on startup. But it doesn't have any trailers. Most likely the original negative of this film is lost and they only had a PAL VHS master to create the DVD from, hence the conversion.

edit: I just looked it up on Discogs and the US VHS is listed as 104 minutes. So it looks like the US DVD is indeed a PAL-to-NTSC conversion...

[William_Calhoun]

I just checked, and all the VHS tapes on Discogs, PAL and NTSC, list a 104 minute runtime, so I don't think that helps. Maybe we can compare the songs on the DVD to the CD soundtrack and see if the speed matches?

[Alister_Manson]

Maybe try timing "Friggin" In the Riggin" since that song seems to be the most complete in the film compared to the soundtrack CD. Most of the other songs are edited or shortened in the film. On Youtube there are versions of the clip that run 3:32 and 3:19, so whichever the DVD version matches will determine the format.

[Alister_Manson]

Present info seems correct, I just timed "Friggin in the Riggin" and it's 3:32 which matches the version on the album. So obviously no speedup, but also no insight as to where the extra 4 minutes went. Unless that was the length of footage excised by the BBFC.

[Tim_Rogerson]

The UK videos and DVDs all have a timing of 100m per the BBFC.

[Alister_Manson]

It's all a bit confusing... as far as I can figure out, the length of the actual film is supposed to be either 103 or 104 minutes, yet the US NTSC DVD runs for 100 and seems to be pretty much identical to the PAL version, which as far as I can tell is an NTSC conversion since there's no apparent speedup

[Jari_Kovalainen]

I'll move this thread to the general forum. Personally I would take the run times from (e.g.) IMDB with the grain of salt. I'm sure most are correct - or close - but still.