PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

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mkaroly
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#31 Post by mkaroly »

Great reviews! I am looking forward to going through these films when the box set arrives. Thanks Andy!

Eric Paddon
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#32 Post by Eric Paddon »

Got my copy of the set today. Went through the first film and it marked the first time I'd heard the Edwards commentary which was overall good. "A Shot In The Dark" has a great transfer and I loved the bonus item featuring Edwards showing bloopers on the Dick Cavett Show because one of the bloopers is actually from a scene that was cut from the film! (where Clouseau recaps what happened in the nudist camp. It's a funny scene even before Sellers breaks up but I can understand why it was cut because it just restated the action we had already seen).

However I am not pleased with the Jason Simos commentary. He is way too spartan and falls into stretches of silence or just commenting on the action instead of loading up on more interesting background detail. And sometimes he reveals much less, like when talking about Bryan Forbes' "Turk Thrust" appearance he mentions the in-joke continuing years later in "Curse Of The Pink Panther" yet he decides not to mention Roger Moore's name. Then later, when mentioning associate producer Dick Crockett he says he "memorably appeared on-screen in Pink Panther Strikes Again" but doesn't tell us in which role! (it was Gerald Ford). If this is what he does on other films, I'm not going to be looking forward to those.

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AndyDursin
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#33 Post by AndyDursin »

I did not care for Simos' commentaries either. He mostly waits until someone is on-screen, then rattles off their IMDB filmography. There's very little insight or background. I listened to a few minutes of his tracks on SHOT and SON, and between the "talking IMDB" approach and frequent gaps of silence, I tired of them quickly.

Quite the opposite from the two tracks William Patrick Maynard recorded for TRAIL and INSPECTOR CLOUSEAU, which I found extremely interesting, critical but even-handed. It's unfortunate they didn't have him do most of them -- he even mentioned my review on Facebook and we connected and exchanged pleasantries. The best commentary out of all these PP discs is Maynard's TRAIL talk, where he talks about all the individual cuts and outtakes, where they would've gone and such -- he even refers to the novelization of STRIKES AGAIN at several points for reference.

I'm prepared for an announcement any day now from Arrow or someone else in the UK that a "Complete Series" set with different commentaries and extras will be coming soon...it's just a matter of time. Also curious where the cartoons are. Depending on what's on it I may import that, though overall, I feel Shout did a pretty good job including as much content as they did (with the exception of Simos' commentary tracks), and Kino Lorber as well.

mkaroly
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#34 Post by mkaroly »

I am still waiting on my set. :evil: It should be to the house by Friday. That is a shame about some of the commentaries.

Eric Paddon
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#35 Post by Eric Paddon »

Against my better judgment I'm listening to the commentary on "Return" only because its my favorite Panther film. Honestly, this guy should have refunded the money he was paid for these "commentaries." He acts as if people are watching the film for the first time and will go into the tease mode of "remember this" instead of getting to the point and will waste time laughing at the gags. The "A Shot In The Dark" commentary was infuriating but this commentary is a disgrace.

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AndyDursin
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#36 Post by AndyDursin »

But, did you expect a truly astute analysis from a member of the "Peter Sellers Appreciation Society", Eric? :lol:

Eric Paddon
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#37 Post by Eric Paddon »

LOL. Well I at least expected a little more verbosity! :)

There were in fairness a couple of items about deleted scenes that cropped up after I made that post, though amazingly at the beginning he refused to elaborate when he mentioned how the bearded guard who notices the diamond's been stolen at the beginning was in a funny scene with Sellers later in the film when he investigates the crime scene (the extras show a still picture of it) but he could have at least explained how the scene played out!

I'm not going to bother with any of his other commentaries. He does Strikes right?

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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#38 Post by AndyDursin »

Yes, and I actually made an error -- Maynard does the commentary on REVENGE along with TRAIL (plus the Kino INSPECTOR CLOUSEAU; for whatever reason, Kino's CURSE is the only one without a commentary). His talks are far more enlightening than the Simos tracks, no question, though I only listened to TRAIL all the way through (and about half of INSPECTOR CLOUSEAU).

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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#39 Post by Eric Paddon »

Commentary on "Curse" would be more welcome than the film! :)

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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#40 Post by AndyDursin »

The Ted Wass interview is pretty fun on the disc, so it's not totally barebones.

I would love a full soundtrack set of this series some day also...Quartet did a great job with STRIKES AGAIN/REVENGE/CURSE but I'm guessing the RCA connection is the reason we'll never get a full "box set" despite MGM's money-hungry open licensing policies lol.

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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#41 Post by Eric Paddon »

Complete scores for the first two scores one has to presume are lost due to the generally lousy preservation practices of UA films of the 60s. "Return" has my favorite score sequence in the series for the heist sequence which is on the old album/CD release I have. A music buff might have noticed that on "Return" Mancini stayed true to the original film by only using the Panther theme for sequences involving the heist and Sir Charles since he remembered that the film concept was originally centered on that character!

On a side note, last night on-line I found a copy of the script Sellers had literally finished a week before his death for his proposed "Romance Of The Pink Panther" movie that he was planning on doing without Edwards. Bad as "Trail/Curse" turned out, a skimming through of it shows something that would have probably been worse. "Trail/Curse/Son" preserved the image that only Sellers could do these films but the "Romance" script also reveals that Sellers without Edwards wouldn't have been good.

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Monterey Jack
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#42 Post by Monterey Jack »

Eric Paddon wrote: However I am not pleased with the Jason Simos commentary.
Waitaminute..."Simos"?

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AndyDursin
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#43 Post by AndyDursin »

lol MJ

Agreed, I've seen that script also. Given that Sellers would've been working with the director of CHARLIE CHAN & CURSE OF THE DRAGON QUEEN -- and considering how terrible Sellers' comedy output was from that era (FU MANCHU, PRISONER OF ZENDA) -- I fully agree an Edwards-less ROMANCE would likely have been horrendously bad.

What was interesting to me in these supplements -- which I did not know before though I may have forgotten -- was that Edwards wanted Dudley Moore to pass the torch to, but Moore was willing only to make 1 film, and did not want to commit to a series while his career was taking off. How they ended up at Ted Wass is a mystery we'll never figure out! In Wass' interview, he seems as mystified as everyone else, recalling that Martin Mull was one of many others testing out for the post-Clouseau detective.

Either way I do like CURSE more than SON as well as both of the godawful Steve Martin films but the less said the better on those!

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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#44 Post by Eric Paddon »

Wass was about as unknown as you could get since he wasn't one of the bigger names in the "Soap" cast. He was married to Janet Margolin who'd had a good big-screen career but that was a decade in the past.

I have a feeling Edwards saw Wass as a Harold Lloyd type because the supplements certainly make clear Edwards love for silent film comedians and how that was something he and Sellers' bonded on.

The "Romance" script really reveals just how much Sellers didn't have all his faculties at that point since Dreyfus has the wrong name (Paul instead of Charles) and he has him becoming a private detective doing bad Bogart impressions!

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Monterey Jack
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Re: PINK PANTHER "Peter Sellers Collection" Coming From Shout

#45 Post by Monterey Jack »

AndyDursin wrote:lol MJ

Dammit, I still enjoy the Tim Burton POTA...in fact, I'll probably give it another spin before the new film hits theaters. Always amazes me the kind of genre movies often batted around as the "Worst Movie Ever!", like this and Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 3...both flawed films, but I'd much rather re-watch those than a lot of the genuine crap that clogs multiplexes these days.

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