Actually, Bob, you can pack 'em (or arrange to have it done, via the terms of your will)--the problem is that you won't be able to reach 'em...

I think films where the photography is especially praised (fetishized?) are the ones that keep getting upgrades. It's kind of de rigeur for the poseur aspect of cinephilia, I'm afraid. For example, CITIZEN KANE is being re-released in "ultra high-definition" by Criterion this November, with enough extras to choke a horse (or make your ears bleed: so many commentators, so little time). Of course it's more than Gregg Toland causing this, but he's an integral part of the KANE mystique.

A film like NIGHT AND THE CITY, which is actually more dependent on the camerawork of Mutz Greenbaum to accord it exalted status in the world of noir, is the other side of this coin. For reasons not made clear, Criterion never bit the bullet and made an effort to combine the three different versions of the film into a "you pays your money and you takes your choice" scenario (along with those nattering nabobs of "noir loggorrhea"): the American release version, the British release version, and the American "assembly" version that was discovered in the vaults but never made public, apparently about ten minutes longer than the others and using an amalgam of the scenes snipped from the two release versions.

I think many of us would prefer if the folks "in charge" would simply focus on cooperating with each other, and by doing so assemble some box sets that upgrade and illuminate the works of key creative people connected with noir in a way that transcends ownership and rights issues. Bertrand Tavernier was able to do this several times in France, and the results were predictably tremendous. We should have a 16-DVD set of the works of John Alton with restored prints; or, on a more modest scale, all of the Hollywood films of Joseph Losey; or, the complete "villainography" of Raymond Burr (in a set that might just require a fork lift).

We're not going to get any of this, of course, but somebody needs to say it every now and again just to remind us of what the custodians and caretakers of "the only indigenous art movement in American film" (so sayeth one of the key gum-flappers...) SHOULD be doing in order to do their jobs properly.

The good news is that many companies (Kino, Warners) are investing $$ in restorations for obscure titles like SHOES or LARCENY. Let's hope that the momentum we've seen in that area over the past year will continue...