by el-brazo » Wed Nov 09, 2005 3:34 pm
@Baradagi:
> I'm going to have to order this now to add to my collection
> since I already have the extremely odd Chinese version called
> Bloodthirsty Hawk. [...] This is the dvd, correct?
Yes! I am sure you'll find it quite interesting.
> You've got me interested in the European cuts to these films
> again el-brazo! Since I can easily get a hold of the Greek vhs
> creleases of the films, maybe I should start collecting those
> and report any strange findings?
Regarding RODAN, I think, that the Greek VHS release could be very interesting, because the question is: Was this rough draft (I think I should call the German version RAWDONE from now on) sold only to RKO Germany or was it also -- or possibly even generally -- sold to other countries as well? I assume that THE BLOODTHIRSTY HAWK is based on the Japanese version, since it's an Asian release, but as far as I know, King Brothers obtained the rights not only for the US, but possibly for all European countries as well.
@August:
> According to a very well-researched article in Japanese Giants
> in the early 1980s, it was related that the King Brothers were
> given the entire work print for RADON; so there are scenes and
> shots that are in the US version that are not in the Japanese
> version -- the H-Bomb prologue in the US version was created
> soley for the King Brothers version.
I would very much like to read this article, because I have not found anything which seemed to be part of a longer work print. I have to admit that I can state this only with a lot of caution, because I did not really concentrate on this, but so far it seems to me that at least all of the striking American additions consist of either stock-footage from (I hope I am using the right words now) "generic film libraries" or material from the theatrical Japanese version which was shuffled, re-cut, mirrored, played backward etc. The H-Bomb prologue, the Wake Island scenes, several short scenes of jets fighters etc. just look like the kind of documentary military material which can also be seen in other movies. But it is, of course, possible that I simply missed those scenes.