A Feature Group Up from Depths

 

When Paramount Played with Batjac --- Part One

Call this “When DVD Was King,” or Gold Age for Discs. Guess all formats have such apex, be they laser, even cassettes of long past. CD’s still come out, though I’m not certain who buys them. DVD stunned for quality when initially arrived. First toe-in I recall was 1999 and Teenagers from Outer Space. Suddenly we knew 16mm was kaput. Now it is discs that are dinosaurs, for why buy when streaming will do? Except streaming is them deciding what you watch, and when, “physical media” the retreat we make to possession that is true. Must be merit there, for Teenagers from Outer Space still lies upon home shelf, but watch it again? There might be the rub. Old enough DVD’s breed nostalgia all their own. Folk in younger category treasure first spin of a favorite on shiny disc. To show age now is to recall VHS you once collected, hoarding laser discs plain eccentric. I dusted off a DVD from Paramount's group of John Wayne estate assets, Track of the Cat seen for a first time in a long time. Starting with voluminous extras rather than the 1954 feature, I came out of hour’s instruct with a Track/Cat masters, ready to school the world on a feature out of circulation since I was childish as in seven or eight, Track of the Cat but one of a bunch Paramount unveiled in 2010 along with others of lost lot owned by Batjac and Wayne heirs. These belonging to the star’s estate assumed myth place for being gone amidst rumor negatives rotted on inadequate storage vine, and maybe we’d not see the movies again. Remember relief when the lot came back in bulk?

John Wayne formed his independent company with a producer named Robert Fellows. Wayne-Fellows teamed with Warner Bros. for financing and distribution. Negatives after eight years would revert to Wayne, as in they’d be his and nobody else’s (Fellows bought out and gone by then). This was arrangement similar to Alfred Hitchcock’s with Paramount, eight years opportunity for partner firms to realize return from reissues and perhaps television play. Trouble with both Wayne, Hitchcock, others like them, was ill-equip to protect fragile elements once Warner, Paramount, whoever, relinquished interest. It was a same situation with Alan Ladd and his “Jaguar” group. Movie stars, directors, are folk much gifted, but not necessarily at archiving. Did John Wayne take casual attitude toward oldies the stuff of warehouse expense and limited prospect for return? Like keeping one-eye or three-legged cats you’re too kind to put down. Remember panting for return of Hondo and The High and the Mighty and nobody showing them? Both limped finally onto CBS during 1979 for new-got VHS recording. My cassettes may still be around … but here’s oddity, to this day we don’t have The High and the Mighty on Blu-Ray, or Hondo on home 3-D. It’s as though they’ve retreated again. Both stream in high-def, privilege that could be withdrawn by flick of a Paramount/Batjac pen. What age of uncertainty this still is for collectors, owners preferring we not possess for keeps, objective to charge on each occasion watched, televisions a toll booth like what I drive through in West Virginia on ways to Columbus each year. Enjoy at choice and leisure? Even if you “own” a streaming film, it can be dammed up a next day. Gather ye nuts while you may but know curtains can lower anytime.

Paramount leased whole of the Batjac properties for home release, “all or none” from what I understand, no cherry pick of Wayne ones with stray pups left in the pound. It is one thing to have Hondo with generous extras, quite another where it’s Plunder of the Sun, an average if that Glenn Ford melodrama that never had legacy so good. Being friend to underdogs, I began much as Glenn did for Mayan treasure, Plunder of the Sun him soldier-of-fortuning over Mexico locations for gold from ancient time. Almost a total was done on location, among disc bonuses a letter Ford sent from there to his beloved mother, nice human interest as narrated by Ford son Peter. There is also background explained by an archeologist who has dug ruins which was Sun backdrop for action, explaining facts they got right, or sweetened for sake of narrative. This all almost makes Plunder of the Sun a pleasure watching, one I won’t call dull, as Glenn Ford in action mode and exotic settings will sustain 81 minutes. Directing is John Farrow, minus celebrated long and traveling takes, but doing imaginative stalk through what was left of pyramids, these open to cast/crew in such way to make me wonder if Wayne himself went down to grease authorities for freest access to sacred spots. Pity plot wasn’t tighter wound, Ford and Sean McClory beating each other up to fatigue effect. There once were movies like Plunder of the Sun by the peck, and Glenn Ford seems to have been in most of them.

Trouble is, I fall asleep during one like this or another Batjac, Man in the Vault, even in close to a straight-back chair, best revive a small square of Lindt Dark Chocolate, eighty-five percent cocoa, like what comes from way south of border, this not product placement, just proposal of chocolate as safe alternative for outright speed one might otherwise take to get through sluggish shows. A Glenn Ford actioner was as safe a bet as Wayne-Fellows (precursor to Batjac) could make on formula product. To later application of same (1956) came a western, Seven Men from Now, which then seemed not markedly different from a host of like-others starring Randolph Scott, assurance against loss as what of his ever failed with paying crowds?, especially now with drive-ins at peak of playing any/all to eager parkers and eaters of meal-size concessions. In brief, Seven Men from Now and like were best in all-outdoors, being shot open air and pledged to please. What by-now Batjac did not see was classic status Seven Men from Now would achieve once auteur status adhered to director Budd Boetticher and writer Burt Kennedy. Turns out this was arguably the best of whole lot Batjac licensed to Paramount, and more than worth effort to restore far-gone, but not irretrievable, elements. Seven Men from Now got most fest exposure for Boetticher and Kennedy being present to hear fresh huzzahs for long-past effort.

Herewith for the record are titles within Batjac group Paramount issued, though none save Hondo and McLintock have so far surfaced on Blu-Ray (most can be streamed in HD): Plunder of the Sun, Hondo, Ring of Fear, The High and the Mighty, Track of the Cat, Island in the Sky, Man in the Vault, Seven Men from Now, and McLintock. There were other Batjacs, some having stayed with Warners since initial release (like Blood Alley), or housed with United Artists (Escort West, China Doll). What made the Paramount group unique was rarity once they finished first-runs and retreated back to Wayne possession. Warners tried using ones they had distributed for television in the early sixties, putting Hondo, The High and the Mighty, others, into a syndicated package offered first in 1960. That did not last long, John Wayne suing to stop tube release, denied court relief, then biding time till Warner distribution deal ran out, at which point titles disappeared from local stations. Said sour experience may have resolved Wayne not to share inventory with other distributors who surely came calling afterward. Fans would not have access to most of these pictures until the CBS runs, although McLintock saw endless network play to become a most familiar of Wayne titles on TV. Others became stuff of legend and object(s) of collector quest. Seven Men from Now began showing up on dealer tables at cowboy cons, ten dollars for as wretched a transfer as man could render, but what was Seven Men from Now by the seventies-eighties but obscure object of cult interest, a “must-see” among Danny Peary selections in his Guide for the Film Fanatic, a connoisseur’s western few else were familiar with.