David Lean.
Whenever this name appears on a film as Director you know you are in for a superb epic, this Director, (in my opinion), is to date unmatched by anyone for epic films.
As you all know, this is a Director of huge proportion and cast’s using thousands of extra’s, today, they simply CGI in the extra people at a computer desk, With David Lean you don’t get much bigger a movie as this man turned out.

This is The MGM 3 x 400ft Scope edition which is very well edited. It is edited onto 2 x 600 reels, (it should be on an Elmo 1200ft reel but is my Brothers).
Again, we appear to be lucky as the fade is only very slight, I have seen these come up for sale completely red. Unfortunately, as always my old digi camera doesn’t allow you to see what I am trying to show you, the greens blues and yellows are all in there, not quite as good as they were but a whole lot better than most I see, and the scope version doesn’t seem to be easy to obtain and what you see on the screen is a whole lot sharper than my pictures. The blacks are still black, (but appear to have a hue on some the images) and the snow scenes are an absolute must for the scope screen. Pure white, this is defiantly a title that we could not watch on the TV any more, this, like Lawrence of Arabia and Bridge over the River Kwai , was made for the big scope screen. This edition uses fades and dissolves in a similar way to Where Eagles Dare so makes for a very smooth edit with no abrupt cuts worth crying over. All in all, a 1st class home release by MGM.

Doctor Zhivago is a 1965 British-Italian epic romantic drama film directed by David Lean. It is set in Russia between the years prior to World War I and the Russian Civil War of 1917–1922, and is based on the 1957 Boris Pasternak novel of the same name. While immensely popular in the West, the book was banned in the Soviet Union for decades. For this reason, the film could not be made in the Soviet Union and was instead filmed mostly in Spain.
The film stars Omar Sharif in the title role as Yuri Zhivago, a married physician whose life is irreversibly altered by the Russian Revolution and subsequent Civil War, and Julie Christie as his married love interest Lara Antipova. The supporting cast includes Geraldine Chaplin, Rod Steiger, Alec Guinness, Tom Courtenay, Ralph Richardson, Siobhán McKenna and Rita Tushingham.
Critics were generally disappointed, complaining of its length at over three hours, and claiming that it trivialised history, but acknowledging the intensity of the love story and the film's treatment of human themes. Over time, however, the film's reputation has improved greatly. At the 38th Academy Awards, Doctor Zhivago won five Oscars: Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Score, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction and Best Costume Design; it was nominated for five others (including Best Picture and Best Director), but lost four of these five to The Sound of Music. It also won five awards at the 23rd Golden Globe Awards including Best Motion Picture - Drama and Best Actor - Motion Picture Drama for Sharif.

Looks another excellent Sharp print Tom.
I've never seen this film but I know from childhood, it was always one of my mother's favourites, so I reckon it must be good! 😂🔟

Lara's theme was a firm favourite in our household in the 70's.

She was always into TV series like Kane & Able and Rich Man Poor Man etc etc when I was young.

The film is more for my Brother and Mrs than for me, this edit, for me personally, is more than enough, i have seen the full feature and it is a great epic romantic drama and brilliantly made but at three hours it was a little too long for me to want to watch again.
This edit retains the story and is a great 50 minute mini epic. This is where the package movie comes into its own.

Does it tell the story correctly and do it justly within the 50mins Tom?

For a very long film, I sometimes wonder if it is possible?

Ben Hur as a 3x 400ft cut down being a prime example.

One or two I have that last around the hour mark, I wonder if I'd fully understand them but for the fact I've seen the full film previously.
It's hard to tell once you know the story line to the full.

I suppose much depends on the complexity of the plot.

i would say this one does a good job.

Excellent research there Tom. This looks a very good print. I have this on DVD; I think we just watched it the once; but after reading your review, I think it's time we saw it again. David Lean was responsible for what I think are two of the greatest films to come out of a British studio; 'Oliver Twist' and 'Great Expectations'.; not forgetting other great films like this one you just reviewed, and 'Bridge on the River Kwai', and 'The Sound Barrier'.

I actually saw this in 70mm back in the day, and the 8mm versions work very well indeed. Tom is this the Cineavision Scope print (with the black bars either side) or the Ken Films scope print (Derek Simmonds had to ask me once if Ken had made a scope copy, he didn't know!) which is framed at the normal 2;66/1.

Barry,
Yhis is the 2:66/1 scope version nnot the cinevision one.
I coukd be qrong but i think yhe cinevision version is ones which have all but faded.

Hi Guys,

I have the full length of this in scope on super 8 also Gone With The Wind and Ben Hur - i think With the School Hols starting today - I will have to screen these again over a few sittings as well as the 16mm prints I've not had the time to screen.

Great films deserved to viewed at least once per year David.
Take the school holidays as an opportunity to view them all, one after the other.

Better still, show one or two in school!
They'd be great for media studies, religious education lessons (Ben Hur) and Physics lessons or Design Technology etc etc for the teaching of all the electro /mechanical goings on, just by studying the machines themselves! 😂

Things have changed in this world, but just as my son learned cine principles first as part of his stop motion degree course only recently, a potential modern day elec eng could still learn much by the principles of operation on many of the more sophisticated Super 8mm machines and their circuit designs.

Please excuse my embarrassing spelling previously there, did this on a poxy mobile.