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Shawscope Vol. 3 Blu-ray box |
Comparison between the Celestial version, represented here by the German DVDs from T.V.P. / M.i.B., and the 2024 restoration from Arrow Video, contained on the British/American Blu-ray from Arrow Video
- 15 relevant missing bits Several other master errors/framecuts with a duration of less than 1 sec each were not listed in the report.
At the end of 2021, Arrow Video in the UK/USA released the ‘Shawscope Vol. 1’ box set, which contained 12 films from the legendary Hong Kong film studio. In addition to 5 well-known HD masters from the licensor Celestial, there were 7 new HD restorations that did not have the infamous framecuts that run through much of the Celestial catalogue. We have documented this in more detail in several editing reports, for example the comparison to Five Venoms. At the end of 2022, ‘Shawscope Vol. 2’ followed with 9 out of a total of 14 films in new HD restorations without framecuts, for example the report on Ten Tigers of Kwantung. From 25 November 2024 (UK) and 6 December 2024 (USA) respectively, ‘Shawscope Vol. 3’ is available. Fortunately, this time even all 14 films included are new restorations, so that there is added value across the board compared to the previously known Celestial versions. Particularly exciting are Clans of Intrigue, which has only been available in a censored version worldwide so far, and The New One-Armed Swordsman, which was only released by T.V.P. in an incomplete reconstruction instead of fully uncut. The Avenging Eagle is a similar case which had a half-baked "uncut" reconstruction in Germany by filmArt. Arrow presents all these problem cases in the longest versions to date, along with much more. Disc 5 contains The Magic Blade with Ti Lung and Lo Lieh. This is a curious case, because there were two Celestial restorations at the time. The version offered by Celestial on the Hong Kong DVD by IVL and at VOD providers such as iTunes (US) was already almost uncut without framecuts. As a separate comparison showed, only an insignificant difference of a few seconds accumulates over the course of the film. Unfortunately, the second restoration offered in SD was the basis for the German DVDs of MiB (only with a new dub and, annoyingly, English subtitles taken from a version without framecuts, so that they became increasingly out of sync over the course of the film) and T.V.P. (with original dub and corrected subtitles for the original audio).
Minus the Celestial logos, the new Arrow version is 4:34 min longer. So there are quite a few frame cuts, but all in all it's not that spectacular: this time no bits during fight scenes were lost. What stands out most are a few significantly longer shots. The island shots in the second half of the film are curious; Arrow has them heavily damaged and for the aforementioned 2nd Celestial restoration they were filtered or even completely replaced.
Runtime information is given according to the scheme The DVD still has the Celestial logo at the start.
+ 10 sec The credits are a different color. The same thing happens with actor credits throughout the entire film.
For comparison, here is the uncut HD restoration of Celestial on iTunes. The fade-ins were also in yellow here, but the color scheme and grain structure were slightly different.
03:11 / 03:14-03:18 A long shot of the dance begins much earlier. 4 sec
05:10 / 05:28-05:30 Yen (Lo Lieh) raises his staff at the beginning of the shot. 2.3 sec
09:44 / 10:29-10:30 The heroic duo look at each other earlier. In the Celestial version, only less than half a second of this can be seen. 1 sec
Alternatively, 22:41-22:42 / 24:26-24:27 The Celestial SD version includes a recycled reaction shot of Yen to cover up a damaged middle section of the shot. The HD version from iTunes already included this correctly without the additional reaction shot. 1 sec
26:01 / 28:09-28:10 Worth a brief mention: here a guy falls over and to the side a bit longer after being hit at the end of the shot. 0.7 sec
27:26 / 29:45-29:46 A medium long shot starts considerably earlier. 1.4 sec
52:45 / 56:49-56:51 The lantern can be seen a little earlier. 1.6 sec
56:04 / 60:30-60:32 A shot during the scene change is significantly longer. 2 sec
60:01 / 64:54-64:56 After the intensity of the framecuts has increased in the last few minutes, a single one deserves a mention here: the warriors lying in formation on the ground are visible a little longer. 1.8 sec
60:22 / 65:20-65:22 The shot of them standing up and attacking him also starts much earlier. 2 sec
60:55 / 66:04-66:05 The way the attackers with swords surround Fu can be seen a little earlier. It is only mentioned because there is a small jump cut at the end, making it obvious why Celestial only starts at shot one. This mini-scene was also missing from the HD master from iTunes. 0.5 sec
65:51 / 71:30-71:33 When Chien (Ku Feng) is introduced, he is shown for a significantly longer time. 2.9 sec
68:37 / 74:32-74:41 The tracking shot across the islands is significantly longer and there is some zooming in. This shot has massive signs of wear on the Arrow version (see the yellow dots in the picture) - and in the Celestial HD version, a completely different shot of the islands was simply used (probably for this reason). Here, too, the zooming in follows a similar pattern. 9.6 sec
68:51 / 74:57-75:01 A long shot begins much earlier. 3.7 sec
76:45 / 83:32-83:37 Another shot of the islands was completely removed from the SD version. This was included in the previous HD version by Celestial (but noticeably filtered). 5.7 sec
The end credits and the credits that precede them differ.
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