Is this possible? I would give my left arm just to see them in Black and White HD glory.

There were a number of titles shown 2 years ago on Voom.

Boy what a great idea I wonder what it would look like.

Anything shot on film can be transfered to HD. The quality of the HD picture will depend on the quality of the original film source and on the transfer.

Is this possible? I would give my left arm just to see them in Black and White HD glory.

Of course the Stooges could be shown in HD. All the original stooges were photographed in 35mm. No reason that the Stooges couldn't be made to look absolutely stunning.

I have a couple of the SD DVDs that were restored a few years ago. They gave you the choice of looking at only the restored or the colorized version. These are the best the Stooges have looked so far as I've seen.

Art

Weren't there some Stooges movies? Where those 1.85 or 4x3?

It is up to the copywrite holder on whether they want to transfer to HD or not. I am not even sure who owns the copywrite anymore on the Stooge shorts/films.

It is up to the copywrite holder on whether they want to transfer to HD or not. I am not even sure who owns the copywrite anymore on the Stooge shorts/films.
That's great news if thats true because Sony Owns the rights to the Three Stooges and you know how Sony is all about HD. I'm so exited!!!!

Weren't there some Stooges movies? Where those 1.85 or 4x3?

They ranged from 1.66 to 2.35.

Boy I never thought I would see a 3 stooges thread on this forum. How about the Honeymooner's while we are at it

Honeymooners, at the least the film series, was shot on 35mm. The original cut negative was used for the last round of SD mastering so HD shouldn't be a problem.

Honeymooners, at the least the film series, was shot on 35mm. The original cut negative was used for the last round of SD mastering so HD shouldn't be a problem.

Well I hope someone does it someday this is one of my all time favorite shows

There has to be a channel related to all things old shows in HD. I love Lucy, Three Stooges, The Honeymooners, The Munsters I don't know bunch of old shows in HD. I really want Larry, Moe And Curley in HD!!

There has to be a channel related to all things old shows in HD. I love Lucy, Three Stooges, The Honeymooners, The Munsters I don't know bunch of old shows in HD. I really want Larry, Moe And Curley in HD!!

+1

Little Rascals too!

As I remember seeing The Stooges shorts years ago at the Saturday matinees in the theaters (no, not when they were ORIGINALLY released - I'm not THAT old! - this was around the late '60's), they were exceptionally good prints and pretty much HD-looking then.

So, just remembering to back then, I'd say that they would look fantastic in HD now.

Man-'o'-man, would that be great! It'd be like discovering them all over again!

They should produce HD masters of the 3 stooges feature films from the late 50's, early 60's.
Classics like "The 3 Stooges Meet Hercules" and "The 3 Stooges Meet Snow White" - the latter the only one they made in color. The other one in the title sequence says "filmed in Glorious Black & White" :D

The success of a HD film transfer is in the quality of the negative being transferred. Does anyone know what condition the original 2 reeler negatives from the 30's and 40's are in? That is the question. If they are accetates and never transferred to later media, then they may not be in any condition to transfer and may not be restorable. Even negatives from the 60's that haven't been taken care of over the years look pretty bad today. Two examples that were restored in the early 90's are the Beatles movies "Hard Days Night" (1964) and "Help" (1965). It took a lot time and money and there are certain sections of Help, the negative doesn't exist anymore and they had to use sections from prints that had been circulated to theatres and you CAN tell those sections, the most noticeable is a 30 second section of them skiing down the slope with the notes on a power line above their heads as they are singing. The chroma shifts and you see all of these dust specs and scratches in the picture. If the Stooge negatives are indeed in bad shape (and I have no idea on their condition at all) then the options to transfer to HD become more limited and the cost to transfer increases dramatically depending on how much restoration/cleanup is required from either a usable print or dubbing master.

No one back in those days even fleetingly considered the negatives lasting 50 years much less 80 years. It was like back in the early 80's the TV networks literally throwing in the dumpster years of filmed programming from the late 40's and 50's because they thought there was no money to be made with old black and white programs (remember color had just become 100%) and they needed the storage space. Now people would kill for those old programs and if not for a few people from those shows having a few episodes in private collections, we wouldn't have what we have now.

+1

Little Rascals too!

That would be great as well all these shows are just classic

There has to be a channel related to all things old shows in HD. I love Lucy, Three Stooges, The Honeymooners, The Munsters I don't know bunch of old shows in HD. I really want Larry, Moe And Curley in HD!!

The pursuit of younger demographics by most advertisers is something that, unfortunately, reduces the chances of such a channel ever appearing.

That said, I agree with you -- there's a great opportunity here since these old programs were mostly shot on 35mm film. In addition, as many of these shows are being released on SD DVD, the rights holders are going in and cleaning up the original prints, in some cases striking HD masters in the process. So HD masters already exist for some of this material. I suspect that the demographic issues could be at least partially overcome if the programming was packaged and promoted properly. (Pay a visit to the CBS-Paramount website and you'll be amazed at how many of these old shows have at least a season or two transferred into HD)

It would be great to see a service like this offered via OTA broadcast television -- and it would probably be able to get better distribution that way, since I don't see cable systems otherwise volunteering to give up their bandwidth for HD "Three Stooges" reruns.

+1

Little Rascals too!For sure :).

But NOT the "Our Gang" comedies. None of them could act once they got old enough to become self-aware. Especially Spanky.

And half of the episodes are of them putting on some kind of a "pro-WWII-type" musical.

And half of the episodes are of them putting on some kind of a "pro-WWII-type" musical.

Maybe that was because it was shot during WWII and back in those days Hollywood tried to help the war effort instead like today they try and tear it down? Big difference in mind set from then to now.

Maybe we should discuss HDTV Programming, and not politics. ;)

Maybe we should discuss HDTV Programming, and not politics. ;)

Just pointing out that we live in a different time and in years to come when you look at programs being produced now, it will be very plan to see how Hollywood was thinking politically now.

I'm well aware of the timelines involved and why they're doing it.

It's just that those episodes bore me to tears, because I'm not really a "musical" kind of guy. And they ARE VERY dated. And the "non-musical" Our Gang episodes just don't have any of the charm of the Little Rascals series. Their acting was much more innocent and natural when they were younger, and the episodes were more timeless.

(My comment was not meant as any kind of political statement or judgement whatsoever.)

The pursuit of younger demographics by most advertisers is something that, unfortunately, reduces the chances of such a channel ever appearing.

That said, I agree with you -- there's a great opportunity here since these old programs were mostly shot on 35mm film. In addition, as many of these shows are being released on SD DVD, the rights holders are going in and cleaning up the original prints, in some cases striking HD masters in the process. So HD masters already exist for some of this material. I suspect that the demographic issues could be at least partially overcome if the programming was packaged and promoted properly. (Pay a visit to the CBS-Paramount website and you'll be amazed at how many of these old shows have at least a season or two transferred into HD)

It would be great to see a service like this offered via OTA broadcast television -- and it would probably be able to get better distribution that way, since I don't see cable systems otherwise volunteering to give up their bandwidth for HD "Three Stooges" reruns.


Thomas -

So maybe what we need is a Nickelodeon-type channel that shows even older series?

I missed the Voom Stooges stuff, but there's no shortage of Stooges on TV, I catch them fairly often. My kids are big Stooges fans, so I don't understand all this generational stuff. It was thirty years old when I started watching it every Saturday morning in the sixties.

The Three Stooges are and always will be the all time classic comedy Trio. I'm going to the studios myself to go steal some Stooges film so I can try and transfer them to HD. I'll make my own pirate Three Stooges Channel

I think Rainbow Media the same company that owns Voom has the right to the 3 Stooges film transfers, I remember seeing a few shows on Voom and looked crystal clear, I'm surprised we haven't seen thoses repeated.

Must be like the James Bond films, HD for 1 or 2 months and will have to wait awhile to see them again. I do remember seeing the Sony logo at the end in the credits also.

I missed the Voom Stooges stuff, but there's no shortage of Stooges on TV, I catch them fairly often. My kids are big Stooges fans, so I don't understand all this generational stuff. It was thirty years old when I started watching it every Saturday morning in the sixties.

x2... my kids think Boomerang is the best thing ever.

The Stooges had waaay jumped the shark by the time they made their movies with "Curly Joe" as the third stooge. It's Moe, Larry and Curly -- not Joe -- and Moe, Larry and Shemp. Period. Their shorts, along with the Little Rascals, are true classics. But the movies are garbage.