Found on Ain't it cool news:

"Apparently critics hated this film, I just cant. Its just a film, whose like well never really see again, and thats probably a good thing, but at the same time, Id love a modern comedic director to do a love letter to the type of funny cinema they love and if its slapstick, it is watching this film in the age of situational and high concept comedies is almost a tonic. Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon are just so much fun and Jack Lemmons Professor Fate is just one of the singularly greatest things to behold. The Blu comes with a vintage Behind the scenes that is nice and unexpected. You need the film in 1080p, cuz thats about how many pies are thrown in this thing! Heh. Having Jack Lemmon be Snidely Whiplash evil with Peter Falk as his faithful doomed assistant its kind of blissful and foreshadows Hackman and Beattys Lex & Otis by 15 years or so! As a lover of WACKY RACES, this is like that but before it and add to Tony & Jack the beautiful Natalie Wood and both Keenan Wynn and Arthur OConnell!!! You should check out Blake Edwards love letter to silent cinema and the realm of slapstick! But really, you just gotta see Jack Lemmon in this, hes having so much fun being evil!"

Vintage behind the scenes? Maybe something about the pie fight, if we're lucky. Otherwise, it will be HD, which is a plus.

I know it's probably been asked among us before, but hypothetically if they did do a modern updated version of Blake Edwards' "The Great Race", cost aside which in today's money would be at least $20 million to $100 million to make a movie especially with the iconic pie fight scene, which I think Lenny should be a special consultant IMHO, which has to be done just like or near the original, as well as who do you choose to be Maggie and on down the line. I hope someone out there does decide to remake this film for a new audience, but still be close to the original as possible.

Sure! Disney should do it, with Amy Adams or Anne Hathaway in the lead role. And with another woman in the cast, maybe in a villain role. We can dream...

Yep. That's why so many of us go crazy over that movie, *and* Natalie Wood! :lovestruck:

I was about 12 years old when I first saw "The Great Race" on TV. I saw the previews and couldn't believe my eyes! When I saw the whole scene, it was like I was transported to another world! Natalie was beautiful, and looked sexy as hell in that corset and stockings! And keep in mind that Natalie wore that outfit in the lake when she was washing off, so we got some wetlook, too!

Norman

i don't remember seeing Natalie in the corset outfit while ashing off in the lake....is that one of the extras on the blueray version?

Saw this when I was about 8 or so, I saw the "promo' for it on the previous friday...absolutely couldn't wait to see the film (it was to air the following night)...i remember feeling nervous about it...Yes, Jack (and Peter Falk) was superb in this film...in his dual role, Jack makes the film the comedy treasure it is).

Ms Wood , of course, was stunning, and probably led to a great many older "enthusiasts" on this forum...this was back in the day when there were no VCRs*

* note to youngsters: VCRs were large box-like machines (connected to the TV by cables called RCA jacks) that would play a video 'cassette' tape (that was one half inch in size) and even allow you to record the show for future viewing pleasure! You can find these machines in some old peoples' basements and soon, in museums.

Maybe I'm not remembering it correctly. (They say the memory is the 2nd thing to go! .... I can't remember what the first thing is! ) Maybe I was assuming she was still wearing it when she was washing off in the lake. But I was sure that there was some clothed wetlook with Natalie somewhere in the film. Then again, maybe not! It's been a while since I've seen the whole movie.


She was indeed stunning! :lovestruck: And to end up in the corset and stockings for the piefight was so damn sexy!

It certainly helped to cement my love of WAM!


In 1976, I was working for a company that sold Betamaxes (it only had Beta I and Beta II on it). It cost $2100.00! I always laughed and said, "I'll know that I've 'made it' when I can blow $2100.00 on a VCR!"

About 4-1/2 years later, I bought a Beta III for about $400.00, and about 5 years after that you could buy a VHS model for about $50.00!

Norman

I have always loved The Great Race and THAT scene since I was a little girl. :lovestruck:

Whenever it's on I make sure I watch it, whether I'm with Jhub or O'toole! :devil:



PGKay

Wow,you're old!

The movie is exactly as it is on my DVD* (the special features are identical, too: the trailer, and a vintage behind-the-scenes documentary (which leaves something to be desired for the modern viewer)**), just with vastly improved picture quality, earning every one of the 5 blue "B"s (out of 5) it got in the blu-ray.com review.

The audio is also rather impressive, likely sourced from the 6-channel mix featured on the 70mm prints in the original release. It's impressively immersive, even by modern standards (little details like Leslie's announcer at the beginning, voice moving subtly across the front speakers as he turns his head; crowd noises in the surrounds at the start & finish lines, and at Leslie & Fate's earlier demonstrations). When we got our first Blu-Ray player, I immediately noticed an improvement in sound quality over DVD (almost moreso than the improvement in picture quality), and that certainly holds true here, as well, even if it does at times reveal limitations inherent in the source.

My only regret is that no one had the wherewithal to sit Blake Edwards, Tony Curtis, and Peter Falk down for an interview/commentary session in the years between when Blu-Ray came on the market, and their respective deaths. It's something like Johnny Cash never writing an autobiography, just a piece of history now lost forever, but...spilled milk.

To sum up: even if you already own this on DVD, the Blu-Ray is well worth the upgrade. A few (slightly) dated effects shots notwithstanding, the movie looks like it could have been filmed yesterday. If you don't own a Blu-Ray player yet, buy one along with this disc (and buy "Inception", "The Dark Knight", and "Tommy" on Blu-Ray while you're at it).

*Some early pressings of the DVD had an error in the opening titles, which resulted in the audience seeming to cheer the villain and boo the hero, this was corrected in later pressings and remains corrected on Blu-Ray.

**The special features appear to be the same (standard-definition) film transfers used on the DVD, merely upscaled to HD. The feature, however, is a pristine new transfer. From a preservation standpoint, it probably worked in the film's favor that it underperformed in its initial release. Films that were huge hits tend to be the worse for it (the negative getting worn from so many prints being made, the prints getting worn from so many showings...)

Yes. I am.

Norman

Except, this time, make the ENTIRE nearly-3-hour movie a piefight scene.

And, another minor change: make ALL the bakers in the scene be hot sexy female
of every imaginable type, wearing every imaginable variety of lingerie or clothing, so that ALL us wammers will be satisfied.

I love it! Like I've said before, Kay, you're my kind of woman! :lovestruck:

After you watch it, do you ever innocently say to Jhub or O'Toole, "That looks like fun! We should try that sometime"!

I, for one, would love to see you as Maggie Dubois!

Norman

Penelope Pitstop's outfit was actually modelled after "one" of the outfits that Natalie wore in this movie.
I think she wore this outfit right at the beginning of the actual race.

I first became aware of the film when Life magazine ran a feature on it with great photos of the pie fight. I never actually got to see the film in the theater; I was only 11 and my film-going was dependent on what my parents took us to.

>>>it probably worked in the film's favor that it underperformed in its initial release.

Also, because the film was a box office disappointment, it ended up on television much more quickly. TV networks weren't (yet) running theatrical movies, but local stations were, especially to fill up time on weekends. This was well before any practical, affordable home recording devices, so that was the only time I could see it, but it showed up more often than if it had been a blockbuster.

The wet-in-corset scene someone mentioned occurs before the pie fight: Miss Dubois is bathing when she is captured; that's why she's wearing the corset in the pie fight. Ironically, Natalie Wood couldn't swim, as she proved in 1980, so they must have faked that scene somehow. Who cares? What hetero male would have notice an army of stagehands in the lake holding her up?