Kid With The Golden Arm - Media Blasters

[Bronx Rican]

Sorry, its not worth it if what we are looking at is something recently added to the dubb as opposed to leaving the original...

new re-dubbing was done and supplied by someone [Celestial] for any number of reasons. And you have confirmed that.

Okay, one more time...

Mr. York didn't confirm anything about "Golden Arm." He said IF there was anything new, MB is not behind it. NOBODY ever said there WAS anything new. The whole point of my clip was to DEMONSTRATE that there is absolutely, positively NOTHING that was added or taken away from the dub on this DVD. I said you can hear for yourself that this is uncut and original, that the dub you hear on this DVD is 100% COMPLETE, 100% ORIGINAL and 100% EXACTLY THE WAY IT WAS ORIGINALLY MEANT TO BE HEARD. I don't claim to know exactly who did what to the original audio before everyone experienced this film for the first time; I was only EMULATING what was DONE to the audio all those years ago. The "nonsense" dub we've heard all this time is WRONG. It was CENSORED. Can't anyone tell from the clip? Wei Pai's character has ALWAYS said "bastard" and "bastards." That's how it was ORIGINALLY RECORDED. It's the exact same actor in English... it was NOT newly put in... can't we tell from LISTENING?!? And yes, Hai Tao DOES say "Right... all nonsense" on this DVD. How'd we get to this point? The audio is fully restored and we're looking at it as a disappointment, keeping us from a purchase?

[chen lung]

Did the voice artists re-dub the nonsense lines at the request of the US distributor (or was it sampled from another scene)?

[venoms5]

Okay, I think Bronx Rican has cleared this up now. At first, I got the impression that some of you were laying all new claims at those mischievous imps over at Celestial for "tampering yet again" with your movies. After watching this lesser Chang Cheh movie one more time (I must say the MB disc looks the best the film has ever looked), there's not a damn thing that's been altered, tampered with, or changed from the way the film was and has always been aside from the expletives being reinstated after being drowned out for their television airings. Check that (still cut) ground zero bootleg, you'll find the "bastard"s there.

I didn't even notice the stretched bits of dialog, if there were any present here.

Oddly enough and on a different note, when SUPER NINJAS played in my neck of the woods on channel 48, the shot of the kunoichi's breasts during the fire element sequence was shown, although it was cut out on the USA Network airing. Both retained the 'Edited For Television By Larry Bensky' credit.

[VenomsFan]

Okay, one more time...

Mr. York didn't confirm anything about "Golden Arm." He said IF there was anything new, MB is not behind it. NOBODY ever said there WAS anything new.

1. What Mr. York said was "I can assure you that MB/Tokyo Shock never did any re-recording themselves. Any new re-dubbing was done and supplied by Celestial for any number of reasons."

He is saying Celestial is known for doing re-dubbs!

The whole point of my clip was to DEMONSTRATE that there is absolutely, positively NOTHING that was added or taken away from the dub on this DVD. I said you can hear for yourself that this is uncut and original, that the dub you hear on this DVD is 100% COMPLETE, 100% ORIGINAL and 100% EXACTLY THE WAY IT WAS ORIGINALLY MEANT TO BE HEARD. I don't claim to know exactly who did what to the original audio before everyone experienced this film for the first time; I was only EMULATING what was DONE to the audio all those years ago. The "nonsense" dub we've heard all this time is WRONG. It was CENSORED. Can't anyone tell from the clip? Wei Pai's character has ALWAYS said "bastard" and "bastards." That's how it was ORIGINALLY RECORDED.

Well we can never be 100% sure about anything. But let's say we can.

1. We do know for 100% that "nonsense" was the ENG dubb for 30+ years.

2. We do know that aside from visual edits, no extra censored dubbs were provided for distribution.

I am following you until this part of your response (which explains why you did not add the Kwok piece in your clip?).

The audio is fully restored and we're looking at it as a disappointment, keeping us from a purchase?

2. Actually I am interested to know if censored dubbs were ever recorded. Up until now that was never the case. venoms5 also pointed out not much censoring was going on in the TV edits of these films. There is proof of cut scenes but not consistent proof of altered audio.

when SUPER NINJAS played in my neck of the woods on channel 48, the shot of the kunoichi's breasts during the fire element sequence was shown, although it was cut out on the USA Network airing. Both retained the 'Edited For Television By Larry Bensky' credit.

Now the part that keeps me more interested is this part of the discussion:

It's the exact same actor in English... it was NOT newly put in... can't we tell from LISTENING?!? And yes, Hai Tao DOES say "Right... all nonsense" on this DVD.

Wait a minute. I thought this was an uncensored dub?!?! Well why does Wei Pai say Bastards and the Kwok say Nonsense in the same scene seconds from each other?!

Doesn't it make sense for Hai To to say "Right! All bastards!" as his reply if it is indeed from an "uncensored" dubb?

Another note, the celestial mandarin to english translation in the subtitles reads as followed for Hai To's response:

[VenomsFan]

Did the voice artists re-dub the nonsense lines at the request of the US distributor (or was it sampled from another scene)?

It's possible Scott. And an interesting fact if this indeed the case!

[venoms5]

Venomsfan, dude, what are you talking about???

Check the MB disc if you indeed have it at 45 minutes in. Wei Pai says "Nonsense", to which Kuo Chui says, "Right...all nonsense."

[venoms5]

It's at 45 minutes and 15 seconds. Not sure where all this talk of some mysterious conspiracy to screw around with the audio has come from, but I have seen this movie enough times (too many times, actually) to know that the AUDIO TRACK IN ENGLISH ON THE MEDIA BLASTERS DVD IS THE SAME GOOFY DUB THAT HAS BEEN ON TELEVISION AND COUNTLESS VHS & DVD RELEASES PRIOR TO THIS VERY NICE RELEASE FROM MEDIA BLASTERS.

Apparently, one of you, both of you (Hell, you all are confusing me, now) have yet to buy this movie, for if you had, you'd see there's no alteration in the scene in question. Both actors state the damn word "NONSENSE". And for completists, it's "RUBBISH" in the damn subtitles.

[chen lung]

Another possible way to check is English versions from other countries, although I don't know if there would be influence from American distributors on these. There's the UK and Dutch VHS.

Perhaps what Richard meant is "any dubbing would have been carried out by Celestial" - not necessarily meaning things were done to this film, but just generally. Unless it's to replace damaged or fill undubbed sections, I doubt Celestial would alter stuff.

[VenomsFan]

It's at 45 minutes and 15 seconds. Not sure where all this talk of some mysterious conspiracy to screw around with the audio has come from, but I have seen this movie enough times (too many times, actually) to know that the AUDIO TRACK IN ENGLISH ON THE MEDIA BLASTERS DVD IS THE SAME GOOFY DUB THAT HAS BEEN ON TELEVISION AND COUNTLESS VHS & DVD RELEASES PRIOR TO THIS VERY NICE RELEASE FROM MEDIA BLASTERS.

Apparently, one of you, both of you (Hell, you all are confusing me, now) have yet to buy this movie, for if you had, you'd see there's no alteration in the scene in question. Both actors state the damn word "NONSENSE". And for completists, it's "RUBBISH" in the damn subtitles.

Bronx Rican has been going on this whole time that the word "bastard" is used. He is referring to the same print you are.

It doesn't make sense, so he posted clips of samples, though.

Now you are saying your copy of MB has a different track. This is getting better everytime I check this post.

[VenomsFan]

Another possible way to check is English versions from other countries, although I don't know if there would be influence from American distributors on these. There's the UK and Dutch VHS.

Perhaps what Richard meant is "any dubbing would have been carried out by Celestial" - not necessarily meaning things were done to this film, but just generally. Unless it's to replace damaged or fill undubbed sections, I doubt Celestial would alter stuff.

Scott I am thinking they worked with undubbed sections with respect to this film. The inconsistency in the words bastard vs. nonsense being the deal breaker. If there were alternate ENG dubbs perhaps they used more than one source. It's possible.

[venoms5]

Wei Pai does say the word "bastard". I've stated this myself already. Once at the beginning of the movie in the Inn with his girlfriend. This was edited out of TV just as other expletives are often drowned out of these movies on television. Both MAGNIFICENT RUFFIANS and THREE EVIL MASTERS come to mind of movies that had expletives either drowned out, or cut altogether. I don't recall any uprising over all the foul language in the dub for THE MASTER, or people proclaiming, "Somebody's been messin' with my movie!"

Back to GOLDEN ARM, the uttering of "Bastard" is in the Ground Zero dvd. He says it again later in the movie when they discover Golden Arms gang has gotten there ahead of them and laid traps. There was never an utterance of "Nonsense" here. It wouldn't make a damn bit of sense if it was. Why in Hell would a character say "Nonsense" after discovering a bunch of dead bodies anyway?

All the other times he says "Nonsense" are where they are supposed to be and have been since this movie ever appeared dubbed. I am actually surprised that as many people complain over these silly dubs and as this movie is one of the more popular ones (I enjoy aspects of it, but think it's one of the directors worst movies), that everyone hasn't already bought this disc.

The only discernible difference between the HK DVD and the MB disc is in the subtitles. The HK subs on the IVL disc are a bit different in places. Which is to be expected considering the subs done by IVL have been shortened, or dumbed down for many of the movies with American counterparts to compare them too.

[Richard York]

1. What Mr. York said was "I can assure you that MB/Tokyo Shock never did any re-recording themselves. Any new re-dubbing was done and supplied by Celestial for any number of reasons."

He is saying Celestial is known for doing re-dubbs!

Let me clarify. I don't recall hearing any anomalies in the KID English dub. Admittedly, I'm not so familiar with old release dubs that I would notice subtle changes. But I sure did on another title, TEN TIGERS FROM KWANGTUNG (if memory serves, it's been a while) and possibly one other title. If I'm recalling correctly, it had obvious insert-edits of Ti Lung using a completely different voice actor, and sounding fairly modern. I'm sorry, all my stuff is currently boxed up and can't check or verify myself.

Nevertheless, all audio is provided by Celestial. The only things Media Blasters did with the audio tracks were creating English 5.1s (with mixed results ), some restoration (BLACK MAGIC 2 English, as Celestial didn't provide it), and some editing (when English dubs were shorter than the uncut Chinese, like MARTIAL CLUB). I'm guessing that, during their massive remaster undertaking, Celestial found issues with some audio elements and did what they thought was best to solve them. Despite my close involvement with these releases for MB, I don't really know anything about the inner workings of Celestial and their various remastering processes.

[venoms5]

Let me clarify. I don't recall hearing any anomalies in the KID English dub. Admittedly, I'm not so familiar with old release dubs that I would notice subtle changes. But I sure did on another title, TEN TIGERS FROM KWANGTUNG (if memory serves, it's been a while) and possibly one other title. If I'm recalling correctly, it had obvious insert-edits of Ti Lung using a completely different voice actor, and sounding fairly modern. I'm sorry, all my stuff is currently boxed up and can't check or verify myself.

Most likely that was a case of the limited dubbing crew, handling multiple voices forgetting which characters lines he was speaking. Case in point, in TWO CHAMPIONS OF SHAOLIN, the Hou Wei Chin character played by Chiang Sheng says a line to the dying San Te, "You're hurt bad...why did you carry this?" The voice for this line doesn't match the voice throughout the rest of the movie both before and after this sequence. That movie has been that way ever since it played on television as TWO CHAMPIONS OF DEATH. There are other examples of that very same thing, although I don't recall it happening in TEN TIGERS at the moment.

[venoms5]

By the way, Mr. York, since you are on now, is there a possibility that Media Blasters will license some additional Shaw titles and if so, is it possible they may pick up some of the more rare, but sought after titles such as TO KILL A MASTERMIND?

[Richard York]

By the way, Mr. York, since you are on now, is there a possibility that Media Blasters will license some additional Shaw titles and if so, is it possible they may pick up some of the more rare, but sought after titles such as TO KILL A MASTERMIND?

Can't say, as I'm no longer with the company. They still have 9 more of this current crop of 10. So I'm sure it'll be awhile before another plunge is taken.

The TEN TIGERS thing, unless I'm confusing it with another title, could have been on the Mandarin track. I wish I could remember. The audio insert-edit definitely sounded new.

[venoms5]

Can't say, as I'm no longer with the company. They still have 9 more of this current crop of 10. So I'm sure it'll be awhile before another plunge is taken.

The TEN TIGERS thing, unless I'm confusing it with another title, could have been on the Mandarin track. I wish I could remember. The audio insert-edit definitely sounded new.

I see. Sorry to hear that you are no longer with them.

Regarding TEN TIGERS, no doubt that was new audio then.

One of the most noticeable examples of that is on the Chinese DVD for ALL MEN ARE BROTHERS. The movie itself was SEVERELY cut for its release over here and oddly enough, the same cuts in the US television edit apparently were missing in the HK version as well. Seemingly every segment missing that was reinstated had all new audio redone for it. It's still missing some bits here and there, but the amount of footage put back in makes for a much more harrowing and action packed picture.

The film began production in 1972, but didn't get theatrical release till 1975 in HK. It would be interesting to know if the amount of violence was one reason why the film was held up for so long.

[chen lung]

TEN TIGERS FROM KWANGTUNG (if memory serves, it's been a while) and possibly one other title. If I'm recalling correctly, it had obvious insert-edits of Ti Lung using a completely different voice actor, and sounding fairly modern. I'm sorry, all my stuff is currently boxed up and can't check or verify myself.

On the Cantonese dub, James Lee mentioned it in his review.

Something similar happened with 'The 36th Chamber Of Shaolin'.

Perhaps a Cantonese re-issue deleted the scene.

The only things Media Blasters did with the audio tracks were creating English 5.1s

I remember Gfanikf saying that, but thought Celestial wouldn't have allowed it and provided their own. Interesting.

[Bronx Rican]

ORIGINAL DUB (DVD):

Leng: "I was ambushed. Iron Robe nearly got me."

Li: "The bastard."

Li: "Those bastards!"

Yang: "That just shows what they're like."

Hai: "...but only I could guess how."

Li: "Nonsense."

Hai: "Right... all nonsense.

'NONSENSE' DUB (TV?):

Leng: "I was ambushed. Iron Robe nearly got me."

Li: "Nonsense."

Li: "Nonsense."

Yang: "That just shows what they're like."

Hai: "...but only I could guess how."

Li: "Nonsense."

Hai: "Right... all nonsense.

Got it? The dub is intact on the DVD. The "classic" dub we all know is not intact; someone sampled the word "nonsense" from the above scene with Hai Tao and used it to replace "bastard" and "bastards" in the other two scenes. That's all. Two whole words out of the entire film. I've said all this. We went 'round in circles here because folks are not reading everything we type. Trained ears are not required here, but if we can't tell just by listening, I can't help you guys anymore.

[inframan]

All right you BASTARDS this thread is turning into a bunch of NONSENSE over a couple words.

[Richard York]

I see. Sorry to hear that you are no longer with them.

Don't be!

On the Cantonese dub, James Lee mentioned it in his review.

I remember Gfanikf saying that, but thought Celestial wouldn't have allowed it and provided their own. Interesting.

Thanks. I knew it was somewhere on that TEN TIGERS disc. The 5.1s (only on the English tracks) were a sales decision, figuring it would add to the "perceived value of the product" (sales people think in these sorts of phrases). I wasn't in love with the idea but went along with it...with the exception of BLACK MAGIC 2 and MARTIAL CLUB, whose English dubs weren't provided by Celestial, therefore audio efforts were focused on the clean-up and editing.

KID WITH THE GOLDEN ARM doesn't have one because it was already running late and I told them scrapping the 5.1 would save them a couple of weeks, and some money. I also told them that no one cared about 5.1s anyway. But then again, I told them that from the very beginning.

Anyway, yes, creation of the 5.1s was run by and approved by Celestial.

[KUNG FU BOB]

Don't be!

Hope you have a new gig, something that you're finding a better fit. Will you be working in the same field, or involved in more genre product?

I also told them that no one cared about 5.1s anyway. But then again, I told them that from the very beginning.

Good to know someone was listening!

[blue_skies]

does anyone know anything about an alternate cut on this US release? Also what is different?

[blue_skies]

does anyone know anything about an alternate cut on this US release? Also what is different?

:ooh:Anyone?

[masterofoneinchpunch]

:ooh:Anyone?

It was mentioned earlier in this thread and in another thread (quoted at the bottom). I had not trouble finding it, though I would have to bring my disc in to work to remember where it was. I did mention another easter egg, which I quote at the bottom.

Hi,

I was supervising production on the Shaw titles for Media Blasters. I am no longer with the company. But THE KID WITH THE GOLDEN ARM was the final regular Shaw release I oversaw. As usual, I can't speak for its lateness, but I can tell you that the release holds up nicely and should please those of you eagerly awaiting its arrival. Not to spoil the surprise for you Easter Eggheads out there, but there are two versions of the film. The main feature is the recent Celestial remaster, the one considered to be out of sequence. The "hidden" feature (which isn't that hard to find) contains a re-edit of the sequence in question which many are familiar with via previous video releases, available in both English and Mandarin with English subtitles.

...Richard York

Did you find the other easter egg where the arm highlights gold on the "extras" screen? (one of those screens that displays the lead character). Not a great extra, but was fun to find.

1 problem with this release:

Celestial remastered a scene out of sequence...

When Copper Head arrives through the tunnel dug by the 7 Deadly Hooks member played by Wu Han-Sheng, Iron Armour makes off with with the gold leaving him to battle Long Axe, Short Axe and Hu Wei,

while Hai Tao stowes away beneath the cart and causes the back wheel to break off. Iron Armour Wang Lung-Wei then shoots off a flare as a signal while Hai Tao instigates a duel.

At this point the 7 Deadly Hooks member played by Lu Chian-Ming rushes in during the fight and announces #3 just sent a signal.

On the DVD it is reversed and the Deadly Valley gang are alerted before the cart is damaged or the signal is even sent! Only after Copper Head's demise and Golden Arm Kid's arrival does the film revert back to the broken cart sequence.

The scenes should switch back and forth between the battle and the cart of gold, but the battle is kept lengthy and the Kuo Chui/Wang Lung-Wei sequences are shown together (ending with a clear view of blood spurting from Wang Lung-Wei's groin after being impaled by Kuo).

Hopefully if DD or MB obtains this film in the future this oversight will be corrected.

No original trailer, just a nicely edited Celestial home video promotional trailer!

location: http://www.kungfucinema.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2995

[blue_skies]

It was mentioned earlier in this thread and in another thread (quoted at the bottom). I had not trouble finding it, though I would have to bring my disc in to work to remember where it was. I did mention another easter egg, which I quote at the bottom

location: http://www.kungfucinema.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2995

Thanks. Maybe you're better at searching than I as I had no luck in all the other Kid with the Golden Arm threads and didn't want to have to go through 23 pages here that may or may not have an answer. I was beginning to think that it was a myth has no one posted a response.

just to be clear the "extra" shows sequences in the correct order?