This is a great month for this film. It is surprising that The Egyptian, being the epic blockbuster that it is by 20th Century Fox, was not released on DVD or Blu-ray sooner. Last week saw the release of a DVD, Blu-ray and of a complete soundtrack, which was presumed partially lost until very recently. These are an interesting releases considering all of them are limited in number and time.
Twilight Time makes The Egyptian their first HD release. According to Nick Redman's interview, the HD master was available at Fox and they must have had plans to release it themselves but somehow that plan never materialized. Hence the price is about 40 dollars but the quality of the film was supervised by Fox and should be good.
This glorious score has many fans and has been released many times but this is probably the best one yet. Concurrently, Varese Sarabande releases a two-CD album of the full score with this recap of the soundtrack's history:
"In 1990, Varèse Sarabande released a CD of the only score album that had ever represented this historic collaboration, but this was a studio recording done concurrently with the film's theatrical release. In 1998, conductor William T. Stromberg recorded a 71:00 album of music from The Egyptian with the Moscow Symphony Orchestra. In 2001, Film Score Monthly released a 72:00 CD of the music that had survived from the original film sessions. Now, finally, and for the very first time, we are thrilled to present the complete score from The Egyptian, adding more than 30:00 of previously-believed-lost music plus a selection of never -before-heard alternate cue variations. Taking advantage of both new mixing technologies and also a newly discovered source for the original music masters"
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| Director Michael Curtiz on the set |
This score is a unique example of collaboration between two master composers of Hollywood: Fox music department head Alfred Newman (All About Eve, The Diary of Anne Frank, The Robe, etc.) and independent genius Bernard Herrmann (Vertigo, Psycho, Citizen Kane, etc.), Alfred Hitchcock's favorite composer.
Another interesting aspect of the film is the cast. First, beautiful Gene Tierney, intelligent Peter Ustinov and last but not least, French star Bella Darvi who plays the part of evil beauty Nefer (a name that deceptively means "Beautiful in the inside and the outside"). Her life and career is a curiosity in itself. A "lost" star if there ever was one. She was Darryl Zanuck's mistress (her name is a portmanteau for DARryl and his wife VIrginia). Addicted to gambling, she finally committed suicide when she was left penniless).
At last The Egyptian came out of the Valley of the Kings. Praise Osiris!
That's all for today folks!
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