Jason and the Argonauts - Criterion Collection Laserdisc Preservation

The Criterion Collection, a continuing series of important classic and contemporary films, presents

Jason and the Argonauts is Ray Harryhausen’s magnum opus. Scene for Scene, shot for shot, and thrill for thrill, it is the best scripted, best acted, and most briskly paced of the renowned fantasy filmmaker’s 15 features.

Set against the Greek Age of Heroes, Jason and the Argonauts embraces the vibrant spectacle of the finest historical epics, the fantasy and the lyricism of the Greek legends, and the sometimes gentle, occasionally biting charm of a modern literary sensibility. It is all neatly bound together by Beverly Cross and Jan Read’s clever, insightful script, Don Chaffey’s taut direction, and of course, Harryhausen’s dazzling special effects.

SPECIAL FEATURES Audio commentary by Ray Harryhausen and film historian Bruce Eder

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Exclusive digital transfer of animation tests from “The Elementals”

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Original theatrical trailers for Jason and the Argonauts

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Original theatrical trailers for It Came from Beneath The Sea, The Earth verses the Flying Saucers, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger

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Original title sequence

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Storyboards, sketches, lobby cards, casting notes and memos on deleted scenes

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An inside look at creating the “Skeleton” and “Hydra” sequences

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Close-up photos of Harryhausen models from the Forrest J. Ackerman Collection

Audio: English PCM 1.0 Mono / Dolby Digital Audio Commentary Subtitles: English / French / German / Spanish Main title: 1080p Supplementary material: 480p Laserdisc source

1963 104 MINUTES COLOR MONO 1.33:1 ASPECT RATIO JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS is under exclusive license from Columbia Tristar Home Entertainment TM ® © 2019

by Columbia Tristar Home Entertainment. All Rights Reserved. © 2019 The Criterion Collection.

All Rights Reserved. Cat. no.

CC1303L. ISBN 1-55940-258-X. Warning: unauthorized public performance, broadcasting, or copying is a violation of applicable laws. Printed in the USA. First printing 2019.

1963

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BLU-RAY EDITION

The Criterion Collection is dedicated to gathering the greatest films from around the world and publishing them in editions of the highest technical quality, with supplemental features that enhance the appreciation of the art of film. Visit us at Criterion.com

Design and Layout - pineapples101@gmail.com

LD 160

The Criterion Collection, a continuing series of important classic and contemporary films, presents

Jason and the Argonauts is Ray Harryhausen’s magnum opus. Scene for Scene, shot for shot, and thrill for thrill, it is the best scripted, best acted, and most briskly paced of the renowned fantasy filmmaker’s 15 features.

Set against the Greek Age of Heroes, Jason and the Argonauts embraces the vibrant spectacle of the finest historical epics, the fantasy and the lyricism of the Greek legends, and the sometimes gentle, occasionally biting charm of a modern literary sensibility. It is all neatly bound together by Beverly Cross and Jan Read’s clever, insightful script, Don Chaffey’s taut direction, and of course, Harryhausen’s dazzling special effects.

SPECIAL FEATURES l l l l

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Audio: English PCM 1.0 Mono / Dolby Digital Audio Commentary Subtitles: English / French / German / Spanish Main title: 1080p Supplementary material: 480p Laserdisc source

1963 104 MINUTES COLOR MONO 1.33:1 ASPECT RATIO JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS is under exclusive license from Columbia Tristar Home Entertainment TM ® © 2019

by Columbia Tristar Home Entertainment. All Rights Reserved. © 2019 The Criterion Collection.

All Rights Reserved. Cat. no.

CC1303L. ISBN 1-55940-258-X. Warning: unauthorized public performance, broadcasting, or copying is a violation of applicable laws. Printed in the USA. First printing 2019.

1963

l

Audio commentary by Ray Harryhausen and film historian Bruce Eder Exclusive digital transfer of animation tests from “The Elementals” Original theatrical trailers for Jason and the Argonauts Original theatrical trailers for It Came from Beneath The Sea, The Earth verses the Flying Saucers, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger Original title sequence Storyboards, sketches, lobby cards, casting notes and memos on deleted scenes An inside look at creating the “Skeleton” and “Hydra” sequences Close-up photos of Harryhausen models from the Forrest J. Ackerman Collection

BLU-RAY EDITION

The Criterion Collection is dedicated to gathering the greatest films from around the world and publishing them in editions of the highest technical quality, with supplemental features that enhance the appreciation of the art of film. Visit us at Criterion.com

Design and Layout - pineapples101@gmail.com

LD 160

The Criterion Collection, a continuing series of important classic and contemporary films, presents

Jason and the Argonauts is Ray Harryhausen’s magnum opus. Scene for Scene, shot for shot, and thrill for thrill, it is the best scripted, best acted, and most briskly paced of the renowned fantasy filmmaker’s 15 features. Set against the Greek Age of Heroes, Jason and the Argonauts embraces the vibrant spectacle of the finest historical epics, the fantasy and the lyricism of the Greek legends, and the sometimes gentle, occasionally biting charm of a modern literary sensibility.

It is all neatly bound together by Beverly Cross and Jan Read’s clever, insightful script, Don Chaffey’s taut direction, and of course, Harryhausen’s dazzling special effects.

SPECIAL FEATURES Audio commentary by Ray Harryhausen and film historian Bruce Eder

l

Exclusive digital transfer of animation tests from “The Elementals”

l

Original theatrical trailers for Jason and the Argonauts

l

Original theatrical trailers for It Came from Beneath The Sea, The Earth verses the Flying Saucers, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad and Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger

l

Original title sequence

l

Storyboards, sketches, lobby cards, casting notes and memos on deleted scenes

l

An inside look at creating the “Skeleton” and “Hydra” sequences

l

Close-up photos of Harryhausen models from the Forrest J. Ackerman Collection

Audio: English PCM 1.0 Mono / Dolby Digital Audio Commentary Subtitles: English / French / German / Spanish Main title: 1080p Supplementary material: 480p Laserdisc source

1963 104 MINUTES COLOR MONO 1.33:1 ASPECT RATIO JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS is under exclusive license from Columbia Tristar Home Entertainment TM ® © 2019

by Columbia Tristar Home Entertainment. All Rights Reserved. © 2019 The Criterion Collection.

All Rights Reserved. Cat. no.

CC1303L. ISBN 1-55940-258-X. Warning: unauthorized public performance, broadcasting, or copying is a violation of applicable laws. Printed in the USA. First printing 2019.

1963

l

DVD EDITION

The Criterion Collection is dedicated to gathering the greatest films from around the world and publishing them in editions of the highest technical quality, with supplemental features that enhance the appreciation of the art of film. Visit us at Criterion.com

Design and Layout - pineapples101@gmail.com

LD 160

The evolution of Jason and the Argonauts began in the late 1950s, after the initial success of 20 Million Miles to Earth. Harryhausen and his producer, Charles Schneer, decided to get away from doing “monster-on-the-loose” stories and try something more ambitious. Their first opportunity came with The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, the first of Harryhausen’s color films. (“You just couldn’t do a Sinbad movie in black-and-white,” he said recently.) The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad was the first “Sinbad” movie that actually showed the fantastic elements of the Sinbad tales. (Ironically, Alexander Korda’s 1940 The Thief of Baghdad, which Harryhausen acknowledges as a major source of inspiration, had loads of special effects but only mentions Sinbad parenthetically.) It was a phenomenal success, appealing to children and their parents. Adaptations of Jonathan Swift’s The Three Worlds of Gulliver and Jules Verne’s Mysterious Island followed soon after and proved equally popular.

Creating a film based on classical Greek legends was one of Harryhausen’s long cherished goals.

With the exception of the 1954 Italian-made Ulysses, starring Kirk Douglas, nobody had ever adapted this material, which offered not only a vast canvas on which to unfold a story but fertile ground for Harryhausen’s imagination and animation skills. Jason and the Golden Fleece, as it was then called, led something of a charmed life, surviving an onslaught of cheap Italian “sword-and-scandal” movies at the beginning of the 1960s and the skeptics who didn’t think that the public was prepared to accept on screen the heroes, monsters, and deities of Greek legend.

The final script by screenwriter Jan Read and author/librettist Beverley Cross proved them wrong, and was itself a major triumph in the field of fantasy filmmaking—a straightforward version that also found room for moments of Shavian conceit (especially Niall MacGinnis’ scenes as a sly and whimsical Zeus) and instances of pure poetry (check out Michael Gwynn’s dialogue as Hermes).

Director Don Chaffey maneuvered his actors effortlessly between these elements and the surrounding action sequences. The cast, the largest and best of any Harryhausen film, included Americans Todd Armstrong as Jason and Nancy Kovack as Medea and some of the finest available British stage and screen talent (including MacGinnis, Gwynn, Honor Blackman, Nigel Green, Laurence Naismith, Jack Gwillim, and Patrick Troughton). They all carried themselves with dignity and gentle good humor.

At the center of the film and its appeal, however, was Ray Harryhausen and his special effects.

Ever since The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms in 1951, Harryhausen had made a career out of bringing to life creatures spawned in the deepest recesses of the ancient imagination, and the farthest reaches of natural history. Jason marked a major expansion of both the reach and grasp of his work, featuring at least five major sequences, any one of which could have been the high point of a career: Talos, the bronze giant, and his destruction; Phineas and the harpies (a sequence that owes a debt to an unrealized Harryhausen project called “The Elementals,” clips of which are included in the supplement to this disc); Triton and the Clashing Rocks, a scene doubly notable because it didn’t involve Harryhausen’s trademark stop-motion animation; the battle with the skeletons; and Jason’s battle with the Hydra.

Principal photography was completed in late 1961 and early 1962, in Greece, Italy and at Shepperton Studios in England. Harryhausen spent almost two years in post-production completing the special effects (animating the skeleton battle alone took four and a half months). Bernard Herrmann’s music—a radiant, declamatory heroic score—completed the picture, and Jason and the Argonauts was ready for release in June of 1963.

Alas, time was not kind to Jason and the Argonauts, and on subsequent reissues, the film’s color and brightness suffered, which, in turn, marred the impact of the special effects. The Criterion Collection laserdisc edition of Jason and the Argonauts features a new digital video transfer from the finest film source available, in its proper aspect ratio, and a digitally mastered soundtrack.

About the laserdisc transfer

This exclusive new digital film to tape transfer of Jason and the Argonauts was made from the best elements of the two existing archival interpositives. Ray Harryhausen was consulted during the transfer on how each scene should appear. For this edition Criterion has presented Jason in its original 1.33:1 full frame aspect ratio.

Phineas, blessed by the Gods with second sight, was condemned by Zeus to everlasting torment because he revealed too much to the mortals that sought his counsel.

THE ARGOS

PHINEAS AND THE HARPIES

THE CLASHING ROCKS

COLCHIS AND THE GOLDEN FLEECE

After refusing Zeus’s offer of a ship, Jason commissions the master shipbuilder Argos to construct a ship in the harbour of Iolcus.

VOYAGE MAP

The clashing rocks pose the last barrier to the east.

Once successfully navigated, though, the shifting rocks are forever still.

Having found the Fleece, Jason must defeat the never sleeping dragon that guards it: the Hydra.

THE BATTLE WITH THE SKELETONS TALOS

Allowed to land on “The Isle of Bronze” to replenish their stores, the Argonauts soon runafoul of the islands gigantic guardian, Talos.

VIDEODISC PRODUCTION CREDITS Producers, Curtis Wong & Bruce Elder Executive producer, Michael Nash Production assistance, Erik Christopher Loyer Film-to-video transfer supervision, Maria Palazzola Film-to-video transfer, Gregg Garvin, Modern VideoFilm Supplement transfer, David H. Bernstein, Pacific Ocean Post Commentary editor, Michael B. Schwartz Copy photography & audio production coordination, Mark Brems Videographic design, Julia Jones with Joseph Cotton Design consultation, Rebekah Behrendr

King Aeetes, enraged at Jason’s theft of the fleece, dispatches an army of skeletons to reclaim the prize and to destroy Jason.

The evolution of Jason and the Argonauts began in the late 1950s, after the initial success of 20 Million Miles to Earth. Harryhausen and his producer, Charles Schneer, decided to get away from doing “monsteron-the-loose” stories and try something more ambitious. Their first opportunity came with The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, the first of Harryhausen’s color films. (“You just couldn’t do a Sinbad movie in black-andwhite,” he said recently.) The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad was the first “Sinbad” movie that actually showed the fantastic elements of the Sinbad tales. (Ironically, Alexander Korda’s 1940 The Thief of Baghdad, which Harryhausen acknowledges as a major source of inspiration, had loads of special effects but only mentions Sinbad parenthetically.) It was a phenomenal success, appealing to children and their parents. Adaptations of Jonathan Swift’s The Three Worlds of Gulliver and Jules Verne’s Mysterious Island followed soon after and proved equally popular.

Creating a film based on classical Greek legends was one of Harryhausen’s long cherished goals. With the exception of the 1954 Italian-made Ulysses, starring Kirk Douglas, nobody had ever adapted this material, which offered not only a vast canvas on which to unfold a story but fertile ground for Harryhausen’s imagination and animation skills. Jason and the Golden Fleece, as it was then called, led something of a charmed life, surviving an onslaught of cheap Italian “sword-and-scandal” movies at the beginning of the 1960s and the skeptics who didn’t think that the public was prepared to accept on screen the heroes, monsters, and deities of Greek legend.

The final script by screenwriter Jan Read and author/librettist Beverley Cross proved them wrong, and was itself a major triumph in the field of fantasy filmmaking—a straightforward version that also found room for moments of Shavian conceit (especially Niall MacGinnis’ scenes as a sly and whimsical Zeus) and instances of pure poetry (check out Michael Gwynn’s dialogue as Hermes). Director Don Chaffey maneuvered his actors effortlessly between these elements and the surrounding action sequences. The cast, the largest and best of any Harryhausen film, included Americans Todd Armstrong as Jason and Nancy Kovack as Medea and some of the finest available British stage and screen talent (including MacGinnis, Gwynn, Honor Blackman, Nigel Green, Laurence Naismith, Jack Gwillim, and Patrick Troughton). They all carried themselves with dignity and gentle good humor.

At the center of the film and its appeal, however, was Ray Harryhausen and his special effects. Ever since The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms in 1951, Harryhausen had made a career out of bringing to life creatures spawned in the deepest recesses of the ancient imagination, and the farthest reaches of natural history. Jason marked a major expansion of both the reach and grasp of his work, featuring at least five major sequences, any one of which could have been the high point of a career: Talos, the bronze giant, and his destruction; Phineas and the harpies (a sequence that owes a debt to an unrealized Harryhausen project called “The Elementals,” clips of which are included in the supplement to this disc); Triton and the Clashing Rocks, a scene doubly notable because it didn’t involve Harryhausen’s trademark stop-motion animation; the battle with the skeletons; and Jason’s battle with the Hydra.

Principal photography was completed in late 1961 and early 1962, in Greece, Italy and at Shepperton Studios in England. Harryhausen spent almost two years in post-production completing the special effects (animating the skeleton battle alone took four and a half months). Bernard Herrmann’s music—a radiant, declamatory heroic score—completed the picture, and Jason and the Argonauts was ready for release in June of 1963.

Alas, time was not kind to Jason and the Argonauts, and on subsequent reissues, the film’s color and brightness suffered, which, in turn, marred the impact of the special effects. The Criterion Collection laserdisc edition of Jason and the Argonauts features a new digital video transfer from the finest film source available, in its proper aspect ratio, and a digitally mastered soundtrack.

About the laserdisc transfer

This exclusive new digital film to tape transfer of Jason and the Argonauts was made from the best elements of the two existing archival interpositives. Ray Harryhausen was consulted during the transfer on how each scene should appear. For this edition Criterion has presented Jason in its original 1.33:1 full frame aspect ratio.

Phineas, blessed by the Gods with second sight, was condemned by Zeus to everlasting torment because he revealed too much to the mortals that sought his counsel.

THE ARGOS

PHINEAS AND THE HARPIES

THE CLASHING ROCKS

COLCHIS AND THE GOLDEN FLEECE

After refusing Zeus’s offer of a ship, Jason commissions the master shipbuilder Argos to construct a ship in the harbour of Iolcus.

VOYAGE MAP

The clashing rocks pose the last barrier to the east.

Once successfully navigated, though, the shifting rocks are forever still.

Having found the Fleece, Jason must defeat the never sleeping dragon that guards it: the Hydra.

THE BATTLE WITH THE SKELETONS TALOS

Allowed to land on “The Isle of Bronze” to replenish their stores, the Argonauts soon runafoul of the islands gigantic guardian, Talos.

VIDEODISC PRODUCTION CREDITS Producers, Curtis Wong & Bruce Elder Executive producer, Michael Nash Production assistance, Erik Christopher Loyer Film-to-video transfer supervision, Maria Palazzola Film-to-video transfer, Gregg Garvin, Modern VideoFilm Supplement transfer, David H. Bernstein, Pacific Ocean Post Commentary editor, Michael B. Schwartz Copy photography & audio production coordination, Mark Brems Videographic design, Julia Jones with Joseph Cotton Design consultation, Rebekah Behrendr

King Aeetes, enraged at Jason’s theft of the fleece, dispatches an army of skeletons to reclaim the prize and to destroy Jason.

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Criterion Collection - Laserdisc Preservation Jason and the Argonauts #160 (1963) [CC1303L] https://www.lddb.com/laserdisc/22983/CC1303L/Jason-and-the-Argonauts Blu Ray - Region A/B/C DVD - Region All Audio: English PCM 1.0 Mono / Dolby Digital Audio Commentary Subtitles: English / French / German / Spanish Main title: 1080p Supplementary material: 480p Laserdisc source

Artwork Criterion Blu Ray Case - Inlay 273mm x 160mm Standard Blu Ray Case - Inlay 269mm x 148mm Standard DVD Case - Inlay 272mm x 182mm Criterion 4 Page Booklet - Exterior Fold down middle 240mm x 160mm Criterion 4 Page Booklet - Interior Fold down middle 240mm x 160mm Standard 4 Page Booklet - Exterior Fold down middle 235mm x 145mm Standard 4 Page Booklet - Interior Fold down middle 235mm x 145mm Blu Ray Disc Art 115mm x 115mm