Jump to content

Question: How many Blond Ambition shows were filmed?


material_boy

Recommended Posts

:lol:

There's actually leaks of Nice and The Virgin Tour DVD's, supposedly they are not laserdisc rips but the actual versions planned for release on DVD.

A number of these appeared on eBay a few years back for stupid amounts of money. Supposedly in-house DVDs to "show WB execs what they had in the archives" Amusingly, they look exactly like (good) laserdisc copies.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yep the CT dancers told us in London they had to go to Wembley Arena early one day during the tour cos they were gonna film Jump in the afternoon with cameras on the stage throughout. Something that wouldn't have worked during the live shows!

Ah, thanks for this info! Makes perfect sense ... as Gus mentioned, there are some close-ups on the CT DVD which appear suspicious ... This explains a lot.

I always thought they were outtakes from IGTTYAS?

not at all they were clearly from lisbon

i rememer when they leaked back in 2005/2006

IGTTYAS footage is from Paris shows.

I know this is a little off-topic, since this thread is really about BAT footage, but ... I remember the "Burning Up" and "Die Another Day" RIT footage surfaced as part of some French mobile promotion, right?

I think -- at the time of 'release' (such as it was, very limited) -- I thought it was Lisbon footage, but ... I suppose that would be hard to prove by the outfits for BU and DAD... they weren't very different between Paris and Lisbon, as far as I know. The dead giveaway for Paris vs. Lisbon footage is the corset color in the opening section -- that lilac color for Paris, the champagne color (which was worn more often) for Lisbon.

I always thought the IGTTYAS footage was from Paris, too -- Akerlund-filmed -- but didn't someone produce screen caps as evidence to the contrary? That the footage in IGTTYAS is really Lisbon footage with a color-corrected corset? (Would that mean that the "Vogue" and NKM footage in IGTTYAS is really from the Hamish Hamilton production? Or -- my mind is slipping about all this now -- was Hamilton out already by the time of the Lisbon concert? Or was he involved all the way through filming, then things fell through with CBS? Gosh, I used to be able to keep all this clear in my head. Memory's getting bad.)

I know that last paragraph sounds a bit bizarre, but I remember the post about it was quite convincing. I was shocked. Remembered thinking the part in her hair looked just slightly different in Paris than it did in Lisbon. And she had those sparkly adhesive gems on her bicep in Paris, right? Perhaps I'm confusing things, but I do recall someone posted about this and made a very persuasive argument that the footage in IGTTYAS may not be strictly Paris.

***EDIT*** It was Hector (of course! :brenspin: ) who presented the side-by-side comparisons for IGGTYAS vs. the Lisbon footage... check this thread from 5 years ago:

http://forums.madonnanation.com/index.php?showtopic=29886&page=12

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest bluejean

A number of these appeared on eBay a few years back for stupid amounts of money. Supposedly in-house DVDs to "show WB execs what they had in the archives" Amusingly, they look exactly like (good) laserdisc copies.

Oh. Well we have this shit in HQ from laserdiscs anyway. So it probably doesn't even matter if they never release it. But I'm sure there are plenty of people who would buy them and it would cost very little to just release that shit like they did WTGT and TGS when DVD's first hit the market.

I mean let's face it, they are NEVER going to find those Paris tapes or do anything that takes effort so just release it for God sake. Then those fans that don't know how/where to get the stuff can just enjoy it in good quality.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The IGTTYAS footage IS from Paris.

BUT, Jonas did use a few angles from Lisbon for Vogue.

oh nvm, just noticed your edit

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ah, thanks for this info! Makes perfect sense ... as Gus mentioned, there are some close-ups on the CT DVD which appear suspicious ... This explains a lot.

I know this is a little off-topic, since this thread is really about BAT footage, but ... I remember the "Burning Up" and "Die Another Day" RIT footage surfaced as part of some French mobile promotion, right?

I think -- at the time of 'release' (such as it was, very limited) -- I thought it was Lisbon footage, but ... I suppose that would be hard to prove by the outfits for BU and DAD... they weren't very different between Paris and Lisbon, as far as I know. The dead giveaway for Paris vs. Lisbon footage is the corset color in the opening section -- that lilac color for Paris, the champagne color (which was worn more often) for Lisbon.

I always thought the IGTTYAS footage was from Paris, too -- Akerlund-filmed -- but didn't someone produce screen caps as evidence to the contrary? That the footage in IGTTYAS is really Lisbon footage with a color-corrected corset? (Would that mean that the "Vogue" and NKM footage in IGTTYAS is really from the Hamish Hamilton production? Or -- my mind is slipping about all this now -- was Hamilton out already by the time of the Lisbon concert? Or was he involved all the way through filming, then things fell through with CBS? Gosh, I used to be able to keep all this clear in my head. Memory's getting bad.)

I know that last paragraph sounds a bit bizarre, but I remember the post about it was quite convincing. I was shocked. Remembered thinking the part in her hair looked just slightly different in Paris than it did in Lisbon. And she had those sparkly adhesive gems on her bicep in Paris, right? Perhaps I'm confusing things, but I do recall someone posted about this and made a very persuasive argument that the footage in IGTTYAS may not be strictly Paris.

Yes! I remember them first appearing on that mobile site.

Certain individual shots from Vogue in Lisbon found their way into the IGTTYAS footage with a colour-corrected corset. Not a lot though. Presumably they didn't catch specific shots they wanted or something was up with the footage.... 'Imagine' in IGTTYAS is entirely Lisbon though. I don't think they shot that song in Paris at all, thinking they wouldn't use it in the movie.

The giveaway for Lisbon footage are two banks of lights either side of the stage that appeared at no other dates. Presumably just to jazz the sparse RIT stage up a bit/provide some additional light for the cameras (same thing for Confessions Tour in London) Also Jonas' stylistic choice for filming IGGTYAS seemed to involve entirely static cameras that never move whereas the (final) Lisbon footage has many constant flying crane shots.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh. Well we have this shit in HQ from laserdiscs anyway. So it probably doesn't even matter if they never release it. But I'm sure there are plenty of people who would buy them and it would cost very little to just release that shit like they did WTGT and TGS when DVD's first hit the market.

I mean let's face it, they are NEVER going to find those Paris tapes or do anything that takes effort so just release it for God sake. Then those fans that don't know how/where to get the stuff can just enjoy it in good quality.

BA just stunk of a rush release anyway. They didn't even bother post producing the sound. Just stuck the awful HBO mix on there with a few different camera angles. I've no doubt that (like everything else) no one knows where any of those master tapes are. They could probably formulate a half-decent DVD of the Nice show if they went back to the original elements.

VT, I guess they didn't see the point in putting out a 55 minute concert on DVD and it's not like they're gonna restore the lost songs or anything. I think that even Ciao Italia is now out of print. They just don't care.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh. Well we have this shit in HQ from laserdiscs anyway. So it probably doesn't even matter if they never release it. But I'm sure there are plenty of people who would buy them and it would cost very little to just release that shit like they did WTGT and TGS when DVD's first hit the market.

I mean let's face it, they are NEVER going to find those Paris tapes or do anything that takes effort so just release it for God sake. Then those fans that don't know how/where to get the stuff can just enjoy it in good quality.

I'd be thoroughly disappointed if they put out a shit dvd releases for these, which wouldn't surprise me. They would end up using a single layer DVD with a lower bitrate than the laserdisc with no effort in remastering anything.

I want these releases to be done justice. And I'd like to think that Madonna and co. would too. Thebeatswithin did say that whenever M comes in contact with her previous collaborates, she'w always asking them if they have tapes of her unreleased recordings. I know that has to do with music. But on reddit she did say she was still "looking for the tapes," in regards to the tour releases. So I like to think she's looking for the BAT Paris footage. I believe Alek did say those reels were handed over to Madonna at one point in time....

Just wishful thinking ;/

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'd be thoroughly disappointed if they put out a shit dvd releases for these, which wouldn't surprise me. They would end up using a single layer DVD with a lower bitrate than the laserdisc with no effort in remastering anything.

I want these releases to be done justice. And I'd like to think that Madonna and co. would too. Thebeatswithin did say that whenever M comes in contact with her previous collaborates, she'w always asking them if they have tapes of her unreleased recordings. I know that has to do with music. But on reddit she did say she was still "looking for the tapes," in regards to the tour releases. So I like to think she's looking for the BAT Paris footage. I believe Alek did say those reels were handed over to Madonna at one point in time....

Just wishful thinking ;/

Watch them release it on Tidal :lmao:
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The footage from Truth or Dare should be released as whole on Bluray.. the Nice and Japan shows are okay but they don't have the dynamic colors, the sweeping crowd shots, nor the intensity this footage brings..The HBO recording is ok but this is much better

Link to comment
Share on other sites

i thought her gardener filmed lisbon reinvention tour and she didnt' like it very much....and had problems with the company that did it and they sued her....

anyway,for blond ambition - they could sell all of the different cities in one box set!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So I like to think she's looking for the BAT Paris footage. I believe Alek did say those reels were handed over to Madonna at one point in time....

Just wishful thinking ;/

That was Japanese commercial footage they found and handed over. Maybe the elephant or the dragon stuff (and probably got flung in a dumpster the next day by Guy's assistant or something...) He said they couldn't even find an original print of the movie, nevermind the actual film negative. It's shocking really.

At this point i would wait 10 years to have the proper bluray with thr paris footage than having the nice onwe had for ages

Realistically, it would be one of the TV concerts though.

Paris footage belongs to several different entities, what's in the movie probably couldn't appear in any other format. So they'd need to scrape together a different 'Express Yourself' etc using footage not seen in the film. We're dealing with a motion picture here. Someone can't just step up and say "hey I wanna take some of the footage from that movie and put out my own brand new version". It's copyrighted material.

Remember she wanted to use a tiny clip from Truth or Dare in IGTTYAS, and they wanted megabucks from her?

Its like, to use a silly example, Sly Stallone deciding he wants to put out a Blu-ray of all the boxing footage from Rocky after acquiring a bunch of original film negatives from somewhere. That's great, he can do that, using unused footage, but not using the original footage from Rocky that belongs to Fox or Paramount or whoever.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

i thought her gardener filmed lisbon reinvention tour and she didnt' like it very much....and had problems with the company that did it and they sued her....

Hamish Hamilton was set to direct it, but dropped out after the CBS deal fell through. He later sued for not being compensated for per-production work. Jonas Akerlund later stepped up to the plate to do the Lisbon recording.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That was Japanese commercial footage they found and handed over. Maybe the elephant or the dragon stuff (and probably got flung in a dumpster the next day by Guy's assistant or something...)

For real?!? That wasn't what he was referring to when he said "Unfortunately, it was handed over to her management so I don’t know," was it???

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hamish Hamilton was set to direct it, but dropped out after the CBS deal fell through. He later sued for not being compensated for per-production work. Jonas Akerlund later stepped up to the plate to do the Lisbon recording.

No Jonas didn't film Lisbon. Christian Lamb, who was the in-house director for the RIT screens did. I THINK he also directed the Koko live Confessions promo show.

For real?!? That wasn't what he was referring to when he said "Unfortunately, it was handed over to her management so I don’t know," was it???

In the screening Q&A? That's what he says. They found some footage from the commercial they shot for Japan and handed it over to her management.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That was Japanese commercial footage they found and handed over. Maybe the elephant or the dragon stuff (and probably got flung in a dumpster the next day by Guy's assistant or something...) He said they couldn't even find an original print of the movie, nevermind the actual film negative. It's shocking really.

Realistically, it would be one of the TV concerts though.

Paris footage belongs to several different entities, what's in the movie probably couldn't appear in any other format. So they'd need to scrape together a different 'Express Yourself' etc using footage not seen in the film. We're dealing with a motion picture here. Someone can't just step up and say "hey I wanna take some of the footage from that movie and put out my own brand new version". It's copyrighted material.

Remember she wanted to use a tiny clip from Truth or Dare in IGTTYAS, and they wanted megabucks from her?

Its like, to use a silly example, Sly Stallone deciding he wants to put out a Blu-ray of all the boxing footage from Rocky after acquiring a bunch of original film negatives from somewhere. That's great, he can do that, using unused footage, but not using the original footage from Rocky that belongs to Fox or Paramount or whoever.

I understand

But that still the best footage of the tour

I would imagine that there will be one point on the very far future that they will start milking her catalog/career and hopefully they can use that footage , maybe for her hologram tour

Link to comment
Share on other sites

BA just stunk of a rush release anyway. They didn't even bother post producing the sound. Just stuck the awful HBO mix on there with a few different camera angles. I've no doubt that (like everything else) no one knows where any of those master tapes are. They could probably formulate a half-decent DVD of the Nice show if they went back to the original elements.

BA Nice is a strange one because it was released by Pioneer back then and not Warner Music Vision (due to the tour sponsorship by Pioneer and a deal that the show would be issued exclusively on Laserdisc, which Pioneer were pushing hard back then).

It's to date the only official Madonna concert release that seems to have been mastered for release, in PAL. WMV mastered everything NTSC - including notably Girlie Show - which was shot in PAL and shown in native PAL on Sky TV in the UK, but all official releases are from an NTSC conversion.

The PAL BA Laserdisc is unconverted original PAL - and it would be interesting to know if the PAL master tapes of that show are still held somewhere (maybe with Pioneer?).

The in-house BA Nice DVD that has leaked is slightly interesting - it comes from the end of 2008 when there was a lot of speculation that her greatest hits end-of-warner release might co-incide with a bunch of other releases.

Then there's the Reliance Mediworks remaster of the show from a couple of years later. They were employed by Warners to produce a 16:9 remaster of the Nice concert and this also leaked out. Definitely signs of a plan to release on DVD IMO and I wonder why that never came to pass either?

My conclusion anyway with regards a future BA release is that we are getting Nice show in some form or other. And I'm not overly bothered about that (except that it will be nice for casual fans and others to enjoy). It will be a downgrade from the 1991 PAL Laserdisc in terms of picture quality.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The PAL BA Laserdisc is unconverted original PAL - and it would be interesting to know if the PAL master tapes of that show are still held somewhere (maybe with Pioneer?).

I just found correspondence I had with someone about the Reliance BA Nice remaster a few years ago - and it seems they did indeed have the PAL master to work from. And they got their source material apparently not from Warners or Pioneer but from "Music Guide Inc.".

I wonder if Madonna's management (outside of record companies) were arranging all of that?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

BA Nice is a strange one because it was released by Pioneer back then and not Warner Music Vision (due to the tour sponsorship by Pioneer and a deal that the show would be issued exclusively on Laserdisc, which Pioneer were pushing hard back then).

It's to date the only official Madonna concert release that seems to have been mastered for release, in PAL. WMV mastered everything NTSC - including notably Girlie Show - which was shot in PAL and shown in native PAL on Sky TV in the UK, but all official releases are from an NTSC conversion.

The PAL BA Laserdisc is unconverted original PAL - and it would be interesting to know if the PAL master tapes of that show are still held somewhere (maybe with Pioneer?).

I remember something in Icon magazine at the time stating that the original intention was some sort of mash-up type BA release with performances from different shows, but then at the last minute they decided on the HBO show. I wish I could track down the original quote.

Yes I remember the PAL issue being discussed before. I was wondering....if the GS DVD is from a PAL master converted to NTSC then re-converted again to PAL for the UK etc, then would the US GS DVD not have slightly better pic quality than the UK? Not as good as the untouched original PAL of course, but better. The Region 1 is missing the 2 track stereo mix of course which is another dumb WB decision. Also I imagine Ciao Italia was shot PAL as well? then doubly re-converted again.

The in-house BA Nice DVD that has leaked is slightly interesting - it comes from the end of 2008 when there was a lot of speculation that her greatest hits end-of-warner release might co-incide with a bunch of other releases.

I really don't know about that in-house BA DVD. It has this basic blue screen menu that looks like someone knocked it up on Nero or something with a date of the year 2000 on it. And the slight splice (during the disk turning) in the middle of the Dick Tracy speech is most definitely there. It does have better quality than the awful NTSC rips of the tour that have been floating around, but that wouldn't be hard.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I remember something in Icon magazine at the time stating that the original intention was some sort of mash-up type BA release with performances from different shows, but then at the last minute they decided on the HBO show. I wish I could track down the original quote.

Yeah I have that ICON magazine issue you're talking about - and someone from Pioneer says in a Q&A that they didn't know which show they were gonna be using up until "the last minute" and that they were originally going to include a mini documentary with clips from lots of different shows throughout the tour - but that copyright issues stopped that happening.

I will dig it out when I am home tonight if I remember.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes I remember the PAL issue being discussed before. I was wondering....if the GS DVD is from a PAL master converted to NTSC then re-converted again to PAL for the UK etc, then would the US GS DVD not have slightly better pic quality than the UK? Not as good as the untouched original PAL of course, but better. The Region 1 is missing the 2 track stereo mix of course which is another dumb WB decision. Also I imagine Ciao Italia was shot PAL as well? then doubly re-converted again.

Definitely the USA GS DVD would have superior picture quality to the PAL one. Although to the casual viewer this would be very slight.

I always preferred having the USA editions of any of the Madonna WMV releases over the years for that reason (CIao Italia, IC, 93-99 all look better).

On the flipside - many of the UK *promo* videos were way better quality than anything that was released, cos they used unconverted PAL versions of her music videos that were mastered originally in PAL (these have never been released to this date without an NTSC conversion).

Examples include JML, Frozen, RoL, Drowned World, Music.

There's a vivid difference between the PAL versions of these which aired originally on TV channels in Europe and were issued without conversion on UK promo videos - to the NTSC conversions that WMV eventually released!

Getting into Geek territory here tho.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hamish Hamilton was set to direct it, but dropped out after the CBS deal fell through. He later sued for not being compensated for per-production work. Jonas Akerlund later stepped up to the plate to do the Lisbon recording.

No, the Lisbon footage meant for the DVD was eventually directed by Christian Lamb. :)

He was also live video director on the tour, i.e. he directed the live footage shot for the venue screens.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes Msig, that's what I said.

Definitely the USA GS DVD would have superior picture quality to the PAL one. Although to the casual viewer this would be very slight.

I always preferred having the USA editions of any of the Madonna WMV releases over the years for that reason (CIao Italia, IC, 93-99 all look better).

On the flipside - many of the UK *promo* videos were way better quality than anything that was released, cos they used unconverted PAL versions of her music videos that were mastered originally in PAL (these have never been released to this date without an NTSC conversion).

Examples include JML, Frozen, RoL, Drowned World, Music.

There's a vivid difference between the PAL versions of these which aired originally on TV channels in Europe and were issued without conversion on UK promo videos - to the NTSC conversions that WMV eventually released!

Getting into Geek territory here tho.

No. This stuff is interesting. It's my dream that some of those PAL shows turn up on some digital channel at some point. I know the BBC advertised a screening of BA Barcelona on BBC2 round about the Music era and it ended up being the damn NICE show they showed. I was so pissed off. I'd love a digital quality rip of that show and the Girlie Show PAL version.

Well I'm gonna upgrade all my earlier DVDs to Region 1, I've always been meaning to, even if the difference is only slight.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Btw, do we even know who directed the released BAT footage, apart from the footage shot for ToD?

EDIT:

Yes, we do. :)
The Nice footage was directed by David Mallet and the Yokohama footage was directed by Mark Aldo Miceli.

I don't know about the Barcelona show, though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Btw, do we even know who directed the released BAT footage, apart from the footage shot for ToD?

EDIT:

Yes, we do. :)

The Nice footage was directed by David Mallet and the Yokohama footage was directed by Mark Aldo Miceli.

I don't know about the Barcelona show, though.

Mallet and Miceli co-directed both Barcelona and Nice. It's easy to spot the Aldo footage as it comes from his screen filming on slightly different video stock.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Mallet and Miceli co-directed both Barcelona and Nice. It's easy to spot the Aldo footage as it comes from his screen filming on slightly different video stock.

Interesting, I didn't know that!

I just noticed that the official LaserDisc releases credit Mallet for Nice and Miceli for Barcelona. There's so much confusion regarding some of M's releases.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Interesting, I didn't know that!

I just noticed that the official LaserDisc releases credit Mallet for Nice and Miceli for Barcelona. There's so much confusion regarding some of M's releases.

It was the same crew that did both shows. As well as Barca being the live broadcast for Europe, it was also a back-up in case something went wrong with the HBO NIce show. They're both filmed very similarly...camera angle wise, although NIce was edited better both on the night of broadcast, and in post production. Micelli gets credit as "co-director" on both end titles. He of course went on to shoot the Girlie Show by himself.

edit- Yokohama, yes, that was Miceli himself too. Very similar in style to the screen footage he directed throughout the tour.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...