Dixiana (Roan)
Picture: C+
Sound: C+ Extras: C Film: B+
Dixiana is quite a mix of everything a
film could be. You have the silent film
influence and the feel of a live play.
It is also an early sound film that happens to be a musical. Add to that another surprise, the finale is
in color while the rest of the film is black and white. This all comes together to make the film
fascinating in that you don't know what's coming next.
For example, it's strange to see placards come up between
edits describing the action. For a
minute, I even thought there was a little Romeo and Juliet alliteration
concerning the protagonist having the last name of Montague, but it could have
been coincidental. It is no unlike
watching the recent feature film version of Moulin Rouge. Only this film does what it does less
clumsily than that film. Set in 1840's
New Orleans gives it a Gone with the Wind epic touch. The music score is great. It's top-notch from Max Steiner. It gave the film a lot of life and is one of
the best scores from that period. The
acting was mostly good, with intensity.
The star gave a Bette Davis-type performance only with a whiney voice
(which was annoying).
The love interest is a Pennsylvania Dutchman with a
fun-loving father and mother who takes verbal jabs at each other. The singing was integrated well and was not
used to the point of overkill where it would take you out of the story. The story centers on a circus performer in
love with a wealthy Virginian. The
subplots include the release of slaves and class prejudice. This gave the film some depth. Attached to the extras is: La Cucaracha, which won an Academy
Award for best comedy short. It's the
first 3-strip dye-transfer presentation of “Glorious Technicolor” in a live-action
film, made for roughly 4 times the cost of a normal short, but a landmark
beginning of the most successful color process of all time. It's set in a Mexican bar and runs for about
20 minutes. It's about 2 performers
competing with each other until they become singing partners.
The standard 1.33 X 1 image is descent, the print is a
little rough, but it was transferred well.
The color finale is in great shape.
This is 2-strip dye-transfer Technicolor footage, so the original
negatives are only going to look so good.
It's great to be able to run a comparison between it and La
Cucaracha's three-strip. They are
both in great shape, but you can see how good three-strip is. La Cucaracha makes good use of color
and composition. You can't compare it
with 1956 Ten Commandments or Wizard of Oz's color, but it is
still looks better than many of the other color formats used long after this
film was produced including Cinemascope and Panavision. Three-strip is just such a vivid and dynamic
color format. It really pops out at
you. I was receiving 5 mbps avg. on the
video, but the audio is still crisp and clear enough. There is some background noise, but the detail is definitely there. The audio was running at 192 kbps, which is
not much. There was enough room to
increase the bit rate, which would have been nice. The extras were a little lite.
The background in the notes are well done and informative/interesting. Otherwise, there are no extras and no
booklet included with the disc.
- Marcus Mazur
