3D Films : The Man in the Dark (1953)

The Man in the Dark (1953)

Columbia's "The Man in the Dark" is one of the movies which kicked off the brief 50s golden age of 3D, released after "B'wana Devil" but before "House of Wax". This is one of only two 3D film noirs, the other one being "I, the Jury".
Edmond O'Brien is the imprisoned thief who volunteers for a risky brain operation to reduce his sentence but ends up with amnesia and thus can't remember where he stashed the loot. This doesn't sit very well with the cops, insurance investigators or his hoodlum ex-colleagues.
Beautifully restored and with excellent 3D, this is a decent little thriller in its own right with a genuinely terrifying climactic chase on top of a rollercoaster.
The myth that it was shot in only 11 days is perpetuated by the enclosed booklet but apart from that, the restorers and distributors, Screen Archives/Twilight Time, have done a great job.
Only 3,000 copies available!
Highly recommended.


"Make me a baby!
Make me a star!
Leave my coffin slightly ajar!"
- Lesley Gore

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)

I didn't like 3D then and I don't like it now.

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)

mgtbltp, so you came to the 3D Films board to tell us that? Thanks so much!

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)

You're welcome.

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)


After careful consideration of the well articulated dissent of 3D, I went ahead and got a copy of this movie anyway. There is little hope for many Golden Era 3D movies being released on Blu-ray, so I'll snag any I can find. And besides, I already have a poster for this one hanging in our movie room!

Thanks for the heads-up, ironjade!

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)

You're welcome.
The problem is that restoring a movie is only half the battle; persuading a distributor that they can sell it at a profit is the difficult part.
3D Archive is set to release Arch Oboler's "The Bubble" on Blu-Ray later this year. Although it's one of the worst movies in history, Robert Bernier's 3D Spacevision photography is amazing. He created what is probably the best out-of-screen sequence ever shot. I just hope it works on 3D tv as well as it did in the cinema.
"It Came from Outer Space" is long overdue for a 3D Blu-Ray release but Universal seem to have lost interest in it.
"Hondo" is in limbo and no usable 3D print of "Gog" exists.
There are still plenty of others which have survived intact but the will to put them into circulation is sadly lacking.

"Make me a baby!
Make me a star!
Leave my coffin slightly ajar!"
- Lesley Gore

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)


"Hondo" is available in a 3D DCP, so releasing it on 3D Blu-ray is only a matter of economics, but that's the big "if." I've heard that Warners was using "House of Wax" as a test to see if it's worth doing any more, and apparently, the sales didn't reach their minimum, so it doesn't look like we'll see "Kiss Me Kate" released in 3D any time soon. The problem is just one step beyond the general ennui for classic movies on Blu-ray. Taken as its one genre, classics, it's already a niche, and the subset of 3D, you're really getting into a rarefied world indeed! I'll get "The Bubble" to help support 3D Archive, and to help embolden them to release more of their titles.

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)

It doesn't help that many old 3D movies are pretty bad but even so, I'd watch them.

3D Archive have offered to restore "Flesh for Frankenstein", the other Spacevision, movie, but Paul Morissey apparently thought they should do it for free and not correct any convergence mistakes, so that too appears to have hit the buffers.
Last I read about Hondo was that after the death of Michael Wayne, the family had lost interest in the restoration.

Niche marketing would seem to be the way to go but then it becomes a matter of prying the movie rights loose from the owners who would rather sit on them for decades than actually do anything useful with them.

"Make me a baby!
Make me a star!
Leave my coffin slightly ajar!"
- Lesley Gore

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)


It doesn't help that many old 3D movies are pretty bad


Ditto for the new ones ;-)

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)



It doesn't help that many old 3D movies are pretty bad but even so, I'd watch them.


From the 3-D Film Archive page on 3-D Myths:


6. Too many bad movies killed off 3-D in 1950s.

Not true. There were exactly 50 movies made (in English) in 3-D during the Golden Age. While there were certainly some bad and mediocre films in this group (ROBOT MONSTER, CAT-WOMEN OF THE MOON, and HANNAH LEE, to name a few), there was also: KISS ME KATE, HOUSE OF WAX, DIAL M FOR MURDER, CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, and so on. The 3-D movies of the Golden Age were certainly no better or worse than any other group of films.



http://www.3dfilmarchive.com/home/top-10-3-d-myths

Re: The Man in the Dark (1953)

I agree that it wasn't the movies themselves which killed off 3D in the 50s but when it comes to selling them today the good ones are already owned by the major distributors and the remainder is a somewhat mixed bunch.
Even so I eagerly await "the Bubble" although if it's region coded I guess I'll be waiting even longer. The distributor also appears to have no interest in shipping outside the US and Canada which is a bit shortsighted.


"Make me a baby!
Make me a star!
Leave my coffin slightly ajar!"
- Lesley Gore
Top