Sad to read of the passing of the Godfather of Soul on Christmas Day.

His 'on wax' accomplishments aside, I'll always remember Brown for his fabulous score to Larry Cohen's BLACK CEASAR (1973). Impossible to forget the sight of The Hammer trucking down the street, dressed in the latest fines accompanied by The Godfather's cool as funk rhythms. Most Mobians will know that he also scored that same year's SLAUGHTER'S BIG RIP OFF.

Looking down his filmography at IMDB, it appears that he played himself in almost everything he was in, but has anybody managed to see the extremely obscure THE PHYNX (1970)??????

BBC Report

BLACK CEASAR Soundtrack CD
(worth getting for his superb rendition of Bodie Chandler and Barry de Vorzon's "Down and Out in New York City")

SLAUGHTER'S BIG RIP OFF Soundtrack CD

What the world REALLY needs is a legit release of the full T.A.M.I. SHOW, with Soul Brother #1 at his finest! Does anyone know whether the original video tapes exist, or only the kinescope they made for the theatircal relase?

Looks like such a DVD release is finally going to happen - details at this thread at the Steve Hoffman music forums. If you read through the thread, you'll see that there's still apparently some debate as to whether the original elements (videotapes that were transferred to 35mm) are still available.

Dave

RIP Godfather...
Once I attended a Blaxploitation film convention in Tarrytown NY. At the Saturday night hotel afterparty, I danced- to Brown's Down & Out in New York City (Black Caesar)- with Edy Williams. Fred Williamson was leaning against the bar, chatting with Antonio Fargas & Richard Roundtree. Rudy Ray Moore entered, followed by Jean Rollin & Brigette Lahaie. I didn't dream it.
If I had, there'd have been a kung fu fight against mobsters.

Good news indeed, espcecially seeing as the film has just been named to the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress!

I don't have the time to hunt and link to it, but apparently a regular poster at Home Theater Forum has figured out how to restore and rejuvenate kinescope material to the best resemblance of it's orignal "hot" video look. In the TV threads, there are links to examples of his work. Perhaps if all they have are film elements instead of the original tape, they should take them to this fellow.

In the UK they have a process called Vidfire, which is able to synthesize the missing frames digitally (pretty effectively on the early Doctor Who and Quatermass clips I've seen) However, since converting the UK kinescope standard of 25fps to 50 fps means approximating every other frame it may not be as daunting as a US version, which would have to convert 24fps to 60fps interlaced (but surely someone out there can figure this out)

This sounds like Kevin Segura and the LiveFeed process. It was used on the recent set of the three complete Ed Sullivan Show episodes on which Elvis appeared, and the results look pretty remarkable.

Dave