For more information, contact Howie Stein, Zoetrope, at 415 788 7500.
American Zoetrope Launches DVD Lab
American Zoetrope and Francis Coppola have launched of a unique mastering facility signaling the company's entrance into DVD production. Located in San Francisco at its renowned North Beach headquarters, Coppola's innovative post-production house has a long history of mixing traditional film techniques and tools with emerging technologies. American Zoetrope's legendary standards will insure the highest quality masters with the fullest exploration of DVD's presentation options. Coppola's guidance and vision combine to create a DVD Lab that offers artistic and technical excellence, partnered with a filmmaker's sensibilities. Zoetrope facilities and services provide the creative edge in translating titles from the big screen to the sophisticated home theatre environment. Its full-service approach to clients' projects includes in-house telecine and a full sound re-recording studio, along with seasoned film professionals to organize and produce projects. Recently hired to work specifically with DVD Lab clients is J. Anthony Ruffo, a compressionist and author with extensive MPEG encoding and film experience. The DVD Lab's initial titles exemplify the range of film genres and budgets, which Zoetrope anticipates as its market. ""Fando & Lis,"" a surreal 1968 black-and-white cult classic directed by Alexandro Jodorowsky, was recently delivered for emerging San Francisco based DVD label Fantoma (www.fantoma.com). A long sought after dupe negative was discovered, restored and transferred in-house, then encoded and authored. Taking full advantage of the new medium's viewer options, Fantoma includes a French television documentary about the film and a newly recorded director's commentary track, edited and mixed at Zoetrope. Working in his own facility, director Francis Coppola guided the concept and design of the greatly anticipated ""Apocalypse Now"" DVD for Paramount Home Video. An additional sequence that did not appear in the theatrical release is included as a bonus to the widescreen presentation of the film, along with a DolbyÆ Digital 5.1 soundtrack. Release date for ""Apocalypse"" is anticipated to be November 1999. American Zoetrope continues to provide post-production for a wide range of exciting film projects, recently hosting Wayne Wang's ""Anywhere but Here"" for Fox/Searchlight Pictures and completing work on Sofia Coppola's feature directorial debut, ""The Virgin Suicides"" for Paramount Classics. Currently in-house is Walt Disney Pictures' upcoming release ""Bicentennial Man,"" directed by Chris Columbus. Zoetrope also offers screening, sound mixing, and comprehensive design and installation solutions for film post-production needs.