The Gazette from Montreal, Quebec, Canada • 45

D-13 MKtW, Montreal, Thursday, July 20, 1989 Delays block Bethune opening again Seeing is believing in the case of compact-disc video format Canada's most ambitious film project, Bethune: The Making of a Hero, has been delayed again. Bethune has been cancelled for next month's Montreal's World Film Festival, festival vice-president Danielle Cauchard said yesterday. The $18-million Canada-China-France co-production has been plagued by financial and script delays since the project was launched by Montreal-based Filmllne International in April, 1987. The movie, starring Donald Sutherland as Dr. Norman Bethune, the Canadian surgeon who became a hero of China's Communist Revolution, was halted for the best part of last year, but shooting resumed in November in Montreal and Spain.

The film was then slated to have its gala world premiere at the Montreal festival opening on Aug. 24. But just two weeks ago, the film was shunted to the Sept. 4 closing position at the festival. Maurice Attias of Cine 360 the film's Canadian distributor, ascribed the latest delay to the fact that the music score probably won't be ready on time.

One film-industry source, however, said the latest delay was possibly a ploy by Sutherland and director Philip Borsos to shift Bethune to the mid-September Toronto film festival. Filmline'i Nicolas Clermont and Pieter Kroonenberg, the project's Canadian producers, could not be reached for comment. A launch date for Bethune has yet to be announced, but a fall date seems likely. Gazette, Canadian Press CDialogue Bernard Perusse Tim Simpson present PITIIOUNAH 31 LE FESTIVAL INTERNATIONAL DE LANAUDIERE L'AMPHITHtATRE DE LANAUDIERE (J0LIETTE) Radio et telivltion The Festival Orchestra conducted by Semyon Vekshtain (ft Le Prince Igor 1'mnmnMtlt 11 compact disc devotees mk have the same nightmare. Somehow the bubble will burst and something will come alone to take the place of their beloved CDs.

Compact-disc video technology combines visuals with CD sound. It will not make your CD collection obsolete, but it has an infuriating way of making It seem like small potatoes. Neither the hardware nor the software is widely available in Canada, but it's probably just a of time before the market embraces the CDV format. Sony, Yamaha, Pioneer and market CDV players here, and Philips has one in the U.S. Philips also has a software line of Video Classics, available here as imports, including Giselle by the American Ballet Theatre, Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake with Rudolf Nuryev and Margot Fon-teyn and Beethoven's Symphony No.

3 (Eroica) by the Orchestra of the 18th Century. Response excellent Polygram, which distributes London, Philips and Deutsche Grammophon classical CDVs, has imported 108 CDV titles through its special imports division for sale to interested dealers. It is also the first company to test the software waters here in the pop field. "The configuration has yet to catch on like compact discs, but in stores that have the hardware to demonstrate the videodiscs, the response has been excellent," says Leo da Silva of Polygram's catalogue marketing division. For consumers, though, it's the old chicken-and-egg story.

Few are buying the hardware because it's expensive and there is little software to use in it. Software is hard to find because few people have the hardware. "The quality on CDVs is mar- this system leaves the spectator breathless. The audio and visual quality is so good it almost blurs the artistic merits of the music. Even classical music, not generally noted for its visuals, offers some powerful camera work to complement the music.

Strauss's Don Quixote by the Berlin Philharmonic on Deutsche Grammophon is a perfect example. Films on CDV could keep a movie fan out of the theatres for good. Some films even have "surround sound." If there is a processor and a speaker in each corner of the room, the sound is distributed around the listener it comes from everywhere. Many top-name films on laserdisc retail in the U.S. for $29.95 -a steal.

Here you'll pay the import price $50 to $55. If laserdiscs are ever manufactured here, prices should go down. Pitfalls clear Some videodiscs also offer still images 100,000 can fit on one disc along with the moving images. Crystal-clear, slide-like pictures of the 1972 Apollo 17 mission can be viewed and selected with a remote control, and encyclopedia material is also available, making the format a solid educational tool. The pitfalls are clear.

Will video rental clubs willingly involve themselves with videodiscs after investing so much money in their videocassette stock? Will disposable rock videos really inspire the yen for ownership necessary to support the five-and eight-inch formats? Will retailers modify their display mats yet again for a new configuration? Most of all, given Canada's and particularly Quebec's traditional foot-dragging in the marketplace, will the whole phenomenon lose momentum before it has a chance to even get going? SATURDAY July 22 7:00 p.m. Co-produced with the Reseau FM stereo de Radio-Canada vellous, but reinvestment in new hardware is scaring off consumers," says Brian Robertson of the Canadian Recording Industries Association. Reinvestment is worthwhile for those with extra cash, because most CDV players can accommodate all formats: CD3s (three-inch "singles" with two to four songs), standard five-inch CDs and CDVs (the latter offering one song with video and three or four with audio only), eight-inch CDVs (with about 20 to 30 minutes of video) and 12-inch, two-sided CDVs, which can handle two hours of video and can fit a whole movie. Five and eight-inch CDVs are pretty well limited to pop, where short videos are the artistic currency. There are, for example, eight-inch video compilations by Stevie Nicks, Whitney Houston and Diana Ross.

The Beatles Live, featuring 1964 performances on the British Ready Steady Go TV show, at 20 minutes, also fits nicely on an eight-incher. But the most interesting use of the medium involves the 12-inch format, which offers not only pop music and movies, but entire opera, ballet and classical pieces, sometimes spread over two or three discs. Jean de la Durantaye, owner of Audiorama on St. Hubert favors the following setup: a Pioneer 1070 CDV player, which retails for about $1,000, two Spendor SA3 speakers, with amplifiers included, selling for $6,900 (ouch!) and a Pioneer 502 50-inch monitor, which goes for $6,000. Seeing and hearing anything on.

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