I bought Albela DVD (2001, Tips, NTSC) the other day. The menu has only "Play movie" option and "Play songs" option. I cannot select scenes from the menu. The worst of all, there is no subtitle. Does anyone know whether it is original DVD or pirate DVD? And is there a version with subtitle?

Not sure from hwere you bought. The original DVD has subtitles for the dialogues but not for songs. Its a double DVD set comes with a free DVD, which has songs from Tips films.

Thank you for the information, dvdunlimited. I bought it at a local store. I guess I bought a pirated DVD.

What's the run time of ALBELA??

I have (mostly rotten now) Tips, perhaps, 2nd release that has 'making of' and also has subtitles.
It did come with a free disc as well.

But, it's almost rotten now.
Luckily most or all of the main film is on top layer and hence I was able to back it up.
Backed up portion is 130 min aprox.
One portion of 18 min or so out of 24 min of extras is OK.
Another 24 min or so that seems like 'extras' is unwatchable.

Zulm review lists it as 165 min, the cover is different
and that version has no extras or subtitles.
http://www.zulm.net/modules.php?op=modl ... 65553573a3

Can anyone confirm what's the actual run time of main feature (film)
in first release and in the second release??

According to BBFC:



Hope this helps ..

Well, what I could recover from my disc is Chapters 1 to 16 aprox 66 min and chapters 17 to 28 aprox 60 min, making the main feature 126 min that looks complete.
Promos are 10 min, Tips attractions are 15 min and 'Making Of' is about 15 min (that doesn't play anymore).

Adding it all up makes it 165 min as listed in Zulm.net review and that's what this disc flashes (165:165:165) )at the end.

Has any one seen this film with extra footage, making it 137 min, 145 min or 165 min??

Just checked my DVD. The movie is 145 minutes long. And my DVD doesn't have any extra features.

Thanks Chenyang.

My copy seems complete at 126 min. May be it's not.

Could you please double check that it's the actual film that's 145 min
and not that 145 min time includes the songs that
may have been recorded again for the songs menu to work.

Thanks.

I liked this film and sure would like to see what I missed.

Rented Tips ALBELA, the first edition that Ali reviewed
and Chenyang stated his to be 145 min long.

The disc has suffered disc rot in 2nd layer and plays only 75 min.
73 min in the orig release (145 min version)
is 63 min in the 2nd release (126 min version).
(2nd knock to jackie when Aish is trying out hat)

So, orig version definitely is some 19 min longer of which
10 min is accounted for in the first half.

--------------------------------

Chenyang, check your disc that it's not by Media Dimension
one that sure will rot one day.
Most likely the newer batch is by 'other than Media Dimension'
as Media Dimension is no more.
If by any chance it's Media Dimension disc, better back it up quick,
before it rots.
(I'm willing to trade for your disc as it still works)

My disc is done by Media Dimensions. And unfortunately, there is already one rotten chapter in the middle. I checked my DVD in Power DVD and jump directly to the end chapter, so I knew it is 145 minutes though there is a rotten chapter in the middle.

P.S.

OK. I just successfully backed up the DVD in a new DVD-RW drive. Rana, please check your PM if you do want this DVD.

As Chenyang found out, 145-146 min is the orig Tips version. CC length of 3982 meters also indicates a film length of 145 min.

Later (subsequent batches) batches of Tips are considerably shorter than the orig 145 min version. Reason is obvious, Tips must have made subsequent batches from the orig DVD that itself had rotted by then and hence missed many (random) segments. One such version is the one that I had (126 min) which was difficult to play (& difficult to back up). Whenever there was a hitch in playing and you have to play tricks to continue, a few min of film goes missing even though player timer is continuous. This means the material is missing in the replicated disc itself.
(At one instance there are back to back songs as a result of abrupt cuts in the shorter version).

Missing scenes as compared to Chenyang's recovered back up are:

1) @ 28 min: Aish-Govinda motor cycle ride; Namrata Shrodhkar's friends tell her about Aish-Govinda. (330 sec)

2) @ 38 min: Govinda-Aish on motorcycle and motorbike breaks down. They hitch a ride on Bullock cart. (150 sec)

3)@ 90 min: MIsc scenes Aish Govinda Jackie. (300 sec)

4) @ 97 min: Misc (150 sec)

5) @ 112 min: Aish & dad decides to go back (360 sec)