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Definitely looking forward to hearing about this one, although having bought both Criterion's and Masters of Cinema's blu-rays last year dampens the enthusiasm somewhat.

(Posted on Monday, May 23, 2011 at 12:12 AM)

It would be great to see a comparison between the Criterion release and the German edition, i have read the efforts that Torsten and his team put into the German release over on Home Theater Forums where he has section of the site where people can ask him questions.

By the way, what do you think of Criterion's The Thin Red Line release, whats been putting me off buying it is the fact they have a whole lot of HD extras on the same disc as the film and it strikes me that something surely has to give, all the reviews say it is flawless though but still something is putting me off buying it and it's likely the extras being on the same disc, now at AVS i have just seen some screencaps and by all accounts the Criterion seems to be better than the Fox European release so maybe they managed to cram five hours or so of HD material onto one disc. ( maybe its 260 minutes or more - don't know for sure )

(Posted on Monday, May 23, 2011 at 10:03 AM)

I think The Thin Red Line CC BD looks fantastic, Michael, but I don't have your critical eye.

(Posted on Monday, May 23, 2011 at 4:56 PM)

Great disc, I also received this one today! I personally didn't compare it to the Criterion, but Torsten Kaiser whose expertise I regard very highly worked on it. They created a new frame-by-frame restoration of the film which amongst other things stabilizes the image and even improves upon the Criterion BD. I also like the two audio options that are provided: A preservation soundtrack that presents the audio as it is and a restoration soundtracks that tries to present the film as Lang originally intended which includes completely silent sections (without any noise or hissing), both in DTS HD 2.0 Mono.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 24, 2011 at 1:10 AM)

I'll be interested to see a review of this, I noticed there was a German disc but didn't realise it was significantly different from the Criterion or MoC (which I bought only recently).

Do you have the other versions for comparison?

(Posted on Tuesday, May 24, 2011 at 2:00 PM)

I watched it yesterday, too and it was the first time I saw the film. I think on some occasions the restoration track really helps bring out Lang's selective use of sound, when single sound instances break the silence. This doesn't always work though, when the sounds themselves have quite some background noise. It also felt strange in some passages to have total silence, which can feel rather unnatural. But I think the restoration track definitely has its merits and it's great to have both audio options available on the disc.

As for the differences in the image restoration of this disc, I think one of the main differences is the stabilized image. Vertical movements of the image have been reduced if not eliminated in many sequences. Existing scratches and splices have also been removed and the gradation and density levels have also been further adjusted, which is shown and explained in one of the featurettes on the second disc. A lengthy explanation by Torsten can be found at: http://www.hometheaterforum.com/forum/thread/307172/m-1931-fritz-lang-80th-anniversary-restoration

(Posted on Tuesday, May 24, 2011 at 7:08 PM)

One addition to my last comment: The new BD is also more complete, because the used 35mm duplicate negative, which had been discovered in France, closes a lot of the gaps that previously existed in some takes. I just read this myself.

However I am thinking about buying the Eureka BD in addition to it. The new BD has a featurette comparing all known versions and shows the alternate takes from the British and French versions, but I'd like to watch the complete British version at some point. The Eureka also has two different audio commentaries that are not on the new BD.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 24, 2011 at 7:27 PM)