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Michael:

Just to be clear, who ever claimed that the look of CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD on Blu-ray was perhaps due to it having been originated on 16mm? I only ask because WAY back when (like over a decade ago), I put forward the theory that CITY *MIGHT* have been shot in Super-16 given the heavy grain on the original Anchor Bay DVD coupled with the fact that the aspect ratio was 1.85:1 vs. the 2.35:1 of Fulci's other films from this era. My comments were never meant to be applied to the Blu-ray, since Blu-ray didn't even exist way back when I first advanced the idea that CITY *might* have been shot in Super-16.

Robert Harris has since, in his review of the Blue Underground Blu-ray on hometheaterforum.com, cleared up the shooting format- CITY was actually shot in 2-perf 35mm, but apparently composed and obviously released in 1.85:1 as opposed to the normal 2.35:1 native aspect ratio of unmated (side-to-side in this case) 2-perf. This MIGHT explain what some folks have noticed re: the odd grain structure on CITY- it's basically a Techniscope image "blow up" to 1.78:1 with the sides cropped off. I haven't seen CAT yet so I can't comment on what may or may not be wrong with the image quality.

Vincent

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 3:01 AM)

Seeing the "full range" on screencaps provided here, I no longer think it looks like the utter disaster I was thinking before, based on the wonky screencaps I've seen on numerous other review sites (it's a shame the bigger sites don't provide the kinds of quality images you find at Cinema Squid, here, and other places—there really ought to be a standard) as well as the three initial shots you provided earlier. I actually think it looks quite good. I'm sure it could have looked a HELL of a lot better, though, so I'm a bit disappointed, but it's a definite improvement over the Anchor Bay DVD—particularly the range of color. I'm a defender of the City of the Living Dead BD, and this certainly does look similar. I'm sure I'll be pleased with this release (and at $15, it's not a huge loss if I wind up thinking it's bad). Best an Argento film has looked on BD yet, however? Man, I just don't get people sometimes. All the other US BDs look way, way better.

As for the film...I really think it's fantastic. Slow, plodding, yes—but ever since I first saw it, I thought of it as kind of an odd western-giallo hybrid. (Wasn't surprised to learn after seeing the movie that Argento had purposefully integrated spaghetti western elements into the film.) It probably is my least favorite of his classic gialli, but not my least favorite of his overall '70s and '80s body of work (barring The Five Days, which I have not seen): that designation goes to Pheonema.

Here's hoping for a top-notch Four Flies on Grey Velvet BD. I feel that film doesn't quite get the attention it deserves, probably due to its sketchy DVD release history. The private eye in that film is probably the most likable, well-written character throughout all of Argento's films.

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 12:20 PM)

I really gotta learn to better proofread before hitting that little "Submit" button. Pheonema? The hell did that come from?

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 12:24 PM)

I tend to think that it probably is "fake grain" but i would rather have fake grain than none at all, although having said that, i would rather they actually did some new 4K scans of the original camera negatives, i don't believe Blue Underground's labelling, does anyone. ?

Cat O' Nine Tails is one of my favourite Argento films as is Phenomena, i suppose it could be worse, i imagine the Arrow release will look worse still, thats usually the case with Arrow.

At least Argento films are getting a release on blu ray, and whatever anyone says there will always be an improvement on even the worst looking of his releases, the dvd editions tend to have many more issues of their own.

Where is all the Hitchcock releases on blu ray, here we are 5 years into the format and you can count the Hitchcock releases on one hand, same goes for many great classics, its a poor show.

I kind of wish they would just announce the release of a new format, a 4K format with 10 bit colour support and let's have a 3 terrabyte dual layer disc, all feasible right now, blu ray is so often a disappointment and thats generally because too many studio's are just using older masters, a new 4K format would have them committing to new masters because 2K outdated masters wouldn't be used.

In fact, call me a snob but i'd love to see a new format specifically remain a niche product, when things go mass market the quality sometimes suffers, still i suppose its a pipe dream, the studio's would rather we all downloaded and they see that as the future. ( i do not )

In fact, maybe that's why Warner try lower bitrates, they see the future as downloads and want to avoid re-encoding their releases for that market and thus keep them low as possible to re-use on a future download market, nah probably not but they could stop filtering and up the bitrates, it wouldn't hurt.

Oh and let me predict right now that when The Dark Knight Rises is released on blu ray that people will complain about the transfer at AVS forums, why you might ask, well Nolan is using IMAX cameras again but only for some scenes, this likely means the 35mm shot scenes get the DMR treatment and that is used for the blu ray release, i still think Batman Begins is superior to the overhyped The Dark Knight.

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 12:46 PM)

If these shots are anything to go by, I think Blue Underground may have its' most nasty looking release yet. I thought for sure that Manchester Morgue and Stendhal Syndrome would battle that one out for years on their own...

DVNR + Digital "Grain" would explain how it manages to look so damned pasty and noisy at the same time, and with only BU having managed to produce transfers of this nature, I'm more and more willing to believe the blame lies on whatever film lab is doing their transfers over in Rome. COTLD does look eerily similar (via stills anyway - I haven't seen CAT on BD yet), but I think it might be less obnoxious in the long run, if for no other reason that Fulci favored rather extreme close-ups that seem to have survived whatever strange temporal processing all of these BU Euro-Horror transfers have gone under.

Though I do feel some sympathy for licensors caught in this nasty situation, at some point it really SHOULD become their duty to make a new transfer. This is a bad transfer - I know people are cheering it on elsewhere, but let's face it, a lot of them don't have a clue (or do and simply don't care). Just compare this to New York Ripper or The Bird With The Crystal Plumage and it becomes obvious that something is rotten here. (I'm not totally convinced those are "reference" transfers either, but they're a hell of a lot closer than anything else BU has released so far.)

It pains me to say this, but the Super-16 sourced Media Blasters release of Beyond the Darkness looks worlds better than this crap in terms of detail and grain structure. (A shame it has a laundry list of problems otherwise...)

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 1:20 PM)

I think 4K is extreme overkill at home. A well-mastered Blu-ray looks stunning even on the largest home theater screen. Another problem with going 4K- most of the Digital intermediates being done nowadays (and for the past decade+) have been done at 2K resolution. NO WAY are the studios going to redo all of those at 4K. Plus all the films being shot digitally are mostly 2K excepting the ones shot on Red (and even many of those are FINISHED at 2K- i.e., THE SOCIAL NETWORK). The Arri Alexa seems to be becoming the digital camera of choice among the best cinematographers and it's either 2K or maybe 2.5K, so there's that to contend with, as well.

Vincent

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 6:06 PM)

There's been much talk of the various Argento Blu-rays from Blue Underground and Arrow using the same masters from Italy - but does anyone know who's actually producing those masters?

(I'm not going to send them letter bombs or hate-mail or anything, just curious. Are we sure they're all from the same company/studio, even?)

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 7:53 PM)

You might have a point there Vincent but technology doesn't stand still, from what i gather all of the Sony releases being released these days are from new 4K scans, that's assuming that interview with Mr Crisp was correct.

As for it being overkill for the home, i don't think so, not when you are talking projector sized screens, i'm sure in the good old Laserdisc and DVD days some people were probably saying they were good enough, i tend to go along with the idea that whatever gets you closer to the original film resolution is better and with the disc capacity and evolving technology i see 4K as being a real reality, downloads are not ready for the mainstream and won't be for a long time, blu ray probably has five more years, after that the studio's and hardware manufacturers will want a new format, 4K is the natural progression, make it backwards compatible with blu ray and hey presto. Display technology is moving towards 4K too and so it makes sense to have software to play on such displays.

Think ahead even further, imagine what we will have in 100 years, we won't be around but i don't for one moment think 2K or even 4K is the final thing, i see digital camera technology evolving way beyond what we currently have, my point being that technology does not stand still and the studio's who have been shortsighted in the past should be preparing for the future more than they are.

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 8:10 PM)

Uh...lots of folks were attributing COTLD's look to 16mm long before blu-ray came into existence.

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 8:17 PM)

Didn't mean to sound "snippy" there. But I do remember people on forums speculating such back in the day due to the extrememly grainy nature of the anchor bay dvd release (or more accurately I guess, the mpeg-2 sd transfer's attempt to "imitate" grain)

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 8:25 PM)

I really don't get how some call this the best Argento BD or best Blue Underground BD so far. While I was unsure with COTLD, I am quite sure by the looks of the available screenshots that "Cat" is based on a heavily DNR'ed master which has been artificially regrained later on. So many of the shots just have this very waxy look & feel to them that is typical for DNR, even if there is a layer of grain atop of it. Actually I think this waxiness is far more pronounced here than on COTLD, at least judging from the screenshots. Bear in mind I currently only own the COTLD disc. Seeing this transfer now strenghtens the assertion that the same has been done to COTLD.

Still, false grain/added noise is probably better than no grain at all. Just imagine how the transfer might have looked before. So maybe BU really did the best they could with what was available to them. At least I still prefer this look to the soft look of "The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue" (of which I only know the screenshots as well, as I skipped that release after seeing those screenshots).

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 8:30 PM)

With regard to the recreated opening titles, it almost seems as if the titles originally conformed into the negative were damaged or something of the sort and they had to go back to the camera neg for those shots.

Notice how on the Anchor Bay DVD the titles have incredibly high levels of dust and white (neg) scratches compared to the surrounding footage - they also seem to move at a very slow frame rate from what I recall. It almost seems like they had access to the original title mattes and attempted to redo the optical for the DVD, but that doesn't really make sense with regard to the BD since it would have been very easy to scan the titles, clean them up, and recomposite them into the image for the HD master.

I'd imagine they just decided digital titles would be easier and sharper and so took that route instead, the dirty bums.

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 10:20 PM)

Oh I agree re: technology constantly moving forward, Foxy, but I still think 1080P is the maximum one needs for home viewing, unless you're going to build an IMAX-size screen for your home theater (wouldn't that be nice?) :)

Let's also remember that while 4K is generally accepted as being the maximum resolution of 35mm film, nobody ever saw that resolution in a theater from 35mm. Even a print directly off the negative will lose resolution, then factor in gate-weave and other anomalies with projection, even really good projection.

Rather than upping the resolution, I think Blu-ray could be improved by offering say 4:2:2 10-bit color space, or anamorphically encoding 'Scope films so as to use all of the available pixels for the active image area, but I really do believe that 4K is overkill in home settings, even with large front-projection systems.

Vincent

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 10:25 PM)

Michael:

No doubt, I agree that 4K should be the mastering standard. My comments are soley regarding home presentation. A proper 1080P downconversion of a 4K master is stunning and I really don't see the need for more resolution in a home environment.

The real problem is going to be all of the 2K Digital Intermediates that have been created over the years (and continue to be produced). SPIDERMAN 2 was the first full 4K DI way back in 2004, there's really no excuse for them to keep using 2K at the professional level 7 years later.

Vincent

(Posted on Monday, May 30, 2011 at 10:49 PM)

This talk about massive DVNR and fake grain without ANY proof is a little funny, to say the least.
If one looks at ANY of the big hollywood movies that we know have massive DVNR, they all (that I have seen at least) have a LOT less sharpness and detailed image than ANY of BU "massive DVNR and fake grain" titles".

So if I get this straight. A small company releasing old low budget movies pays a lot of extra for DVNR and THEN adding fake grain, and magically get a much sharper and detail image than what big studies get on big budget films?

Do ANYONE see any logic in this?

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 12:02 AM)

Mattias: How's about I add a bunch of grain on top of a notoriously DVNR-riddled Hollywood Blu-ray, see how that stacks up?

Predator Ultimate Hunter Edition
Predator Blue Undergroundized

Looks pretty dang similar to all of BU's "questionable" titles, I think - a smeared, blurry image with a thick layer of noise laid on top has a way of not looking as blatantly "digital" as DVNR, and if these were older DVNRed transfers adding a layer of grit on top to distract the viewer from how pasty they were prior.

By the by, Michael's never claimed to be an expert on Italian telecine practices, or even said that DVNR + Digital Grain IS the problem. All we know for sure is that Blue Underground is lying to us about at least some of their source materials, and with the licensor's word being questionable, he's simply trying to understand why their releases have a consistently bizarre look.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 5:19 AM)

Matthias, don't you agree that the screencaps of "Cat" do have a smeary, waxy look? Just try not to look at the grain, but at the image itself. It has a very strange look, unnatural and not like film. On many occasions it does not have any detail, at least in the wide shots shown here. Without the grain it would look very similar to titles of which we know for sure that they have been DNRed.

I also don't think that it is BU who did the (potential) DNR and then regrained it. If true, these steps must have been applied at different stages by different people, at least that would make some sense. One thing to remember though is that the Arrow disc of COTLD had essentially the same look as the BU disc, just with lots of compression artefacts added. So that means that the grain/noise must have been already there as well when both received the master and cannot be the result of something BU did in order to try and make the best of an existing master. Or did BU and Arrow collaborate on COTLD?

Of course we don't know when those masters were done and how many people worked on them before they were transfered to BD.

One further note regarding Stendhal: The grain looks very strange on that one, too, but I don't think it looks smeary or waxy like "Cat". So I am not sure about that.

Then there is the different theory Michael just mentioned, which I remember already came up during the lengthy discussions following the COTLD release, about problematic transfer settings resulting in digital noise. This does sound plausible, too, and comes from people working in the profession.

So while this very much looks like DNR+false grain, we can't absolutely confirm this, but at least it seems clear that there is something inherently wrong with these transfers.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 8:17 AM)

Just look at Patton, Gladiator, or any other BD and one will see that they have softer image.
So unless someone really can put up some proof, I would say this is just internet gossip. Just like COTLD. We see the same people claiming things that they cannot back-up. I quote what Vincent said about COTLD "To be blunt, this is a STUNNING Blu-ray. There is NOTHING wrong with this Blu-ray. Folks who are seeing "problems" either have issues with their systems or have become brainwashed by internet hysteria."

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 8:23 AM)

Bobafett: "Matthias, don't you agree that the screencaps of "Cat" do have a smeary, waxy look? Just try not to look at the grain, but at the image itself. It has a very strange look, unnatural and not like film."

How many 35 mm films have you transfer?
In WHAT way does this: http://www.landofwhimsy.com/hdcaptures/catoninetails18.jpg
looks like this:
http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film3/blu-ray_reviews51/patton_blu-ray/large2/large_patton_blu-ray1x.jpg

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 8:28 AM)

That was my last comment here. Until there is proof coming up, I rather use my time with something meningful than gossip.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 8:31 AM)

Mattias: "How many 35 mm films have you transfer?
In WHAT way does this: http://www.landofwhimsy.com/hdcaptures/catoninetails18.jpg
looks like this:
http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film3/blu-ray_reviews51/patton_blu-ray/large2/large_patton_blu-ray1x.jpg"

What is your point here? Are you saying it couldn't possibly be DNR'd like Patton because of the layer of grain applied over it. What is this proving/disproving exactly?

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 10:25 AM)

"How many 35 mm films have you transfer?"

You mean actually overseen a telecine for? None, personally. And I'm willing to be that you haven't ever touched an Interpositive, either. Regardless, Michael knows a hell of a lot more about what can go wrong in an HD video transfer than 95% of the people I know - and some of those people even make DVD/Blu-ray for a living.

Saying "You don't have proof, so this conversation is over!" is a pretty weak defense, much less when someone admits that they're only floating a theory. More importantly, you have absolutely no counter argument - you just say he's wrong because "there's no proof" and "you disagree". So everything Michael says, despite years of accurate and honest DVD and Blu-ray reviews, must be rumor-mongering. Because God forbid he might be an observant, concerned genre aficionado who'd like to point out what film distributors are doing wrong so that they might not make the same mistakes twice. No way, it's way more fun to just make stuff up as you go to confuse the internet!

You know what, Mattias? There's no ABSOLUTE PROOF that you and I aren't the same person, either. I could be nothing more than a brilliant sock-puppet scheme! But I'm sure anyone with two brain cells would be willing to entertain the idea that we're not, none the less. Sometimes you just have to consider an argument with any hard evidence because the facts you're given are either incomplete, or don't add up. If this is a "New Transfer From The Negative" made on properly maintained equipment without any temporal distortions, then I'm a sentient turnip from the Crab Nebula.

By the way, your "Patton" hotlink didn't work. You're also completely missing the point - there are hundreds of individual DVNR algorithms kicking around in the world with thousand of possible settings and variables, so no two DVNR jobs are ever going to look exactly alike, particularly if you then cover the DVNR in artificial grain (which Fox never did for Patton, so the comparison is irrelevant). My Predator experiment would have been far more relevant in showing how extra video noise can give the impression that a smudged, blurry transfer has "more" detail than it actually has, but hey, believe whatever the heck you want to.

Guess I'll see you around the internet, NIN74. Have fun preaching to the AV Maniacs about how absolutely nobody knows anything and we should all just shut the hell up and not try to understand why the releases we spend our hard-earned money on are varying degrees of sh*t. I'd much rather take a slightly more proactive stance, but we've all got our preferences.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 10:34 AM)

Michael,

"This post at Home Theater Forum discusses a problem with some transfers that the poster, an assistant film editor, describes as a "digital floor", whereby "The image was pulled, they looked at it, thought they were seeing film grain and didn't look closer, they didn't get that though and since their harvest was calibrated to the digital noise rather than to the grain of the film, everything after that would be off in small but to some people significant ways."

This makes more sense to me, i think you might have hit the nail on the head, it's either an old master with DNR all over it that has had artificial grain poorly applied to it or it's as that post above describes.

Here's a thought, does anyone have an email contact for Blue Underground, maybe we can all write to them on this matter and they might look into it. That's a long shot but wouldn't it be great if they listened to people who buy their product and checked the quality control on future releases, perhaps they would contact their Italian mastering studio and alert them of a potential issue.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 12:17 PM)

I find the comparisons with Patton and the "rebastard" Predator a bit extreme, personally. If there is heavy noise reduction/smearing on Cat and a heavy dosage of artificial grain thrown on top, the underlying image doesn't look nearly as plasticky to me. Whether those smear-job examples have more detail or not, Cat looks nowhere near as waxy to me, even if you were to slap some fake grain on top of the caps for those other films. It was done with that Predator shot, and Arnold's face still looks like shiny rubber. I'm not seeing that type of smear with Cat; I'm seeing something much different, whatever the cause is. It looks better than the smear jobs, but still looks...weird, but not altogether terrible.

If that is artificial grain added to Cat, that's the strangest damn so-called artificial grain I've seen yet. Way weirder looking than Django, Stendhal Syndrome, City of the Living Dead, or any other flicks which exhibit what people theorize to be fake grain. Which is leading me to believe it's not artificial, and something else bizarre is going on—'cos why would they opt for such a funky looking fake grain type and pattern and not something better?

But, that's just me.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 2:30 PM)

Disturbing to think, with what has already happened due to the studios' provision of single faulty masters to multiple distributors, that in the fairly near future it's conceivable that many studios will be making so-called 'definitive' scans of their films, tossing the celluloid master to rot in a vault, and leaving us with bastardized overprocessed versions of classic films (and in the case of things like the Cat titles, not even making an attempt at preserving the content as it was originally seen.)

Controversy about the BD aside, I think we can all agree that 'permanent' tinkering of this variety, intended not just for home viewing but for the ages, is scary indeed.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 4:53 PM)

I'm a big fan of your reviews Michael, and just wanted to throw in my two cents. I personally am (relatively) happy with the look of CAT. I would argue that the sites that are fellating BU over this disc are doing so with more of an eye towards the film's previous releases.

As the sole HD representation of the film thus far, it's hard for it to not at least seem mildly impressive against the smudgy DVD editions. While I agree that it's hyperbole to call it the "best Argento BR yet", I would argue that, in terms of (admittedly compromised) clarity and color, it might be the most revelatory. CAT has always been an ugly film, IMO, and this is the first release where it looks like a product of Argento (although maybe it shouldn't and that's just a sign of tinkering- yikes). Being someone who first saw the film on a second generation VHS dupe of the 1.85:1 Japanese Laserdisc, I definitely fall in the mildly impressed camp.

It should also be noted that a transfer's Grain Structure is just one of a myriad of qualities to consider, and seems to be the sole strike against this release, as opposed to the previously mentioned Beyond the Darkness BR, where that was the sole thing Shriek Show got right. That said, I'm glad you do sound the alarm regarding this aspect on a regular basis, as most review sites ignore it in favor of other things.

Lastly, I think it is interesting that 4k/Next Generation formats found their way in to this comments section. I personally tried to force a rule on myself: only upgrade to a BR release if it has the potential of being a definitive release (which of course will never be definitive given the inevitability of format changes and technology advancements). CAT definitely represents a release that forces me to break my rule, as it looks so much better than what I had before, but could look better.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 7:15 PM)

What did Media Blasters/Shriek Show do wrong with the Beyond the Darkness Blu-ray? (And is there any place that has screencaps? I looked but came up with nothing.) I noticed they were putting some titles on BD, and was pretty excited by having Zombi Holocaust on the format, but given how dreadful Media Blasters' DVD transfers are, I'm not expecting anything all that impressive. If their HD transfers at least look like film, though, that's a definite big step up from their DVDs and may be worth the purchase.

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 8:38 PM)

Kentai's blog has an extremely thorough dissection of the release (with screencaps and audio samples), which has audio pitch/sync issues, poor black levels, excessive cropping/incorrect AR, and is missing 25 seconds of footage. The full review is here (I'm terrible at including links, so be prepared to copy and paste):

http://kentaifilms.blogspot.com/2011/05/beyond-darkness-blu-ray-vs-dvd.html

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 8:59 PM)

"If this is a "New Transfer From The Negative" made on properly maintained equipment without any temporal distortions, then I'm a sentient turnip from the Crab Nebula"

What a dork

(Posted on Tuesday, May 31, 2011 at 11:38 PM)

Out of curiosity, does anyone happen to know off the top of their head what the ballpark budget is for a cult DVD and/or Blu-ray release?

Are things so tight that forking over a few grand to run a neg or IP through a Spirit is out of the question, or is it simply just a matter of convenience/saving a buck/studios wanting to save wear on their elements/"it looks better than SD and the average Joe won't care"? I mean, the cost of new a transfer is probably significantly less than that of the disc replication, and certainly much less than the cost of licensing the title...

My rant here probably sounds very naive to those who know the actual workings of an independent DVD label, but I'm really quite curious about this.

(Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 12:17 AM)

@evilfactor
In the case of the really small labels, e.g. Code Red (and I would assume newcomers Midnight Legacy), things seemingly really are that tight. This going mainly by various revelations made on CR's blog over time.

(Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 12:53 AM)

Kentai, I just read your review for the BEYOND THE DARKNESS BD, and I have to say it's one of the most entertaining I've ever red. The comment about Frank having a "case of rosacea" from the pushed reds had been rolling with laughter.

(Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 1:17 AM)

Kentai, I just read your review for the BEYOND THE DARKNESS BD, and I have to say it's one of the most entertaining I've ever read. The comment about Frank having a "case of rosacea" from the pushed reds had been rolling with laughter.

(Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 1:18 AM)

Christopher: The substantially less-waxy Patton transfer and a higher-quality grain algorithm would probably have produced a result much closer to CAT. Infact...

Patton DVNR
Pattin DVNR + Grain

My point was more that most people don't really know what DVNR + Digital Noise actually looks like - why would they? Without a point of reference it's hard to "see" what the problem looks like, and producing some real-world examples could hopefully educate people who simply haven't had the chance to see it for themselves and thus be armed with a little bit more knowledge.

Nicholous: Word is that BU is actually going to the negative for Fulci's ZOMBIE. It isn't cheap, but as you've guessed even a new DI made from the negative typically costs less than the actual license. Suffice to say it's several thousand dollars to make a new transfer from scratch, and wither that's five or twenty-five grand depends on where you go and how much work you have to do. If the negative is in perfect shape, you'll have a perfect transfer in a few days. If it's in shambles and you have to use 2 or 3 prints to make it complete again, the cost and time to prepare it goes up.

Labels who are in the licensing game would much prefer to buy a license and have the materials laid out for them, and it's hard to blame them... less money, less time, less drama. But when those materials are shoddy, sometimes you need to swallow that bitter pill and make something better. BU has so far neglected to do that, and it really makes it hard to want to give them my money for films I genuinely enjoy.

Professor Thelonius McNazty: I know you are. But what am I?

Sergio: You're too kind. You laughed so hard I think you may have hit the "submit" button twice. ;)

(Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 3:34 AM)

I'm glad I didn't sell my BEYOND THE DARKNESS DVD (not that I'd ever be reckless enough to sell a DVD before even seeing the BD).

(Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 11:30 AM)

Kentai, I just read your treatise on the BEYOND THE DARKNESS BD, and I have to say it's one of the most sniveling and overtly self-satisfied I've ever read. That comment about Frank having "an acute case of rosaceas-mcnastius" really had me rolling my eyes, and my mouse cursor back to the top of the page. But yeah...way to nitpick a BD that utterly eclipses all prior incarnations to a near-Aspergersian degree.

Btw - didn't you try to claim over on blu-ray.com that LG's new anniv. release of Memento--one of the more overtly revisionist transfers in recent times--was "a more accurate representation of its theatrical look"? lmFaO

(Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 11:01 PM)

Ok, Ok...I lied. I read your whole review of BTD. But seriously, don't you feel maybe you came down a little hard, considering the big picture? That 25fps audio nonsense is a bummer for sure, but I feel I can live with it, and I'd personally consider it by far that release's biggest transgtession.
Oh yeah, and dude who was actin the fool 'bout the new Memento was not to, but a another screen name beginnin' with K that sounds vaguely similar. My bad dawg.

(Posted on Wednesday, June 1, 2011 at 11:08 PM)

Professor: How dare you... only near-Aspergersian?! I'd say that write-up qualifies as full blown OCD! :)

Was my review harsh? Yeah, kinda. Was it too harsh? I honestly don't think so. Media Blasters presented the film uncut, accurately synced, and with properly pitched audio nine years ago, when standards were so low you could almost trip over them. If they don't have the manpower or know-how to pull off the same feat nearly a decade later and on the high-definition double dip, they seriously need to pack up and find another line of work. It was easier to sigh, roll my eyes and say "Whatever, it's still better than a VHS dupe" ten years ago. Today? I just don't see any excuse. The fact that MB had at least a year to get it right sure doesn't make them look any less foolish, either.

Contrary to what some people are saying, I'm not picking on the release just because Media Blasters released it. MB has a habit of releasing crappy product - I should know, I've been buying it for at least a decade now - and with most of the focus on the forums being who broke the news that the release was compromised - not the release itself - I felt like somebody had to cut through all of the bull and set the record straight. I think I did that. If I looked like a bag of flaming dick in the process, meh, I have no regrets. People can disagree with my opinions and assessments however they like* - so long as the information I'm posting is accurate, the way in which I deliver it should be irrelevant.

If Blue Underground or Anchor Bay or whoever else had the stones to release a disc that was cut and had the audio drifting in and out of sync, you bet your ass I'd call them on it. If I ever go crazy enough to buy the Arrow releases BU doesn't already own locally I'm sure I'll be no more or less gracious to them, either.

Heck, the reason I'm here is because I think Michael has always been very even handed, detail-oriented, and totally fair when talking about the transfer quality on DVD and Blu-ray releases. He's sharing information because he feels that it matters, and in the current world of online reviewers willing to shrug off obvious, sometimes glaring issues in the name of continuing to get free screeners, that's something I'd like to see more of. (There's also his charming personality, suave good looks and his Private Island off the coast of New Zeland - but who's counting? :P )

*I'll admit one thing: I was pretty passive in pointing out that the audio fidelity on the disc isn't awful, and calling it a "slight" upgrade to the DVD (strictly in technical terms) was a bit undfair. I had low expectations and felt they were met, but there's so damned many presentation problems that I didn't bother go in depth as to how, "for a 30 year old dub, despite dropouts, high end distortions, sync errors and pitch errors... yeah, it's pretty okay". Was that totally fair? No, I guess not. But having spent several hours figuring out what was *wrong* with the audio, about that the last thing I wanted to do was spend another 5 minutes pointing out how modestly adequate it was.

I'll, uh, bow out here and let Michael get back to his regularly scheduled programming.

(Posted on Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 3:10 AM)

I watched the BU BD of CAT last night and found that my thoughts were similar to yours, Michael. I get the feeling that the praise for this one is due to the prior DVD being poor and further than appropriate viewing distances. Would you be able to get caps where Arno is walking down the steps into the tomb after stabbing the killer, or when Giordani and Arno are speaking to each other near the beginning, with the gold wallpaper in the background and that lion or demon looking figure/statue (whatever it was) on the floor?

(Posted on Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 2:54 PM)

Reading all that stuff regarding Beyond the Darkness got me a little bummed out. I wonder if they'll similarly muck up the other titles they release.

Speaking of BDs and low-grade films... I don't know if anyone here's a fan of Frank Henenlotter, but I adore his movies Basket Case, Brain Damage, and Frankenhooker. Found out that Basket Case is coming to BD (from Something Weird, I believe), and Henenlotter had this to say:

Working on the HD master of “Basket Case.” Found most of the 16mm negative and an incomplete 16mm print which have a different color timing to the night scenes which somehow got lost when the film was blown up to 35mm. Though we’re using the 35mm inter-positive for the transfer, our point of reference is the 16mm original. The result is that this version of BC is going to look a bit different than what we’re used to, but it will be as close as possible to the original 16mm version I shot way back when.

I'm all sorts of excited. When I expressed some worry over possible grain reduction, he simply replied, "The grain is part of the original 16mm image. I wouldn't think of trying to erase it."

(Posted on Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 9:00 PM)

Thanks! Last shot was what I was speaking of. Arno walking down the steps with his cane sure was ugly. For the statue, it was multiple colored, mostly black but with color, clay-like and looking like a marble, I thought. Either way, these get the point across as much as the prior ones do. The one cap you put up originally, outside Bianca Merusi's place, I'll say that I was thinking you'd be able to read the name plate in motion but as it turned out I couldn't. Also, when Arno is doing his crossword puzzles the first time around, you couldn't even make out the letters on the pieces until it was a overhead shot, even though they were rather close.

(Posted on Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 9:49 PM)

Gosh, those caps you've done for Brian look ghastly. There's no detail at all in the faces and clothing, or the bookshelves and tapestries in the background.

If I wasn't already convinced, I'm now quite certain there is something SERIOUSLY weird about this transfer.

(Posted on Thursday, June 2, 2011 at 11:18 PM)

Oh, for-- why in the world would you use the IP when the OCN is RIGHT THERE?! Even if it's incomplete, the difference between using the 16mm negative and a 35mm blow-up print is practically night and day.

I understand it's more expensive, and your options are a little more limited (since you have to use a GOOD lab), but the results for The Evil Dead speak for themselves.

(Posted on Friday, June 3, 2011 at 1:58 AM)

I'm getting this information from Henenlotter's Facebook page, and a guy named Bruce asked him:

Out of curiosity, was there a reason the original 16mm elements weren't used for the transfer? I would've thought a pre-blow up element would've provided more detail.

To which Henenlotter replied:

I assumed the same, but a side-by-side comparison showed that the 35mm blowup was just as sharp. In fact, I couldn't tell the difference. However, as was the custom way back when, the 16mm negative was A&B roll which meant it would cost twice as much to transfer it and then it would have to be edited together. Worse, there were a couple of gaps in the negative for footage used in the sequels. It just made more sense to use the 35mm for the transfer but the 16mm for reference.

*Shrugs*

It's likely, more than anything, an issue of cost.

Either way, I'm definitely interested in seeing how this Blu-ray for Basket Case turns out. And I'm very excited for the color timing of the night scenes, which apparently have a blueish hue that was lost in the 35mm blowup.

And, Arrow Video are apparently coming out with a BD for Frankenhooker (Henenlotter assumes, anyway, since he recorded a commentary track for them recently). I'm hoping they do a nice job...although judging by screencaps and my BD of Battle Royale, Arrow's transfers don't really impress me.

(Posted on Friday, June 3, 2011 at 5:17 AM)

I'd much rather have the OCN for 90% of the film and the 35mm blow-up IP for the other 10%, but at least Frank's being up front about it. That's always a plus.

What I will say is this, though; Maniac!, Last House on the Left and The Dorm that Dripped Blood are all excessively soft and have heavy, noisy grain - both of which are typical side-effects of blowing 16mm to 35mm. The Evil Dead, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Beyond the Darkness were all sourced from 16mm prints, with The Evil Dead using 35mm inserts only as necessary, and they all look substantially better. Coincidence? I doubt it.

(Posted on Friday, June 3, 2011 at 7:41 AM)

Does anyone have the Wild Side DVD of Cat released last year - if so, how does it look?

(Posted on Friday, June 3, 2011 at 10:07 AM)

This release clearly suffers from the Road to Perdition look(TM), but to a greater degree:

http://www.cinemasquid.com/blu-ray/movies/screenshots/road-to-perdition?movieid=13982&locale=all

Please note that this differs from the striated Mulholland Drive look(TM):

http://www.cinemasquid.com/blu-ray/movies/screenshots/mulholland-drive?movieid=14876

(Posted on Tuesday, June 7, 2011 at 4:57 AM)

Just wanted to add that Synapse are also bringing Frankenhooker to BD later this year. Will be interesting to see how it compares to Arrow's.

(Posted on Wednesday, June 15, 2011 at 10:53 PM)

Synapse releasing Frankenhooker on BD is such good news. I don't think I own any of their BDs, so I dunno if they're high quality, but considering their DVDs usually look really good, I'd imagine they do a good HD job.

(Posted on Thursday, June 23, 2011 at 5:51 AM)

Huh... "HD job"... That looks and sounds unclean.

(Posted on Thursday, June 23, 2011 at 5:52 AM)