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Forget the '01 DVDs, I'm furious that the Blurays don't look like my VHS tapes recorded off Bravo. :angry:

Looking at all the comparisons for Weinstein DVDs, they all seem to suffer from the same softness problem. The Mist, too. Weird since Miramax had the exact same problem, with almost all of their DVDs having excessive DVNR, softness, and edge enhancement (Pulp Fiction, The English Patient...

I don't like colorization on principle, but I'm impressed by She. Instead of looking gimmicky, all the samples look like hand-stenciled color you'd see on period lobby card photographs.

Wow, the remastered All Quiet looks stunning. The old DVD looks like VHS... not even in comparision. The poor quality transfer didn't help the compression much, either. Arabian Nights looks fantastic, too. It looks just as eye-popping as Warner's Ultra-Resolution restorations!

Wow, Criterion did a fantastic job! I'm thinking of maybe just renting the new Seven Samurai first. I'm not sure if I want to take a monetary gamble on such an obscure film, not to mention one generally given lukewarm reactions by critics. :D

The old DVD really seems to make the makeup on faces look too artificial and overdone. I wonder how much of the sharpness on the old version can be attributed to the edge enhancement and excessive grain.

The Eureka 2-disc DVD is sharper, pure B&W, progressive 25fps, and is razor sharp. Kino's DVD has PAL-to-NTSC ghosting, has greenish discoloration, filtering (causing softness), and is interlaced. I thought it was great until I saw how much better the R2 is.

I'm really annoyed by Kino's practice of fouling up their R2 imports. They made it interlaced, discolored, softened, messed up the contrast, and improperly converted from PAL again. It's like how Metropolis should have been perfect and they couldn't even get that right. Probably their best...

"I've owned both 35mm and 16mm IB prints of the film - the first DVD, which was taken from the laserdisc transfer, obviously isn't nearly as sharp as the new transfer, but the color (especially on the laserdisc as opposed to the DVD, which had many other issues) was totally accurate on the laser...

In comparision, "The Cutting Edge" which is the companion to Visions of Light in terms of editing... it's 16x9 with everything shown in OAR (everything from 1.33:1 to 2.55:1). Dolby Digital 5.1 sound, too... It would be a neat project to see Visions of Light totally remastered, but it would...

You might find this interesting.... I've been in contact with someone doing a fan "video reconstruction" of The Thief and the Cobbler, so here's a comparison between three versions: DVD-R sourced from a 2nd generation VHS of the workprint cut: R3 NTSC 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen DVD from...

Interlaced DVD's don't really mean the transfer isn't HD origin. For example, all the Eisenstein films in Criterion's box set are interlaced, but used HD transfers. Why studios let this pass quality control, I have no idea.

Gary: The re-issue of Traffic is not in any way different from the prior release, but rather a re-promotion of the title with a wider distribution than before.

Gary: Thanks for the Ryan's Daughter review. I'm amazed that it looks like a recent movie instead of something that's 36 years old.

I'd really like to see how the Dial M For Murder laserdisc compares to the DVD. The old video master on TV looked horrible, even compared to the DVD.

The cropping on the R1 Ben-Hur is not an issue at all. Martin Hart (www.widescreenmuseum.com) says the new R1 is identical to the 70mm MGM Camera-65 specs. Although, the film should have been cropped on the sides to 2.50:1 to replicate the intended framing, as well as provide more resolution...

I really find it annoying that Kino almost never encodes their DVD's in progressive mode. The only disc I've seen with progressive video is Seven Chances, in fact.

Just one observation: The PAL version has blown out contrast. Notice that in the office shot, the lights in the background have details only present in Criterion's DVD.

I posted this on another forum, but I thought it would be appropriate here... A comparison between prints of the Private Snafu short "Spies" on three different DVD's: Bosko Video: Looney Tunes Golden Collection Vol. 3: Treasures from American Film Archives (Volume 1, Disc 1)...

How did Paramount release this? According to the IMDB, this was originally released by Paramount in 1946. Normally, this would mean that Universal now owns the film. The IMDB doesn't list any remakes (which was why The Miracle of Morgan's Creek was kept in their ownership for the remake...

Gary... on your We're No Angels review:

Thanks for the cap. Looks great!

Could you post a larger screenshot of the silent version? I know you mention interlacing issues, but isn't this unavoidable with the source? I thought anything other than 24fps or 30fps would have these issues.

Gary... would it be possible to do a comparison for House on Haunted Hill? WB has their own DVD and it's 16x9. The Legend Films DVD doesn't look that bad (the B&W version), so it would be interesting to see how they differ.

Digital noise can sometimes give the illusion of being sharper. For example, at first glance, the Ultimate Edition of Terminator 2 seems to be a lot sharper... but you'll notice it's all DVNR and edge enhancement that's making it look that way. When compared to the Extreme Edition, the EE is...

Just one little nitpick... In the comparisons for Bullitt and The Ten Commandments, as well as the review for Once Upon a Time in America, there's a lot of concern over these 1.85:1 films being cropped to 1.78:1. While it depends on framing, 1.78:1 should actually yield a little bit more...

Gary, I'd just like to mention how great your reviews are, especially the dozens of Criterions lately.

Gary: You mentioned that the Flash Gordon serial DVD's from Image Entertainment are from public domain materials... actually, the DVD's Image released used Hearst Entertainment's original elements.

Wow. I can't believe how sharp and detailed the Films Sans Frontieres version of Potemkin is!

Gary: I think you corrected it before the Japanese Superbit was added, but the 40th Anniversary Dr. Strangelove is listed as 1.78:1, instead of 1.66:1 in its comparison page.