A Few Words About A few words about...™ Air Force One -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Robert Harris]

Columbia (Sony) seems positioned with people in place, and whatever lag times necessarily now past, to be turning out what to my eye is a continuum of quality Blu-ray catalog titles.

I'm told that their latest strategy is to harvest all images, whether they be from original negatives, fine grain master, or interpositives at 4k, and then down-rez from there to a final HD master. This is a more expensive way to proceed, but from what I'm seeing, it pays off in spades.

After spending some quality time this evening with Glory, I shared an hour or so with Air Force One, which although a totally different type of film from a visual sense, is just as high in the quality factor as the slightly more rough-hewn Glory.

Grain appears normal and resolution is as it should be. Whether some of the other studios are still dealing occasionally dealing with older masters, which may be the case, or not, Sony is out there strutting their stuff, placing beautiful images on screen via their Blu-ray system.

In the most general sense, the bar appears to have been raised, and I couldn't be more pleased.

As an aside, Air Force One is one of those productions that cries out to be viewed theatrically on a large screen -- I'm referring to fifty feet or more -- but still works readily as a Blu-ray, for which this is one of those cases where bigger is better, and the quality of this disc holds up perfectly.

Highly Recommended.

RAH

 

[Nelson Au]

Thanks!

 

[Hamilton72]

Hang on, according to some other reviews I've read, the Russian/English captions are PLAYER-GENERATED and positioned BELOW the film image.

This is not how Air Force One was shows in cinemas.

If this is to be a new Sony trend, then consider me extremely concerned.

I won't be upgrading from the DVD unless somebody can confirm that the Region B version is any different...?

 

[Colin Jacobson]

And this is accurate...

 

[Hamilton72]

I gather the captions are burned-in on the UK release. Looks like I'll be picking that one up instead.

 

[James Carpenter]

I just finished watching this and the subtitle problem is worse than reported. Due to some kind of error the "forced" English/Russian subtitles do not work unless the English subtitles are engaged. So it's all or nothing. This should be recalled or at the very least replaced.

 

[PaRaman]

I have spent three days searching for some common reason for this.its help me

 

[Robert Harris]

If a problem exists, it is player dependent, as it worked perfectly on a Denon.

 

[Hamilton72]

Apparently there is a fault on some copies. Sony has set up a recall/replacement program. Details over at blu-ray.com

Alas, even the fixed copies have the subs in the wrong place, so...

 

[Yumbo]

Will check out the UK edition.

 

[Vern Dias]

Robert, Please do NOT recommend movies with the subtitles in the black bars!

This is not how they were shown in the theater and for those of us with 2.40:1 screens, they require a significant compromise.

If your goal is trying to identify HD that looks as close as possible to the original theatrical showing, the position of the subtitles alone should disqualify this and several other titles you have recommended.

It really doesn't matter how good it might look on a larger screen, because I suspect those of us who have the largest screens in our HT's have large 2.40:1 screens. So the second line of the subtitles is not readable which means we have to reduce our image size and shift the image up to read the subtitles. Certainly not the theatrical experience we try so hard to replicate....

Vern

 

[Robert Harris]

Since titles are generated and not a part of the image, the situation might possibly be resolved in the future via a selection of image area for subs -- which might in turn involve a firmware or player model upgrade. As for recommending or not based upon title positioning, it can certainly be noted that titles fall below the image area. However, for the relatively small audience affected, I would not go so far as to hold back a recommendation.

The position situation is worth looking into.

RAH

 

[Hamilton72]

Surely everybody is affected. Even if you have a regular 16x9 screen this kind of presentation does not represent the movie as it was shown in the theatre, it doesn't matter how glorious the PQ/AQ is!

Just because it's not important to some people doesn't change the facts.

This disc should carry one of those "this movie has been modified from its original theatrical presentation" messages at the start!

 

[FrankT]

I am with Robert on this one. Where sub titles are is way way way down on the list on whether a title should be recommended or not.

 

[Hamilton72]

Well EE is way way down on my list, but that doesn't make EE a good thing!

 

[Hamilton72]

Okay I just checked out the UK edition. URGH. Although the subtitles are in the right place, they're still player-generated unfortunately.

So the only way to see this movie properly is DVD. Great.

 

[Dan M]

That depends upon the type of setup you have. For those of those of us who use lenses for constant heighth consider it way way UP on the list

But here's another thing to consider: Even with the subs designed to be placed below the image area they are never exclusively below the image anyway. Depending upon how much dialogue is being spoken at the time many of the subs spill into the image above. I find this even more annoying and un-cinema like.

This problem could easily be rectified though I feel. Either by designing the disc itself to simply move subs up or down via the remote or a menu/subtitle option. If my old Brotherhood of the Wolf HD DVD can do it then surely Blu Ray can too. Or perhaps a hardware firmware upgrade.

 

[Hamilton72]

Or just by leaving them as they're supposed to be!

Leaving placement aside, keeping the theatical subs gives a movie far more of a stylish and, let's face it, accurate look than anything a player could generate.

 

[Jesse Blacklow]

Not true, and completely disregards the much larger segment of viewers who may want or need multi-language options for that of the constant-height or zero-deviation purist viewers.

 

[Robert Harris]

If one looks at this logically and in a detailed manner, it becomes apparent that digital titles are generally not the same as those which appeared on theatrical film prints. I'm aware of very few instances in which the original hi-con titles were scanned or harvested for image to replicate the original film. At that point the concept of originality flies out the window.