DVD Review HTF REVIEW: Alfred Hitchcock: The Masterpiece Collection (1 Viewer)

[MatthewLouwrens]

I don't know that this is entirely fair to RAH.

He did the best that he could to get it as close as possible to the original while still satisfying the wishes of the people who were paying for the restorations in the first place.

Now, the fact that the previous release did not have the mono is disappointing, but this release (along with others such as Jaws) indicates that the studio now understands this and has sought to rectify the problem. And hopefully they continue to make the mono tracks available in the future.

And, had RAH, who quite clearly has an incredible respect for Vertigo and Hitchcock in general, not carried out the restoration, you would be watching an ugly faded awful-to-watch picture with the mono track, instead of the beautiful clear wonderful picture with the mono track that we have here.

So what's the problem?

 

[John Hodson]

I remember a similar situation with John Kirk's restoration of The Good, The Bad & The Ugly over at MGM. Kirk's problem was that he was to prepare the film for a limited cinema release with a full 5.1 soundtrack. The problem was that the original - and emblematic - gunshots sounded terribly thin in modern theatres, with modern sound systems, and so to beef them up so that they'd actually sound like gunshots, Kirk replaced them with new sounds that ricocheted across the stalls.

When the DVD was released, there was a certain amount of uproar. But Kirk had only done his level best as commanded by his masters. His brief was to prepare a soundtrack for a viable commercial cinematic release, not for home theatre.

It seems churlish to castigate the work of cinema preservationists when, having saved a work of art, every minor detail doesn't meet our expectations, right here, right now. Without the work of these people we wouldn't have the films in as watchable form as we have them today; or in some cases, we wouldn't have them at all.

For that I thank them, one and all.

 

[Robert Harris]

At the heart of the matter is that an original print of "Vertigo" as we knew it in 1958 can no longer be projected in a modern theatre and sound as it did in 1958, when two things were in place.

1. The audio systems in said theatres generally harkened back to well before the days of Gone with the Wind. This hid a multitude of audio sins, which would be inexcusable today.

2. There was as magnetic master from which to create soundtrack negatives from which positive prints could be produced.

Neither of those situations are still in place.

And the original audio for "Vertigo" cannot be restored.

RAH

 

[JayHM]

I've gone and checked my out-of-sync SHADOW OF A DOUBT disc on three different players, and the sync issue is consistent. It is very obvious, and I've shown it to other people who agree that picture and audio are definitely not in sync (picture is early).

 

[Mark-P]

Well that certainly explains why Rear Window looks so different when compared to the other films in the set.

 

[Herb Kane]

So then it wasn't necessary to bring in Michael Gambon...? My boys are going to be very pleased...

 

[Haggai]

Jay, I got my copy of the collection today and checked a little bit of the Shadow of a Doubt disc, and it didn't seem to have any sync problems at all. You must have just gotten a bad disc, so hopefully you can contact Universal and get a replacement for it.

 

[Steve Tannehill]

This does concern me, but if you say it's 3-4 frames, that is 1/8 or 1/6 a second. That can be pretty hard to detect. It is certainly for me.

But it gets chalked up with the other issues that distract from the set as a whole. Thanks for bringing this up and making us aware.

- Steve

 

[Steve Tannehill]

I can't speak to the sound--it was fine to my ears. But the picture has definitely gotten some color correction. I just did one capture to compare:



The old disc is on the left; the new disc is on the right. Note the black bar on the left. There is no black band on either side (except top and bottom) of the new release, thus the image is centered better (in fact, you can see some of the old image to the extreme right.

Granted, I don't have a color reference for blue skies, but I think the one in the new transfer looks better... as do the overall colors in the rest of the movie.

- Steve

 

[JayHM]

Yeah, 3-4 frames will not be obvious to everyone. However, it is obvious at those two spots. When the glass falls over, the sound of the glass hitting the table clearly happens after the glass is already lying still. And "I brought you water" doesn't begin until after her lips have already said "I bro..."

I've sent an e-mail to Universal about this...

 

[DavePattern]

If it's of interest to anyone, I've put together details of what Universal removed from the full "AFI Salute" broadcast:

http://www.daveyp.com/hitchcock/foru...hp?p=1174#1174

 

[Robert Crawford]

Those two spots were known to me and I still hardly noticed it after playing both scenes several times over again and again.





Crawdaddy

 

[Harry-N]

What I DID notice while playing the "brought you water" scene was the totally different music on the Spanish track, starting as she's bringing the water pitcher up the stairs, giving the scene a horror-movie flair.

The lip-sync on the English track is a bit off there. I've not watched the whole movie yet, so I can't comment on the rest of it.

Harry

 

[Micah Cohen]

Well, I hate to put the skids on this, but I've spent all morning reading the two threads about this DVD set (RAH's and this one), and I still feel the need to ask a basic question:

Should I replace my current PSYCHO, VERTIGO and REAR WINDOW releases with this box set?

Thanks for your opinions!

MC

 

[Robert Crawford]

Yes!

 

[Steve Tannehill]

The lips were out-of-sync with the Spanish track.

- Steve

 

[Steve Tannehill]

And MARNIE. It is a clearly improved transfer.

I'm going to finish the Marnie review, then attempt to get through Psycho and Rear Window. Work called this morning (ugh) but they pay for sets like these, so I can't complain.

At that point, I will publish an overall rating and recommendation... although, honestly, if you are new to Hitchcock this set is a no-brainer. Snap up those cheap online or warehouse club copies pronto.

If you already have the bulk of the titles, or just want a couple, that's where it gets tricky... you have to remember that I came from the laserdisc days, where the $100 I paid for Criterion North by Northwest would have paid for this entire set (and then some). I'd still get the new set. But if you are just looking for the (reportedly) improved Psycho and Vertigo releases, I have to wonder when Universal will package them separately...

- Steve

 

[Deepak Shenoy]

... and I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for Universal to release them individually and even if they do, I wouldn't expect the Psycho DVD to contain the excellent Making of Psycho documentary because the boxset has this documentary moved to the extras disc.

Back in early 2001 when Universal made the 4 Alfred Hitchcock Presents discs (containing the 17 episodes directed by Hitchcock) available only in the 4 boxsets with overlapping titles, people (including myself) were pretty sure that these 4 discs would get individual releases at some point (or as a boxset with just the 4 AHP discs). This never happened and 4 1/2 years later Universal has finally started releasing season sets of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, but people looking for just the 17 Hitchcock-directed episodes will have to wait several more years for all the 17 episodes to be available as a part of the full season sets.

-D

 

[Patrick McCart]

Although, they could simply make it a DVD-14 with the DVD-9 in the box set, with the other side just having the documentary. Same thing for The Birds.

 

[Kevin M]

I'm curious, in the course of the mid-90's restoration you also preserved the "raw" elements as well, yes? So in the future will it be possible for, if not by you than another passionate film restorer, to actually do a new restoration using these new processes?


Also I just wanted to add that although it is tempting (and slightly understandable) to paint Universal as a corporate bad guy in this story it should be remembered that they did put up much of the considerable cash it took to restore Vertigo in the first place, they didn't have to do that. Even with their other faults, in the end they did back the decision to preserve this classic and that should be commended.