BrianDBoyle
Auditioning
- Joined
- Apr 10, 2002
- Messages
- 14
I was reading a review of BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA on DVD in the most recent issue of Video Watchdog, and I stumbled across a disturbing reference. The article refers to BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA on DVD as being "zoomboxed, exactly like its LaserDisc release."
Well, I had never heard the term "zoomboxed" before, so I hit Google and dug up this old Mondo Digital.com STARMAN reference:
"After two botched widescreen laser releases (one from Pioneer Special Editions), John Carpenter's heartfelt science fiction favorite has been fully letterboxed and looks even better than it did in theaters. As Video Watchdog noted, the two laser editions were "zoomboxed" (all of the edges of the widescreen image were zoomed in and cropped off to make the image larger, a practice repeated on Big Trouble in Little China)."
My highly prized copy of BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA on DVD might be zoomed in and cropped? Grrr!
I trust Video Watchdog to deliver the straight scoop, so I have to believe that the article is true and, now that I've had some time to think on it -- once thought lost somewhere in the dim mists of time -- I seem to remember reading the Video Watchdog review of the BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA LaserDisc.
I don't remember how long ago, or the issue number, but the reviewer had a very specific scene in mind. He referred to the scene in which Jack Burton is crawling on hands and knees across a plank athwart a chasm. The reviewer said that in the theater, you had a real sense of danger because you could see the consequences for Jack were he to slip...a long fall, followed by deceleration trauma, resulting in death.
The reviewer said in the "zoomboxed" LaserDisc version -- and it is starting to seem as if the studio used the LaserDisc transfer for the DVD -- you cannot see around or beneath Jack, so there is no sense of Jack being in danger.
Anyway, I could not stand the thought that my BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA DVD might not be OAR, so I hit the Video Watchdog Web site. The only reference I could find to BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA is on the THE VIDEO WATCHDOG INDEX Titles A - D page, in which they list out the articles by back issue:
title of film -- issue number:page number
BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA -- 20:63, 82:46
Not much help there.
Next, I found another reference to "zoomboxing" from the DVD Savant on dvdtalk.com:
"Obviously proud of their fine work on this set, Fox here has the maturity to do real comparisons with previous video masters, where we can plainly see beyond the color improvement to notice that some older letterboxed transfers (especially Bus Stop) had indeed been 'zoomboxed.' This was a term Savant first read in Video Watchdog, which blew the whistle on laserdisc transfers where the image was surreptitiously blown up a bit to enlarge actors' faces, and then matted back down to conform to the expected letterbox."
Well, I kept digging, and I found an article by the DVD Savant on dvdtalk.com that specifically mentions "zoomboxing," and its implications. Here is the link:
Transfer Trouble: Formats and Video Fudging
and an excerpt from the article:
"In '93 or '94, Tim Lucas of Video Watchdog reported a much more sinister practice which he called Zoomboxing. In telecine, wider shots are blown up to make the human figures in them larger. To retain the 'letterboxed' look, the enlarged shots were than overmatted back down to the narrow ratio of the rest of the film. Watchdog showed examples from many films proving this was being done (Starman and Jurassic Park being noted titles). The letterboxing fan, who simply wanted to see all of the image, was cynically given a widescreen movie whose letterboxing was a complete hoax."
I'm going to keep after this until I get to the bottom of it. Please stay tuned, or please help me out...
Well, I had never heard the term "zoomboxed" before, so I hit Google and dug up this old Mondo Digital.com STARMAN reference:
"After two botched widescreen laser releases (one from Pioneer Special Editions), John Carpenter's heartfelt science fiction favorite has been fully letterboxed and looks even better than it did in theaters. As Video Watchdog noted, the two laser editions were "zoomboxed" (all of the edges of the widescreen image were zoomed in and cropped off to make the image larger, a practice repeated on Big Trouble in Little China)."
My highly prized copy of BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA on DVD might be zoomed in and cropped? Grrr!
I trust Video Watchdog to deliver the straight scoop, so I have to believe that the article is true and, now that I've had some time to think on it -- once thought lost somewhere in the dim mists of time -- I seem to remember reading the Video Watchdog review of the BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA LaserDisc.
I don't remember how long ago, or the issue number, but the reviewer had a very specific scene in mind. He referred to the scene in which Jack Burton is crawling on hands and knees across a plank athwart a chasm. The reviewer said that in the theater, you had a real sense of danger because you could see the consequences for Jack were he to slip...a long fall, followed by deceleration trauma, resulting in death.
The reviewer said in the "zoomboxed" LaserDisc version -- and it is starting to seem as if the studio used the LaserDisc transfer for the DVD -- you cannot see around or beneath Jack, so there is no sense of Jack being in danger.
Anyway, I could not stand the thought that my BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA DVD might not be OAR, so I hit the Video Watchdog Web site. The only reference I could find to BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA is on the THE VIDEO WATCHDOG INDEX Titles A - D page, in which they list out the articles by back issue:
title of film -- issue number:page number
BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA -- 20:63, 82:46
Not much help there.
Next, I found another reference to "zoomboxing" from the DVD Savant on dvdtalk.com:
"Obviously proud of their fine work on this set, Fox here has the maturity to do real comparisons with previous video masters, where we can plainly see beyond the color improvement to notice that some older letterboxed transfers (especially Bus Stop) had indeed been 'zoomboxed.' This was a term Savant first read in Video Watchdog, which blew the whistle on laserdisc transfers where the image was surreptitiously blown up a bit to enlarge actors' faces, and then matted back down to conform to the expected letterbox."
Well, I kept digging, and I found an article by the DVD Savant on dvdtalk.com that specifically mentions "zoomboxing," and its implications. Here is the link:
Transfer Trouble: Formats and Video Fudging
and an excerpt from the article:
"In '93 or '94, Tim Lucas of Video Watchdog reported a much more sinister practice which he called Zoomboxing. In telecine, wider shots are blown up to make the human figures in them larger. To retain the 'letterboxed' look, the enlarged shots were than overmatted back down to the narrow ratio of the rest of the film. Watchdog showed examples from many films proving this was being done (Starman and Jurassic Park being noted titles). The letterboxing fan, who simply wanted to see all of the image, was cynically given a widescreen movie whose letterboxing was a complete hoax."
I'm going to keep after this until I get to the bottom of it. Please stay tuned, or please help me out...