Blu-ray Review Jurassic Park Ultimate Trilogy Blu-ray Review - Recommended (1 Viewer)

[Kevin EK]

A few quick odds and ends here:

Re the digital copies. I probably wasn't clear enough in the review about this, but there aren't separate digital copy discs in the package. It's a download option that will expire at the end of next year. Personally, I don't mind this, since the other discs just take up space.

Re the packaging, I much preferred this to what happened with BTTF last year. I had no problem getting the discs out or putting them back in. The ones last year were a nightmare for me. I agree it's a drag that there is no bottom and you could drop all the discs on the floor that way. I just don't hold the package that way. Too many problems like that in my past. (One recent one was a little dog who decided he liked to eat DVD and Blu-ray packaging. I have the destroyed cases as proof, and even some slightly clawed Blu-rays that thankfully still play. And no, none of those were review copies...)

Re the OSHA violation on the poor guy standing on top of the raptor crate. This is one of those things where if we tug on the thread of that sweater, the whole thing unravels really fast. I mean, you're transporting a multi-million dollar creature, which is known to be super dangerous, and you don't establish any kind of automatic lock system or automatic gate system so that you can avoid exactly the accident that occurs here. No, you have a guy standing on top of the cage, manually lifting the gate (which should be so heavy that he can't lift it) like someone letting a lion into a circus pen. So of course, Rappy comes running out and somehow knocks the cage off its seating, thus opening up a wedge and knocking the idiot off the roof so he can be eaten. To answer Malcolm, he didn't have insurance, but there was certainly a multi-million dollar wrongful death suit. (Which begs the question, "What the heck were you doing on top of the cage in the first place?")

Re Paul Warren's post - I don't know any way to convince you that this is a new scan other than to say that the USHE person who answered our questions was quite specific that these are new 2011 transfers done for the Blu-ray release, with full input by Amblin Entertainment at every step. Universal doesn't have anything to hide, to my knowledge. But you're more than welcome to contact them or Amblin to ask for more specifics. I'm unaware of a high def transfer of the movies done for HDTV, but I'd be curious if anyone has actually seen one. You mention DNR "set to overkill" and say this is a "poor looking transfer". Can you provide any specific examples of this? And if you believe that the new transfers were not from film elements, what do you believe the source was? An earlier video transfer, and thus this would be a transfer of a transfer? That honestly doesn't make much sense.

 

[ian spector]

One question...how does this disc sound compared to the DTS Laserdisc ?

 

[Johnny Angell]

I just watched the first couple of chapters. Exactly what does gate weave look like? I could see no problem with the credits. I'm watching on a 46" Samsung.
As for not finding it believable that they wouldn't have a locking mechanism on the cage to lock it to the animal enclosure, ever here of "unsafe working conditions.?" There's some miners who could give you some info on missing safety precautions. It was no different at Jurassic Park.
There is one part in the film that has bugged me. At the start where we see Grant giving his speech about how birds evolved from dinosaurs and the volunteers scoffed. At that time, it was a known idea making it's rounds in the community. I had read about it and anyone who volunteers to go on a dino dig would surely know about it. But they needed a scene to introduce the idea to the audience and that's how they did it.

 

[Kevin EK]

The gate weave issue is just that the credits are a bit wobbly, but not in a major way.

I agree that Jurassic Park was a classic example of "unsafe working conditions". The survivors could give a series of lectures on safety precautions, couldn't they? My favorite new element I noticed in that opening sequence is that you can see that the bottom of the cage is unpainted wood - which tells me the whole thing was painted wood and they didn't cover the bottom. With the new transfer, I could see it, which then generated the question of how you'd keep a creature like that in a wood box when it could just claw through...

The dinos into birds theory and the "hot blooded dinos" theory were both covered in the seminars taught by Dr. Kevin Padian when I took his course. Both were fresh in my mind when I read the book. I still remember a lot of things from that course, mostly how entertaining it was.

 

[Johnny Angell]

I just watched the complete movie and watched the closing credits. At normal viewing distance I could see no gate weave. When I viewed from about 12-18" I could see it, but it was still slight. I agree this should not happen, but it is minor.
JP has never looked or sounded better since I saw it in the theater.
One thing I noticed for the first time is that the lawyer sure has hairy legs. Shorts and a coat and tie? Is that done often in the tropics?

 

[cafink]

I don't think anyone claimed that the gate weave was a problem itself, only that its presence indicated that the transfer was not new, a notion which seems to have been satisfactorily debunked due to the credits having been optically composited.

 

[MattAlbie60]

Re the OSHA violation on the poor guy standing on top of the raptor crate. This is one of those things where if we tug on the thread of that sweater, the whole thing unravels really fast. I mean, you're transporting a multi-million dollar creature, which is known to be super dangerous, and you don't establish any kind of automatic lock system or automatic gate system so that you can avoid exactly the accident that occurs here. No, you have a guy standing on top of the cage, manually lifting the gate (which should be so heavy that he can't lift it) like someone letting a lion into a circus pen. So of course, Rappy comes running out and somehow knocks the cage off its seating, thus opening up a wedge and knocking the idiot off the roof so he can be eaten. To answer Malcolm, he didn't have insurance, but there was certainly a multi-million dollar wrongful death suit. (Which begs the question, "What the heck were you doing on top of the cage in the first place?")

A friend of mine just graduated from law school and in one of her classes maybe a year ago she was assigned to take a moment from a movie and deconstruct the ramifications of it. She picked this exact moment, and arrived at exactly what you did. It was pretty interesting. It was like a 15 minute presentation she had to give.

 

[Scott Calvert]

I don't think anyone claimed that the gate weave was a problem itself, only that its presence indicated that the transfer was not new, a notion which seems to have been satisfactorily debunked due to the credits having been optically composited.

No. Films that are given scans on modern datacine equipment will not ehibit the amount of gateweave present on the JP disc, optical composite or not. As I said earlier, check out any transfer of an older film known to have been scanned on these machines: Harryshausen, Guns of Navarone, The Deep, Caine Mutiny, etc etc etc. I can assure you that those films have optical credits (that were not digitally recreated for video like some other older titles) and the credits are ROCK SOLID.

 

[Scott Calvert]

double post

 

[Chad R]

I'm still angry that the first film is not available separately. And since "Back to the Future" is still locked in the trilogy set a year later, I don't see the situation for "Jurassic Park" improving anytime soon.

 

[Jason_V]

As much as I enjoy JP and to a lesser extent the other two films, I can't justify getting them now just to sit on the shelf. The set will invariably be $20 sooner or later and that'll be my price point.

I am very amused, though, about the OSHA conversation here. Of all things to point out, that would not have been in my top ten.

 

[Carlo_M]

OSHA - yet another case of government bureaucracy clouding the situation. I for one see nothing wrong with standing untethered on top of a vicious dinosaur cage. Not anyone's fault that he couldn't maintain his balance per his job description!

 

[Kevin EK]

Amazing that we've gotten down to figuring out the OSHA ramifications of working conditions at Jurassic Park.

I'm sure the worker's family was deeply consoled that OSHA weighed in on his predicament AFTER he was eaten.

I suppose there could have been a clause in the Jurassic Park employee's contract regarding "assumed risk". Something like "Employee acknowledges that this is an 'at will' employment situation and that at any time said employee may become a dining option for any of the various creations (read: vicious dinosaurs like T-Rexes, compies and raptors) and that in such situation, employee relinquishes all right to legal recourse..." Who knows how many employees might have been saved this fate if they bothered to read the fine print?

 

[FoxyMulder]

Originally Posted by Kevin EK /t/315806/jurassic-park-ultimate-trilogy-blu-ray-review-recommended/30#post_3866728
Amazing that we've gotten down to figuring out the OSHA ramifications of working conditions at Jurassic Park.

I'm sure the worker's family was deeply consoled that OSHA weighed in on his predicament AFTER he was eaten.

I suppose there could have been a clause in the Jurassic Park employee's contract regarding "assumed risk". Something like "Employee acknowledges that this is an 'at will' employment situation and that at any time said employee may become a dining option for any of the various creations (read: vicious dinosaurs like T-Rexes, compies and raptors) and that in such situation, employee relinquishes all right to legal recourse..." Who knows how many employees might have been saved this fate if they bothered to read the fine print?

At least he was feeding an endangered species, thus doing his bit for their preservation.

 

[Johnny Angell]

One of the two deleted scenes for JP is the corporate #@!hole giving a speech to the Ingen board and he lists numerous financial settlements, one of which is the gatekeeper.

 

[Lord Dalek]

Originally Posted by Johnny Angell /t/315806/jurassic-park-ultimate-trilogy-blu-ray-review-recommended/30#post_3866748
One of the two deleted scenes for JP is the corporate #@!hole giving a speech to the Ingen board and he lists numerous financial settlements, one of which is the gatekeeper.

That was originally in the novel, so was the little girl getting attacked by compies (they just moved it to TLW).

 

[Johnny Angell]

I just watched JP2 and noticed a little oddity. At the 33:56 mark when the Ingen helicopters are bringing their troops in force, Malcom takes a pair of binoculars from Eddie. I believe he puts the wrong end of the binoculars to his eyes. That how it appears to me. A bit earlier in the scene when Eddie is using the binoculars, there is a clear difference in size between the front and the eyepiece end.
I also watched the two deleted scenes and thought they both would be good additions to the movie. In one we get a better idea of Roland's motivation for being on the expedition and without the scene, we don't truly understand that he and Ajay are good friends until we see Roland's sadness at Ajay's death. In the other, we once again get a better understanding of Ludlow and see briefly the machinations behind Hammond's removal as CEO of Ingen.
I think both scenes would have been good additions to the movie.

 

[dpippel]

Over the past four days I've watched all three JP films. I thought that the transfers on 1 and 3 were pretty good, but Lost World looked processed and soft on the whole. I wasn't impressed with it at all. Two other things struck me - I'd forgotten how truly awful Lost World was, and I actually enjoyed JP3 much more than I remember enjoying it in the past. Sam Neill was a huge part of the reason why. Without his Alan Grant the third film would have been significantly less entertaining. I'm looking forward to going through the extras this weekend.

P.S. HATE the packaging.

 

[trajan]

Any idea when these films will become available as singles?

 

[Bryan^H]

Any idea when these films will become available as singles?

Probably no time in the near future. Back To The Future box set was released almost 2 years ago, and Universal still hasn't given us the option of buying them individually.