The PR firm that handles Fox releases has not sent a review copy to me for Von Ryan's Express. It may come this week or, as was the case a month or so ago, the review copies were over two weeks after street date arriving. One never knows.
I watched it last night instead of Patton, but I became too engross in the film to notice any PQ problems. For the most part, it looked very good to me.
I also watched the Blu-Ray last night and the video is very good not over grainy no scratches or any other problems with the transfer. This is one of Frank Sinatra's better movies. Trevor Howard is very good as a British officer who doesn't like Frank but understands they all need him during this desperate time as prisoners of war. As the movies progresses and Frank's leadership and decision making skills become apparent Trevor's opinion changes and in the end he has great respect for Frank. One of the better WW II movies holds up well over time.
All right, I bought the disc, and here is my take:
The first DVD was way-y-y too dark, and the contrast too high. The 2nd DVD release, a 2-disc special edition, corrected the dark issue, but was very-y-y soft, nearly blurry at times.
The Blu-ray is neither too dark nor too soft, so those problems are corrected.
But another problem emerges (which may have been present in one or both of the DVD's, I do not recall): color & saturation inconsistency. I suspect this was taken from a partly-faded Eastman color source. Fox did not restore or correct this film the way they did with the second Blu release of PATTON. About half of the shots look splendid, fully color-saturated, but alternately, the remaining shots are dullish and rather faded. It is still far superior to anything seen in the home before, and the closest we have come to reliving the 1965 theatrical prints, but it is far from exemplary. The sound is mono, as far as my ears can discern.
All bonus features from the second DVD release have been ported over.