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R2 Gets Stiffed On Indy ? (1 Viewer)

Sean Aaron

Second Unit
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May 17, 1999
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Sean Aaron
I've never been hit with customs charges from play.com on boxes of Law and Order (sadly before the R2 was announced months later) or MST3K. Just lucky I guess.

Generally I buy R2 over R1 when possible; the exceptions are regarding extras or if the item isn't available over here.

I'm really tired of the whole region-coding thing and a lot of the properties not available in R2 (Rex the Runt -- hello it's British!) don't make sense. More importantly why can't a shop carry something that won't likely be available in R2 like Strangers With Candy? The banning of imports is ludicrous. Who gives a crap about hollywood's bottom line. People at my office get bootlegs of movies out in theatres without the whole import thing coming into question -- the MPAA just needs to deal with it. Get some more realistic pricing and suck it up on the piracy. Or throw in the towel and go bankrupt -- I really don't care which.
 

Darren Pillans

Second Unit
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Feb 25, 2000
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331
If the R2 version is cut there should be only one option...

Region 4.

The Region 4 Indy collection should be exactly the same as the Region 1, with one exception. It will be PAL.

Hello? Anyone there?

Anyone who gets NTSC when they can have PAL is missing out. Region 4 is cheaper too.

And don't give me the speed-up baloney, I've heard it all before. Sure it exists, but it's negligible.

In terms of resolution and color accuracy, PAL kicks NTSC's butt. That's something anyone can see.

The end.
 
Joined
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Anthony
Darren, agreed - I've ordered a few disc from Oz, and will be ordering A BRIDGE TOO FAR from there in August. It's certainly cheaper, but customs problems still apply. And you get your discs even later than we do, on he whole.

This PAL thing bothers me, though. Like I said, go to DVDBeaver.com and take a look at the graphics comparisons.
How come the R1 transfer wins out over other regions so often ? Either you disagree with their comparisons, or something else is going on. If companies don't take the same care with non-R1 transfers, it doesn't much matter whether PAL is a superior format.
And when I play R1 discs on a widescreen tv, I don't see any great difference in the quality. Does anamorphic level the difference out ?
 

Derek_McL

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Apr 5, 2003
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316
Yes PAL's probably better than NTSC but what if a movie isn't available in that format ? And as Anthony says we in the UK always seem to lose out when material is converted from NTSC in terms of picture quality. I looked at DVD Beaver the other day concerning transfers of two classic film noirs : D.O.A. and Detour : ghosting is prominent in the Region 2 PAL versions particularly of the former. I still might buy the films because I found them in a box set at a very cheap price but the difference is obvious.

I've never actually imported anything from Australia because I would think the range of titles wouldn't be much better than here compared to the US and as Anthony says the Australians will get their DVDs probably even later than us. A few months ago I was interested in buying the silent version of Napoleon (1927) on offer in Australia I registered with a website which said they would contact me by e-mail when I could presumably order the DVD : not a murmur since so I think I'll stick with imports from the US for the moment.
 

James Reader

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Mar 10, 2002
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quote:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In terms of resolution and color accuracy, PAL kicks NTSC's butt. That's something anyone can see.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Yah...however, we have NTSC over here and we CAN'T see it...even with wonderful Malata's and whatknot.
Well, no offense Craig - that's because your watching a PAL picture converted to NTSC. Visually (and I stress visually) you're going to be missing out of all the PAL benefits, plus there's a further change for the image to be compromised as it is converted 'on-the-fly' by the player.

The fact is, PAL should be the better picture quality. Just look at the facts on paper. The sad fact is that often the PAL discs aren't better, which just goes to show how little care is taken in their mastering/encoding.

Again let me just stress, I am talking from a visual point-of-view here.
 

CraigL

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James,

I know all of this so no offense taken. As I said, we don't have PAL TV's...so there is no difference. Not only does it looks worse but it sounds worse. Thus, there is NO benefit. People in PAL countries have better picture but they still won't have "better" sound.
 

Darren Pillans

Second Unit
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Feb 25, 2000
Messages
331
CraigL, thanks for having a sense of humor and seeing my post for what it was. A bit of aggressive fun.

I mean absolutely no disrespect to those in Region 1, just a feeling of frustration from those in Region 2 who feel Region 1 is their only option.

I watch newer movies, IE: anything post 1975, so I can't comment on all DVDs, but I have NEVER seen an NTSC disc look better than its PAL counterpart. NEVER.

For 2 years my collection was exclusively Region 1, as I was an early adopter. Then when all my friends got on board and I compared their Region 4 DVDs to mine, I couldn't rationalize it any longer.

After conducting extensive Region 1 to 4 comparisons of every DVD I own, I've become a PAL junkie.

PAL is sharper, more defined, cleaner and has more accurate consistent color.

Sure, some Region 4 titles take longer, but that's more a thing of the past. Most new movies have simultaneous worldwide DVD release dates.

Indy, Reloaded and Twin Towers all are scheduled to hit the same time as Region 1. Heck, with the time difference, we sometimes get them a day earlier!

So all you Region 2 people, why not get the Region 4 Indy set?

http://www.ezydvd.com.au/item.zml/223668
 

Craig: Mclaren

Second Unit
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May 20, 2003
Messages
374
Why don't we bombard Paramount with letters and phone calls telling them to get there arse in gear. If an uncut Temple of Doom can be released in the UK at the expense of deleting the older VHS then damn well do it!! Anyone got Paramounts london number? :D
 

Geoff_D

Supporting Actor
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Jul 18, 2002
Messages
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It must greatly amuse our American friends to see us in the UK get so upset about an uncut version of ToD. The movie that many see as this hideous, bastardised version of what Indiana Jones is all about (see the other Indy threads!) is elevated to almost mythic status in the UK, simply because it's had a minute's worth of cuts to it! In whatever form it takes, I don't think that ToD is half as bad as many say it is. For completeness' sake, I'll be getting the R1 version.

As for NTSC vs PAL issues, they don't bother me. I notice PAL speed up but it rarely spoils my viewing, and NTSC may lack a few scan lines compared to PAL but can appear just as detailed. The immediate extra 'sharpness' of PAL does look nice, but IMO detail retrieval and colour reproduction is very similar on both formats (on my puny 28" 16x9 Sony at least). Lately I've sat through some stunning NTSC transfers, like Charlie's Angels Superbit, Pearl Harbor DC and T2:Extreme. T2 is possibly the finest transfer in my 450+ dvd collection, and it's a sure contender for the best transfer I've ever seen. And - horror of horrors - it's NTSC! But recently I got rid of my R1 Scream box set because I've picked up better PAL versions of the first two movies (the third one can burn in hell for all I care). I compared the anamorphic NTSC release of Scream 2 to the non-anamorphic PAL version - and I preferred the PAL dvd! Even though it was anamorphic, the NTSC dvd looked softer in comparison. Basically, PAL and NTSC each have their own caveats, and I'm glad that I'm able to cherry-pick the top releases from any region that I want.
 

Mikael Soderholm

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And don't give me the speed-up baloney, I've heard it all before. Sure it exists, but it's negligible.
It is a fact that speed-up exists, but it is an opinion that it is negligible ;)
About half of my 300 disc collection is PAL (R2 and R4), but I try to buy R1 when a lot of music is involved, because that is where I tend to notice the speed-up most, but I do own the R4 Moulin Rouge! and it sounds great, so I guess it depends, The R2 Christiane F. sounds terrible, Bowie on helium :frowning:.

Both formats have their pros and cons, it it speed-up vs pull-down, vertical resolution vs refresh rate and so on.
 

Sean Aaron

Second Unit
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May 17, 1999
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Sean Aaron
Well, I'm not keen on the second one, so I'll be waiting for a separate release to buy these.
 

Cees Alons

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Cees Alons
I've had to pay custom charges (actually it's 19% VAT you have to pay over here)
It's worse: if you're unlucky you have to pay extra and then it's customs AND VAT AND "handling" of it by the carrier! If you're lucky you don't pay anything extra :).

If a film is made available in R2 in another language than English (e.g. in French, German, Swedish, Dutch), the original track is often available too - and most often, almost always, actually, the cuts made necessary by the BBFC are NOT present!
So my guess is that the version Vincent Matis will probably watch, will be the same version (in PAL) as the R1 version. :)

Cees
 

SaschaStolingwa

Auditioning
Joined
Apr 22, 2003
Messages
7
Hi, :)

the German version of Indy will be uncut! It was confirmed by Thorsten Nobst - _the_ Product Manager from Paramount Germany.

By the way... it includes the English audio track! :)

Kind regards,

Sascha
 

Darren Pillans

Second Unit
Joined
Feb 25, 2000
Messages
331
If the UK versions of Temple have always been cut, what about the Australian versions?

I have an Australian VHS widescreen copy of Temple. How do I know if it's cut? It's PAL, so if it's uncut, where did it come from?

Secondly, where do other PAL masters for uncut Australian DVDs come from?

The Aussie Episode 2 DVD is PAL and uncut. As I believe, the UK DVD has the Jango/Obi-Wan headbutt removed.
 

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