USHE Press Release: Universal Classic Monsters: The Essential Collection (Blu-ray) includes Creature (1 Viewer)

[Mark-P]

Just checked my Amazon UK order. The status is now listed as DISPATCHING SOON. Yea!!

As has mine. Surprisingly the orders shipped from Amazon UK don't take that much longer to arrive than the US orders. I generally get them in 4 to 5 days. The first one I'm going to watch is Creature in glorious 3D!!!

 

[David Weicker]

As has mine. Surprisingly the orders shipped from Amazon UK don't take that much longer to arrive than the US orders. I generally get them in 4 to 5 days. The first one I'm going to watch is Creature in glorious 3D!!!

Looking back at my last few Amazon UK orders:
"Dispatched" email___ Received
1/5/12______________1/11/12
10/10/11____________10/18/11
8/8/11______________8/16/11
This is to the Chicago area
David

 

[Robert Crawford]

I usually don't get my UK orders from Amazon until the Saturday which is four days after the Tuesday release date.






Crawdaddy

 

[Craig Beam]

Mine (the US version) shipped today. I get free 2-day shipping thanks to Amazon Prime, so I should have it Monday or Tuesday. I had previously decided to hold off and get it down the road during a sale or something, but those reviews over at DVD Beaver made waiting impossible.

 

[Johnny Angell]

Shipping from the UK to Arkansas seems to be dicey. If I get it on the following Monday, I'll be happy. When I ordered Ben-Hur, I reported it to Amazon and they said to wait a total of (I think) 15 days. When it still hadn't arrived, they sent me a replacement. A couple days later, the first one arrived. While the second was enroute, I emailed Amazon. They thanked me for being honest and said to keep both. My brother-in-law got it for free.

 

I'm showing a triple-feature of "Frankenstein," "Bride of Frankenstein," and "The Wolf Man" at SkyDome Cinema in October. We will probably have a bonfire as well (no torches.)

 

[Bob_S.]

Craig, same here. I was going to wait and get it cheaper down the road since I don't have a big screen tv and I'm happy with the dvds. But I saw those screen captures and I immediately ordered the coffin set.

 

[FoxyMulder]

Originally Posted by eric scott richard /t/321849/ushe-press-release-universal-classic-monsters-the-essential-collection-blu-ray-includes-creature-in-3d/210#post_3981898
I'm showing a triple-feature of "Frankenstein," "Bride of Frankenstein," and "The Wolf Man" at SkyDome Cinema in October. We will probably have a bonfire as well (no torches.)

I can supply the villagers.

 

LOL.

 

[Kevin EK]

Just found this thread.

I received a review copy late in the week (Thursday morning) and spent several hours yesterday going through all of the movies.

I'm going to post a rough copy of my review later today, as the full one will require me to spend a lot of time itemizing all the special features and accounting from whence they come.

I'll give you a quick preview here:

The first 6 discs in the set - Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Invisible Man, Bride of Frankenstein and The Wolf Man are all great work. I'm going to Recommend this set on the basis of those 6 discs alone. Dracula and The Mummy in particular received some lovely attention both in their picture and sound. Dracula and Bride of Frankenstein show much more detail in the dark areas of the screen - one example is the portrait over the fireplace in the prologue of Bride of Frankenstein. In the 2004 DVD, the portrait is almost completely black. In the Blu-ray, you can see the portrait. This isn't to say that the moody looks of these movies has been changed. Just that things aren't in such deep black shadow that you can't see anything - now you can see the detail, and it's a wonder.

The problems happen in the final 2 discs.

Phantom of the Opera, which arguably should not be in this set in the first place, has some serious color registration issues. In multiple scenes across the movie, the red or green goes out of registration and you get green or red outlines or bleed. It's on a shot-by-shot basis. An early scene with Claude Rains and Susanna Foster has the green registration problem on her coverage. The master shot and Rains' coverage is fine, but when they cut to Foster, we have green problems. The big scene with the chandelier falling has red registration problems in a variety of ways, but not in every shot. The VFX shot looking up to see the chandelier fall has the background looking fine, but the miniature chandelier out of red registration, which makes no sense. One crowd reaction shot looks fine, and the next one is out of registration.

Creature from the Black Lagoon includes both the 2D and 3D versions. The 3D version is effective for the 3D but we must keep in mind this is really "in your face" 3D, or as I call it, "poke in the eye" 3D. Some of the shots have wonderful dimensionality to them. But others, like underwater shots of the Creature swimming behind reeds, push the foreground plants so far forward that it became physically painful for me at times. As for the 2D version, the best word I can use to describe it is "inconsistent". Some of the shots are wonderful. But then others look so low definition I could have sworn I was watching an SD DVD. Again, this is on a shot-by-shot basis. Some scenes look good and then have one heck of a bad shot. Other scenes don't have any good shots. And this isn't a field enlargement issue. This is happening on wide masters. I don't understand what happened here or why, but it's not a very satisfying presentation.

I will still recommend the release on the strength of the first six discs alone. I can't say "Highly Recommended" because of the problems with the final two discs. But getting 6 first class presentations here (7 if you count the Spanish Dracula) is very nice indeed.

I need to also take a moment to thank Joe Kane, as I will do in my rough and final reviews. Joe Kane graciously allowed me to bring the set over to his home theater to evaluate the picture and sound quality. Joe's setup is his own HD projector design and his own screen design. The screen is 90" and we were sitting approximately 8 feet back, which was very comfortable and made the PQ issues very easy to see while enjoying the movies.

As a side note, by watching the movies in such rapid succession, I began noticing things I would never have caught on to before - that there are two different performances of the Swan Lake overture between the two Dracula versions, and that the same version from the English language Dracula is also on The Mummy. It's also fun to watch James Whale casting some of the same people both in The Invisible Man and Bride of Frankenstein. And in watching the opening funeral/body recovery scene in Frankenstein, we could easily, easily see the backdrop against the stage wall that was supposed to be "sky". The folds in the fabric are evident, as is a hole at left. And when Henry throws the shovelful of dirt back, it can be seen AND HEARD to hit the wall! Finally, the moment in Phantom of the Opera where Enrique rigs the chandelier to fall got what was probably an inappropriate laugh - when he pulled out the saw and began going to work, we turned to each other and noted this is a heck of a way to get that thing to go. Visions of cutting to the clock and the hour and minute hands going round came to mind, as did the idea that we were about to see a lot more of Enrique's opera before that saw got through much of the chain...

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Quote:

[COLOR= rgb(24, 24, 24)]Creature from the Black Lagoon includes both the 2D and 3D versions. The 3D version is effective for the 3D but we must keep in mind this is really "in your face" 3D, or as I call it, "poke in the eye" 3D. Some of the shots have wonderful dimensionality to them. But others, like underwater shots of the Creature swimming behind reeds, push the foreground plants so far forward that it became physically painful for me at times. [/COLOR]

This is my kind of preferred 3D. Let me see how painful
it will be for me to watch.

 

[Bob Furmanek]

If you find the 3-D cinematography painful in CREATURE, you had best stay away from any other Golden Age title, except for DIAL M. Hitchcock greatly minimized the depth in that film and it is much closer to what they are doing today.
I find most of the modern 3-D movies to be very flat with very little depth whatsoever.

 

[Matt Hough]

Like Ron, I welcome the pain. Wait...I didn't mean it to sound quite like that!

 

[Kevin EK]

Just being honest, Bob.

As I said, there are many people who find this kind of 3D to be very enjoyable. For me, it's a bit harder to take. Having my eyes watering during various shots was not working for me. On the other hand, there are other shots where the dimensionality works great for me. I prefer the type where it's a bit more like looking into a window box, with various levels of depth visible. I'm not saying this is bad work - just that it may not work for everybody.

To each their own.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Yeah, I have made no secret that I am very dissatisfied with
modern-day 3D that plays it too safe. I love as much depth
as possible with as much stuff flying out of the screen that can
be done without becoming overly gimmicky.

Sounds like Creature From The Black Lagoon is going to be fun.

 

[Charles Smith]

Same here. Give me depth, and give me stuff flying at me. It's all good!

 

[FoxyMulder]

Originally Posted by Ronald Epstein /t/321849/ushe-press-release-universal-classic-monsters-the-essential-collection-blu-ray-includes-creature-in-3d/210#post_3981952
Yeah, I have made no secret that I am very dissatisfied with
modern-day 3D that plays it too safe. I love as much depth
as possible with as much stuff flying out of the screen that can
be done without becoming overly gimmicky.

Sounds like Creature From The Black Lagoon is going to be fun.

I can't tell you how glad i am to see another opinion like this, i see no point in watching 3D just for depth, i also think it's no wonder 3D is not selling as well as the studio's and television/projector makers would like as the filmmakers are not utilizing it the way that i suspect most movie fans would enjoy, call it a gimmick but having things flying out of the screen at you is an enjoyable experience to many, i also think there is overpricing of some discs compared to the 2D edition.

 

[Kevin EK]

I'm actually okay with the stuff flyiing out of the screen as it does in the opening explosion in Creature. I enjoyed that. It's things like the underwater reeds that feel like they're really getting pushed into the foreground and staying there as solid objects that get me. That's where it gets into the poke in the eye for me.

I also agree that the pricing on the 3D editions is ridiculous at times. Of course, those editions also have the 2D Blu-ray and the DVD and the digital copy, etc. Most times I've seen that you can't just get the 3D edition without getting everything else...

 

[Mark-P]

I think the registration issues Kevin is seeing on Phantom are going to be typical of any 3-strip Technicolor film that hasn't had the luxury of the Ultra-resolution process.

 

[FoxyMulder]

There are a lot of bargains on Amazon UK for 3D titles, i mean Hugo at £6.99, what's not to like about that price, at the same time, you get some of the Disney ones and other animated titles selling for over £20, these ones don't seem to drop in price, i mean take a look at The Nightmare Before Christmas in 3D, it's £29.99, bit on the steep side for a film i would give a shot at watching in 3D, still for every expensive one there are several selling cheaply so that's good.