Paramount to re-do "Godfather" DVDs - Page 4

Gary Tooze · 11-11-2003, 08:11 AM

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The Godfather DVD shows more picture info on all sides in comparison to the vhs widescreen copies.

The region 1's are slightly cropped on top (and bottom) and the Region 2's are badly cropped on both side edges... I have just compared all 4 discs (Region 1 vs. Region 2). You can see HERE

Regards,

Geoff_D · 11-11-2003, 12:11 PM

Thanks for that Gary. What most surprised me is that the R2 appears to be filtered more heavily than the R1! Lots of fine detail is missing from the R2 grabs, and shadow detail is also compromised. They still look okay for thirty-year-old films though, and unless Lowry's efforts are truly spectacular then I won't be upgrading.

Ed St. Clair · 11-11-2003, 06:48 PM

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This is a rather common occurrence with 1.85:1 films, though.

Damin J Toell,
Can not comment on how "common" this is.
However, in the case of The Godfather DVD's, it was the choice of the Director of Photography, backed by FFC.

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Oh I see. Well I'm not one of those who participates in the 1.78 vs. 1.85 or the 2.35 vs. 2.40 arguments

Carlo Medina,
So I am not counting you as an OAR advocate.

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The Godfather DVD shows more picture info on all sides in comparison to the vhs widescreen copies.

ScottR,
Are you saying that this makes the DVD version better than the VHS (as far as ratio goes) or are you saying that makes the DVD presentation; OK?
Even though the DVD clearly is missing information.

Gary Tooze,
Thank you for the screen captures.

Adam Tyner · 11-11-2003, 07:00 PM

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So I am not counting you as an OAR advocate.

I consider myself to be an OAR advocate, but even some of the most high profile DVD sites use 1.78:1 and 1.85:1 interchangably, and there's been considerable debate on this forum as to which aspect ratio 'scope' refers to...2.35:1, 2.39:1, or 2.40:1. I understand that you feel strongly about this, but I think completely dismissing someone's opinion because of a 2.09%-3.79% difference in image size...a difference virtually all of us, I'd imagine, would have considerable difficulty spotting after taking overscan into account...is unfair.

Aaryn Chan · 11-11-2003, 08:14 PM

I see they cut the sides because of burned negative.

ScottR · 11-11-2003, 09:08 PM

I see nothing wrong with the R1 ratio.....honestly, the framing looks very balanced.

Colin Jacobson · 11-11-2003, 09:40 PM

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I consider myself to be an OAR advocate, but even some of the most high profile DVD sites use 1.78:1 and 1.85:1 interchangably, and there's been considerable debate on this forum as to which aspect ratio 'scope' refers to...2.35:1, 2.39:1, or 2.40:1. I understand that you feel strongly about this, but I think completely dismissing someone's opinion because of a 2.09%-3.79% difference in image size...a difference virtually all of us, I'd imagine, would have considerable difficulty spotting after taking overscan into account...is unfair.

Agreed. It's like worrying about older 1.37:1 movies shown in 1.33:1 - it's such a tiny difference that it seems absurd to accuse someone of not caring about OAR because they don't fret over this.

Besides, given the overscan so common on many TVs, even a perfectly OAR DVD could end up as MAR on anyone's set...

Patrick McCart · 11-11-2003, 11:27 PM

Showing a 1.85:1 at 1.78:1 is just a matter of a few less lines of resolution being matted.

In fact, a lot of films, when matted EXACTLY, end up being tight in a few shots. It's better to have a little less matting than having too much.

Bill J · 11-11-2003, 11:36 PM

I don't know if this is old news or not, but...

Davis DVD says that a single disc version of the film will be released on May 11th and similar releases of the other two films are likely to follow.

Rob Tomlin · 11-12-2003, 12:50 AM

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There is nothing wrong with the current set. It accurately represents the look of the film. The re-releases will probably just clean it up some and remove film grain and such, which should be there.

I agree, but would add that Lowry can do more than remove grain (a bad thing really), they can remove dirt and scratches.

I had the opportunity to see both Godfather 1 and 2 a few months ago at The Academy Theater in Beverly Hills. They were using their own archived prints. This is an absolute state of the art facility.

I can tell you that the DVD's, while not "reference" quality, do a pretty good job of accurately representing the look of these films. I think most of what people see in these DVD's that bothers them is inherent in the source.

This is something that Mr. Lowry will no doubt be able to improve upon. I just hope he doesn't go too far, and maintains the original look of the films. I know that is one of his goals.

Daniel J.S. · 11-12-2003, 12:53 AM

Oh I see. Well I'm not one of those who participates in the 1.78 vs. 1.85 or the 2.35 vs. 2.40 arguments

My understanding is that the scope ratio IS 2.40:1 (or, more accurately, 2.39:1). We still refer to it as 2.35:1 because that was the ratio of the Panavision process until it switched to the current ratio in 1971; it would seem the original terminology stuck.