A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray - Page 2

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Bigger screens tend to magnify things - a very big screen and a close seating distance will make movies looks very bad that looked good on smaller displays.
During my time as a home theater enthusiast I have been going up in screen size and down in relative seating distance to the screen. This does help the cinematic experience as films now cover a bigger part of my field of view but a lot of transfers do not looks that good at these distances as they did before. So it could be a combination of both but as has been pointed out before RAH also has a pretty big screen and he also does sit quite close to it.

Regarding the nature of the halos:
Some halos can of course be an artefact of the original photography, so if the halos have diffuse edges and look more like a white glow around actors or objects they are probably in the film elements, too. But I have yet to see halos with sharp edges on film, so if there are some of those on the transfer they probably cannot be found on the elements used for the transfer.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Absolutely true and often forgotten. Background projection and unsharp-masking techniques could have been the cause.

Halos can also be generated in the last stage of displaying the picture: the TV set or projector.

I often wonder if those reviewers actually calibrated their sets for HD use. Factory settings almost always have too much edge-enhancement, and even "proper" settings for SDVD could still be off for HD viewing.

It's very tricky to determine if too much EE, if present, was applied in the transfer stages or not. Halos on the original elements are not easily removed. Having one's monitor at a "sharpness setting" that's too high, can relatively easily be healed.

Those cases where reviewers see halos that aren't seen by highly experienced movie enthusiasts, lead me to think it might be the latter in those cases.


Cees

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

I would not expect RAH to mention halos that were caused by principal photography as in that case there is nothing wrong with what is on screen.

To be fair to Joshua Zyber: If he does mention halos this also means that he does not see them with other movies so I would be surprised if this was caused by an excessive sharpening of the picture.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Excessive halos caused by TV settings would only been seen in almost every picture if it was really an excessive setting.

I won't deny that, under a more moderate setting, it would only be visible in some problematic parts. But even if they were "problematic" in this respect, that doesn't mean the TV (or projector) setting isn't to blame.


Cees

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

You are right that sharpening does show artefacts only in certain scenens but from what I read Joshua whom I mentioned is aware of this and does not use it, dunno about others of course.

In any case I would be surprised to find reviewers that both mention Halos as objectionable artefacts AND use so much sharpening that they cause the problem for themselves, people who notice halos usually also know how to operate the sharpness settings in their systems.

Hopefully I will soon be able to see for myself - The Professionals are on their way together with The Sand Pebbles and A Bridge Too Far

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Doesn't state screen size but here is his eqp.

Joshua Zyber
- BenQ W10000 1080p DLP projector
- Panamorph UH380 anamorphic lens
- DVDO iScan VP50Pro video scaler
- Panasonic DMP-BD30 Blu-ray player (via HDMI)
- Toshiba HD-A35 HD DVD player (via HDMI)
- Denon AVR-3808CI receiver
- Cambridge Soundworks (CSW) Newton MC600HD left/right main speakers
- CSW Newton MC300 center speaker
- CSW Newton S305 left/right rear speakers
- CSW Newton MC200 center rear speakers (2)
- CSW Basscube 8 powered subwoofer

Any clues there?

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

I did say "maybe", and I mentioned Lumet only because he just made a movie that exhibited some of the "old school" values on display in The Professionals -- namely, trusting in the script and the actors to keep the audience interested without resorting to frantic cutting or look-at-me camera moves. I happen to think that Lumet's visual skill has been grossly underrated, but that's a subject for another thread.

M.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

That's a potential problem, of course, because it's in the picture projection path and adds a deliberate distortion.
I know some guys use it to achieve a form of same height images (which is fine if you dig that). If you like it, it's great while enjoying a movie, but personally I consider it plainly wrong if you try to judge the full quality of the disc image with all that extra glass in between. Of course we also cannot know how the projector was calibrated (just like you do not know that about mine ).

But really, I don't think we should concentrate on one reviewer in this discussion. I'm sure he saw what he saw.


Cees

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Ok- this subtitle problem has really ticked me off.
When I read the first review on this that mention the placement of the subs, I had to scratch my head and try to remember where in this movie there was subs, and how often these occurred.
I hadn't seen the movie in a few years and I honestly couldn't remember. I just pulled out my original disc of this and now I know why- THERE WEREN'T ANY!
Now, I missed seeing this in the theater, but watching the film, the scenes I watched, play properly without them. In the ambush at the train, Lee Marvin's character basically interprets what is being yelled by the banditos which makes the subs entirely redundant. No question to me, the scene plays so much better without seeing them on screen. Ifyou don't know Spanish, the effect is more tense and more chaotic. And if you do, then again the subs are redundant. They effectively dumb down the sequence.
Now this wouldn't be a problem if you could just shut them off- but you can't! Some knucklehead at Sony forced subs on this...and ugly, large computer generated ones at that. UGH.
the level of frustration with Bd's has just started to get to be too much for me. I'm really losing a lot of enthusiasm I had and it just doesn't feel worth it. For the paltry # of releases per month, all these issues are ridiculous. I'm paying a premium price to in most cases double or even triple dip, and the releases are still ending up compromised in one way or another.
This is a real drag.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Paul,
As someone that plays my discs with the subs on all the time, I'm sorry this problem bothers you, but I hardly pay attention to the placement of them as I'm into the film itself too much to allow that to bother me. What I do like about this disc is that it interprets the spanish speaking dialogue.





Crawdaddy

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Well, I'm glad you took the time to compare the BD subtitles vs. the SD DVD because I thought it odd that they would be translating every bit of Spanish dialogue (e.g. 'Buenos dias!', which even most people who don't speak Spanish knows what that means). Having never seen this film in the theaters or on any other home video format, I wasn't going to mention it. Needless to say, I shared a lot of your observations, particularly, the 'redundancy' in subtitled information.


I have no problem with your desire to see it interpreted; however, for me, I was defer to what was the director's intent, and, honestly, we may no longer be in a position to know. I think that a large portion of the problems that we've been experiencing lately with BD stem from a lack of understanding the director's intent because the director may not be alive/available and the studios do not have sufficient expertise on the subject themselves. That said, this wouldn't be a problem if you could turn the subs off, but Sony has forced them and you can't!


I know that a lot of people are tired of the 'negativity' here, but, like Paul_Scott, I'm being asked to pay a premium price and not receiving a premium product, in my opinion, when I see results like 'Patton', 'The Longest Day', 'The Professionals' (too a much lesser degree I will admit), and now, most recently, 'Gangs of New York'.

The studios have kind of got me in a Catch 22, as I have no intention to go back to SD DVD at this point; but I no longer feel it is safe to pre-order anything on BD so I am stopping that practice immediately until I have read some reviews. Additionally, the cost of hardware and software coupled with the amount of frustration I have experienced over the past month or two with certain titles has virtually assured that I won't be recommending this format to any of my family and friends for quite awhile.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

I think there should be a standard set of options regarding what we should be able to do with subtitles in general:

Subtitles SHOULD be made movable

Subtitles SHOULD be made more like closed captions in that the viewer can decide about their size, font and color. This functionality can be had with closed captioning, a MyHD and most HBO movies for quite some time now and I would say it is about time we get that ability on the most high end home theater medium of them all !

Of course

Subtitles already CAN be programmed to be turned off by the viewer

Subtitles already CAN be programmed in different languages, with added information for the hearing impaired and for those that just don't understand the spoken language of the movie, it would be nice to have more options to choose from for most discs

With that kind of functionality implemented one viewer can have no subtitles at all and another one can have huge yellow subtitles in the middle of the picture - I can always dream I guess

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Sony encodes their subtitles to have forced narratives appear when the language is active/off. The narrative subtitles are the exact same ones that are contained within the full subtitle stream; those particular parts are simply flagged to appear when the subtitle stream is in the "off" setting.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

May I suggest that you politely let those who can do something about it know the details and the suggestions for a correctly authored disc.

My attempt was made on June 19, 2008:

Blu-ray.com Post#3951

And Penton's response:

Bluray.com Post #3957

Paul

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Paul, I had already noticed your post on blu-ray.com, so I didn't feel compelled to write another response basically reiterating the same thing. I do appreciate your efforts though.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

If "The Professionals" BRD is not a premium product then I'm afraid this format is doom to excessive expectations not being met according to some consumer standards






Crawdaddy

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Sorry, Robert. I call BS on that.


I'm not contesting that they got the visuals and audio mostly right. They did a laudable job in that respect. But while it is the major, it is not the entire aspect in regards to presentation. Even putting aside the likliehood that they were never intended to be seen in the first place, having them non-removable and non resizable as they are here, in essence modifys the aspect ratio of the presentation from 2.35:1 to 16:9 (or something like 2:1) because it essentially makes the black bars (at least on the bottom) a mandatory part of the image. Can I live with it? Yeah...but it chaffes when the format is presented (and priced) as a premium product for discerning viewers and I buy it only to see immediately it is not a definitive presentation. I merely traded one issue (resolution) for another( a compromised AR).
Sorry that I can't share your excitement about that.I thank Paul H for his efforts (and he is spot on about the use of masks. I tried them when I briefly owned an RP and quickly became a true believer-THEY WORK!).
Sorry, but I hope a future pressing of this title 'fixes' this, because it is a problem that is going to affect a number of enthusiasts who are actively looking for higher performance with scope aspect material. That includes both constant heighters and maskers. Anyone content to use the awesome potential here with no aspirations beyond viewing on a 16:9 display without even masking, is not someone I expect to understand the level of annoyance with this.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

There are a lot of BDs and DVDs that have this problem. That, obviously, doesn't make it right; but if we cannot complain about such things, in this forum of all places, in an effort to shed some light on these problems without being made to feel as though our issues are unreasonable, by our very own peers, then I'm afraid that is far more damning to this hobby.

In fact, my main issue isn't even about the placement of the subs, which would be easily fixed by taking OliverK's suggestions to heart, some Java coding, and some standardization (i.e. mandatory studio support). My issue is that 'forcing' the Spanish subs may have inadvertantly affected the director's intent. Many times in films foreign languages are delibertly not translated to make the viewer feel uneasy, isolated, confused, etc.

The fact that someone who has this film in their Top 10 doesn't seem to care about this issue is sad. The fact that studios don't seem to have anyone available to answer these questions before pressing a disc is depressing.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

Paul A, you and I are in complete agreement. They should not even be there in the first place.
And forcing me to alter my set up for one film, to accommodate something that shouldn't be there in the first place is what really burns my beans here.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

I don't believe that anyone has indicated that it's "unreasonable" to raise the issue.

If you're referring to my colleague Robert Crawford, I see nothing to indicate that he "doesn't . . . care" about the problem. He merely said that it doesn't interfere with his own enjoyment of the film. There's a difference.

M.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

No comment in return.

However, I'm sorry your enjoyment level is compromised with this issue.





Crawdaddy

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

No further comment is necessary as Michael Reuben has explained my position on this matter.





Crawdaddy

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

While I am guilty myself of elaborating on the matter of subtitles in this thread I would think that this is not the place to go into more detail on them, except for the matter of the translation or non-translation of the spanish subs and the decision to make them mandatory or not which by the way seems to have been covered sufficiently.

Subtitles within back bars truly are very annoying but the problem affects, to my knowledge, all Warner Cinemascope titles, too and I am sure a few others.
So let's make a thread for this or even a general subtitling praise and complaints thread and if we update it with every movie that has subtitles in the black bars it will pretty much stay close to the top until the subtitles are made movable. BTW: Most people with 16:9 sets or screens that do not do masking prefer the subs to be within the black bars so I think that making them movable is the only solution that pleases all.

Re: A few words about...™ The Professionals -- in Blu-Ray

No, but this site and RAH's glowing review of the transfer as well as your and others' obvious enthusiasm for the film really made me want to seek it out. And it was a film that slipped by me before now (there just isn't anyway to see them all). I just rented it, but it is one that in time will probably be added to my collection. I enjoyed it immensely and look forward to sharing it with others.

I thought the transfer was pretty good, but it sure did have a lot of grain. I wish there was some way to digitally remove stuff like that.

I just purchased this film in a 20 dollar two pack with "The Quick and The Dead" starring Sharon Stone. I can't remember ever seeing this, so for all intents and purposes this was my first viewing of the film. This film was a pleasant surprise. Judging by the cover art, I was expecting a cheesy 'B' western, but I couldn't have been more wrong. This film was a tightly plotted, fantastically shot gem. There are a lot of modern cinematographers and directors who could take some lessons from this film on how to frame and shoot an action scene. The Hacienda attack in this film is just one example. At no time did a viewer ever lose the sense of where everyone was in geographic space and yet the violence of the scene was only on a bit smaller scale than that in "The Wild Bunch". I actually think the violence in the attack, bloodless as it was, may have been better done than in "TWB" attack purely on the basis that it didn't seem as over-the-top.

 

I also thought it was unusual sound choice when

 

Warning: Spoiler! (Click to show)

Anyway, that was just a small detail that struck me.

 

The dialogue and interplay between Lee Marvin and Burt Lancaster was also a high point, as was the "philisophical" dialogue between Lancaster and Palance, who (I am ashamed to say) I didn't even recognize until I read the end credits. Watching actors like Marvin, Palance and Lancaster work together is a treat. The understated dynamic going on between these guys just doesn't show up very often between actors in the films of today. 

 

There were so many well constructed and shot scenes in this film that I can't begin to name them all, but one other scene that particularly struck me was the train escape. That was just a beautifully shot sequence. If that scene were shot today it would consist of nothing but shaky cam and quick cuts of hooves, arms, legs, horse's heads and men's faces.

 

Amongst other good lines, the ones that I really got a chuckle out of were the last two lines between Bellamy's Grant and Marvin's Fardan. That exchange, IMO, was just classic.

 

The PQ on the blu-ray was outstanding. It is hard to believe that a film shot in 1966 could be made to look as good as it did. You almost could have sworn it was shot yesterday. The only thing that really gave it away as an older film was the sound. The sound was good, but it definitely didn't have the dynamic range of modern tracks and parts of it did have a bit of a sharp, "tinny" sound; however, it more than adequately did the job.

 

All-in-all, this was a most impressive package in picture, sound and story quality.

Edwin,

 

I'm glad you enjoyed this fine film as it's one of my personal favorites from the time I first viewed it in a movie theater over 40 years ago.  IMO, the dialogue in it is among the best ever written for a western or action film which isn't surprising since the underrated Richard Brooks directed and wrote this film.  Also, I think Conrad Hall's cinematography is among his most impressive works.  Furthermore, I agree with you that the actors had some good film chemistry that you sometimes don't see in today's action films.

 

 

 

 

Crawdaddy

"The Professionals" Richard Brooks

Watching "The Professionals"  (1966) blu-ray on my plasma set. All I can say is "WOW"

 

This film looks great (and It's 45 years old) Great job SONY!

 

Hopefully more SONY Releases will look this good. I have already pre-ordered "Bridge and the River Kwai" and "Tommy"

 

Still waiting for "Lawrence of Arabia" "Oliver!" "Bye Bye Birdie" "1776" and "Lord JIm"

If "The Professionals" looks this good, the others are pre-order purchases too.

 

"Bell, Book and Candle" "Picnic" and "Pal Joey" would also be nice (All have just been remastered for the Kim Novak Box set)

I'm enjoying this film a lot. Classic Western. Great PQ. And it's available in a bargain two pack with Quick and the Dead. I wonder how much it cost to prepare this film for blu-ray. I bet a pretty penny. And I wonder if they made that back...

 

I wish more Westerns could get this treatment. Any nominations? How about Shane?

 

I had never heard of The Professionals before, so I am interested