A few words about...™ The Wizard of Oz -- in Blu-ray - Page 4

I couldn't believe that I had to debate the issue with the manager.  They "fixed it" finally - with a severe window boxing that could have easily been corrected by someone adjusting the projector lens.  At that point I was too upset with the manager to deal with it.  I came straight home to pre-order the Blu-ray just to get the bad taste of that screening out of my mouth. 

Still, you have the satisfaction of being more enlightened than those gimps. So, you've got that going for you... Which is nice.

I think the DVD-Beaver screenshot of Emerald City in the distance looks contrast-boosted on Blu-ray, making it look a bit harsh and overbright.  As a consequence it doesn't quite have the subtle glow effect that can be seen especially on the shots of the first edition DVD's and was still retained - although to a lesser degree already - on the Special Edition DVD's.

I'm going with RAH on this; he's seen it in motion.

Thanks to those who posted their experiences about the theatrical showing.  I was wondering what I might have missed.  Now I know that it would likely have been a big waste of time and money.

Thanks for the reports. I was thinking of attending this event but decided to skip it. Now I'm kind of glad I did. Nothing worse than having the theater management and workers have so little regard for the show. I remember seeing one of the new Star Wars movies a few years back in a theater with no sound coming from the surround speakers at all, even though there was surround on the previews. I complained and got my money back (nobody else seemed to care) but it's such a frustrating experience.

Very, very poor presentation here. The image was very washed out, almost like watching on a early generation LCD, and the colors were extremely muted. IMHO, Oz should not look like it was redone in pastels!

Also, there was a very odd screen door effect. When my wife, who does not share my obsession with picture and sound quality, makes the same observations unprompted, you know that they dropped the ball on this one.

On the plus side, it was in OAR, but it looked like it was window boxed in a 16:9 frame, and the whole image was shifted right, thus on the left side, there was dark screen, followed by lighter screen, then the actual image. Shame they did not have masking curtains that could properly frame a 4:3 image. 

I am quite curious how this was actually presented in terms of the equipment. I have seen a few DLP projected films, and they looked pretty good. This was a far cry from what those films looked like. At the conclusion of the credits, the Windows desk top appeared at the bottom of the screen, so there would seem to have been a PC in the loop somewhere.

Oh well... lesson learned. A shame that they don't re-release the film using a properly restored print. Albuquerque is not exactly the cinema capital of the world, so even if they did, it may not be shown here, but it would surely be better than what I saw last night.

Brian

The Century Theater in Huntington Beach, CA had their own snafus, but I must admit they handled it more professionally than the other theaters I'm reading about here.  The slide show at 6:30 came off fine, although the cycle time was barely more than maybe five minutes so the same slides cycled through countless times.  The Angela Lansbury documentary started on time but sounded rather echoish where we were in the back of the packed auditorium.  Midway through the documentary, the screen went blank.  When the audience got restless, a theater employee turned up the lights and announced that there was a mishap in the booth and they were working on it.  She assured us that when it was fixed, the program would be resumed at the point where the picture went blank, which it eventually did after maybe seven or eight minutes.

When the actual movie started, the echo effect went away and the stereo remix was the best I'd ever heard.  The transfer itself was lovely with that old-fashioned Technicolor color saturation but, as others who saw it at the Motion Picture Academy a few weeks ago complained, the projection left a lot to be desired.  It was dark and muddy-looking.  Digital projection just can't yet equal a pristine 35mm print struck from the best sources.

But it was fun seeing the film with an appreciative audience that laughed at all the right places and responded to the emotional heart-tugging in the story.  The film will always be timeless.  There's nothing that dates it.  There are no cars, telephones, appliances or 1930s fashions that make it look old-fashioned.  And the dialogue's references to the depression era in which it was made ("Times being what they were, I accepted...") are vague enough to be eternally relevant.

This is very nearly the perfect Hollywood movie and I'm thrilled that it remains fresh and new and that new generations continue to embrace it.

 I always have to laugh when these digital projection zealots on chat boards try to tell me that it betters conventional projection.  I went and saw the new Harry Potter in digital projection - dark, muddy, and pretty rank.  And that's been my experience every time I've seen digital projection.  And these have been in supposedly state of the art theaters.  I don't know if it's the projectors themselves or the source material, but give me film projected properly any day of the week.

How can you go with anyone on this?  I think you can only go with your own eyes.  Can't go from caps, and while I respect and appreciate the words here, I don't always agree with them.  So, I'm really anxious to see this with my own eyes and judge for myself.

 When my program started there was a title on the screen that indicated that the presentation was in the aspect ratio that audiences saw on original release in 1939.  So 1.85 was not possible back then.

Your manager should have been paying more attention!

I'm no zealot and heaven forfend that I would suggest that digital is actually better than projected film, however, I've only seen four digitally projected films - Dracula, Billy Liar, The Dam Busters and Goldfinger - and much to my surprise each one looked bloody gorgeous, luminous and actually quite film-like.

 In regards to Jeff Swearingen's post that the manager thought that 1.85 "looked better":

I don't recall anyone else from that screening posting here, but I certainly was not complaining, raving more like it, as it was far and away the best digital presentation I'd ever seen and better than 35mm projected films from this era (and I've seen more than a hundred), for example, the 4K projection was much better than the 35mm print of Gone with the Wind ran at the same theatre earlier in the summer.

I don't is if this is the right thread but.............

Digitalbits is reporting Wizard of Oz for $34.99 at Target----without the box of crap.

I can confirm that Steve.  It looks like the same discs/content...but without all the extras...for $34.99.

And I'm not stalking you today or anything (we just seem to be showing up in the same threads)!

Well $35 is still high, BUT it is the Wizard of Oz so I'm done complaining and will buy it.

Sure, I could get it later for less probably but it's The Wizard of Oz and they did spend a lot to restore it.
But I'm getting it for my kids anyway.

That's what I'll tell the clerk anyway.


Here's the link to Digitalbits on the subject........

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/#mytwocents


And the actual Target ad..........

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Target/Paramount/Warner_Brothers__/Disc_Announcements__/Target_Blu-ray_Exclusives_Available_September_29/3499

Edited by Camper - 9/24/09 at 2:25pm

I hear ya, Steve!    It is still a lot, but...

I'd recommend getting there early.  Who knows how many copies of these will be available? 

 If Target is really selling this edition for full MSRP of $34.99 I think I'd rather spring for the extra $15 and get the full-on edition from Amazon. That's not a substantial enough savings for me. Now if the street price is closer to $25...

Yes, $15 isn't a great deal of difference unless you just don't want the extras---which I don't want in any way. So spending $15 IS a lot if you don't want something.

And yeah Mike, I'll be there early Tuesday--I have the day off AND a Target card---I don't even need real money to buy it!!

This is tempting but it's about $10 more (plus tax) than my Amazon UK pre-order, so I'll probably wait for that. 

Would you believe $19.95?  Someone is claiming he bought it at Walmart for that much.

yep. and has a picture to boot,



http://img198.imageshack.us/img198/4774/wizl.jpg

albeit small from a cellphone

Now THAT I can go for! Thanks for the tip.

All these damn exclusives... I don't understand it. Shame I can't order any of them to ship to Australia. The UK 3-disc version doesn't come out for another few months... By the way guys we've already been through all this a page ago.

Also, that WalMart version seems to be based on the German cover art. This is promising; perhaps we all might have access to more concise versions sooner than previously thought. And without sing-a-long banners on the front too!

 I don't know that they did wire removal on the lion's tail, but I was looking for wires (especially that one) and I saw none.  PatH

I believe that they did remove the wires on the Lion's tail.

 So we are still not 100% certain that Target's WoO edition will contain every special feature that the UE contains, correct? (such as the MGM documentary) Is it truly the same except none of the trinkets?

I think all these posts on teh differ editions etc need to be moved to the other Wizard posts, this one should just be about discussing the image etc of the release. Right? It seems like the thread just spiriled.

Yes, RobertR, I think you were lucky.

I saw the showing in Knoxville at the Regal Westown.  It was the worst looking movie I have seen in a theater.  The Robert Osborne introduction began without sound.  After many yells from the audience the sound came on.  Shouts to "start it over" went unheeded.  The picture was grainy and out of focus.  I won't  attend any of these "events" in the future. 

In spite of all that, there were some positives:  the film was in correct aspect ratio; sound was very good - after there was sound; seeing it with an appreciative audience was good; and the film itself is so good that it overcame the bad - almost.

I would think TCM and Warner Home Video would be appalled by such a poor presentation when they are promoting the Blu-ray release.  After all, when Robert Osborne said "for the first time in high definition" I would expect that to mean something other than what was shown here.