A Few Words About A few words about...™ Niagara -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[haineshisway]

Stunning. Surprising no one is talking about this transfer and film - it's like "What's coming next?" This is what color looks like, especially of that era - the reds, the blues, the greens - look at them and remember what they look like.

From the likes of me this transfer gets a five all the way. I'm not watching on a 100inch screen, however. But from where I sit I see a gloriously glorious transfer. Bravo, Fox!

 

[WadeM]

Niagara and The Asphalt Jungle are by far my favorite Marilyn Monroe films--I should be getting this blu-ray soon, especially with the praise it's been receiving.

 

[JohnMor]

GORGEOUS transfer! Wonderful blu.

 

[Lromero1396]

I was bothered by the frozen grain and noise reduction more than I was anticipating, so I wouldn't score this disc any higher than a 4/5 on video. I'm also overjoyed that Fox included a lossless mono track in addition to the 5.1 for once. In my opinion the audio gets a 5/5; I heard absolutely no problems on the mono mix. However, I would like to point out a flaw on the 5.1 tracks this disc has: the opening Fox fanfare is not the correct Pre-CinemaScope fanfare introduced in 1935, but the re-recording introduced in 1953 on How to Marry a Millionaire. This version was also used on some subsequent CinemaScope productions. Fox made this same error on the one and only English language mono track on their release of Laura back in February and I hope that this error does not continue to turn up on future releases.

 

[haineshisway]

I saw no frozen grain and I certainly saw no noise reduction - you think you can have textures and detail like this with DNR? No. One scratches one's head is what one's doing right now.

 

[Robert Crawford]

I was bothered by the frozen grain and noise reduction more than I was anticipating, so I wouldn't score this disc any higher than a 4/5 on video. I'm also overjoyed that Fox included a lossless mono track in addition to the 5.1 for once. In my opinion the audio gets a 5/5; I heard absolutely no problems on the mono mix. However, I would like to point out a flaw on the 5.1 tracks this disc has: the opening Fox fanfare is not the correct Pre-CinemaScope fanfare introduced in 1935, but the re-recording introduced in 1953 on How to Marry a Millionaire. This version was also used on some subsequent CinemaScope productions. Fox made this same error on the one and only English language mono track on their release of Laura back in February and I hope that this error does not continue to turn up on future releases.

Just curious, what HT equipment are you viewing your BDs on?

 

[Eastmancolor]

Stunning. Surprising no one is talking about this transfer and film - it's like "What's coming next?" This is what color looks like, especially of that era - the reds, the blues, the greens - look at them and remember what they look like.

From the likes of me this transfer gets a five all the way. I'm not watching on a 100inch screen, however. But from where I sit I see a gloriously glorious transfer. Bravo, Fox!

Bruce, I did watch the film projected onto a 120 inch screen and the transfer holds up marvelously. This is as about as close to looking like a 35mm Technicolor print from the early 1950's as it gets.

 

[haineshisway]

Bruce, I did watch the film projected onto a 120 inch screen and the transfer holds up marvelously. This is as about as close to looking like a 35mm Technicolor print from the early 1950's as it gets.

Exactly. This talk of frozen grain and DNR? It's unbelievable, really. First of all, you can't have it both ways - if there's frozen grain there can't be DNR because it removes the grain. But neither is on this transfer and it just makes you wonder, as Mr. Crawford asks, how people are viewing things or if they just make assumptions based on I don't know what really. What it really makes me wonder is what would the comments be if the person actually saw a 35mm IB print of this and it looked just like the Blu-ray?

 

[JoshZ]

Exactly. This talk of frozen grain and DNR? It's unbelievable, really. First of all, you can't have it both ways - if there's frozen grain there can't be DNR because it removes the grain.

DNR doesn't always delete all the grain. It does sometimes have the side effect of making grain patterns freeze in place while the image behind them moves.

 

[ThadK]

Picked this up finally, heavily discounted. It was never one of my favorite Marilyn flicks, despite being a Niagara Falls native, but the color truly was gorgeous. I just wish Fox would cool it with the DNR and grain reduction/removal. Maybe not as bad as GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES, but it is there.

 

[lionel59]

Excited and relieved to hear that original Fox Technicolor elements have survived for a major title. Does anyone know of any other Fox titles in this category?

 

[bigshot]

DNR doesn't always delete all the grain. It does sometimes have the side effect of making grain patterns freeze in place while the image behind them moves.

That is a function of compression, not DNR.

 

[Rob_Ray]

Excited and relieved to hear that original Fox Technicolor elements have survived for a major title. Does anyone know of any other Fox titles in this category?

Stars and Stripes Forever. The elements weren't nitrate and Niagara probably isn't either, so they weren't junked.

 

[Worth]

That is a function of compression, not DNR.

Compression makes the whole image look blocky. DNR can still reveal some grain, but makes it look clumpy - almost like the moving parts of the image are floating through Jell-O.

Blu-rays typically have high enough bitrates that compression is less of an issue than DNR, though obviously there are some exceptions.

 

[ThadK]

Compression makes the whole image look blocky. DNR can still reveal some grain, but makes it look clumpy - almost like the moving parts of the image are floating through Jell-O.

Blu-rays typically have high enough bitrates that compression is less of an issue than DNR, though obviously there are some exceptions.

Which made the GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES Blu particularly heartbreaking. I love that film, and the Blu's color timing was the first time I've seen it gotten right on home video (the amazing job on the sound didn't hurt things, either). Unfortunately, that gaudy Technicolor looks as though it's been smeared in pastels at times.

 

[bigshot]

Compression makes the whole image look blocky. DNR can still reveal some grain, but makes it look clumpy - almost like the moving parts of the image are floating through Jell-O.

DNR smooths over grain. Compression blocks it up. Look at a DVD with lots of grain sometime. The compression algorithm tried to find areas it can freeze to save bandwidth. Hair blowing in the breeze lightly will freeze and then move and then freeze again. Both compression and DNR look for flat areas with no movement, but DNR fuzzes it out, while compression freezes it. Often after DNR has been applied, compression has an easier time, because all of the chatter in the grain is smoothed out.

 

[bigshot]

The blockiness you see on DVDs is called Macroblocking. That is a different kind of compression error. That is when there is so much difference from frame to frame, the key framing of the compression can't keep up and it starts to just turn into colored squares.