BATMAN 20th Anniversary Edition (Official Advertisement) (1 Viewer)

[Nick Martin]

 

[Edwin-S]

Looks not too bad. Might pick this up if the price is right. They appear to be giving it some respect by releasing it in the same book format as some of their other classic films. I know a lot of people hate this kind of packaging, but I don't mind it.

 

[TheBat]

sounds good. I have a friend who is sending me the import of batman returns.
I have the 1989 movie taped in HD from hdnetmovies from December.
Jacob

 

[Paul Arnette]

Stop the press... What happened to Batman: The Motion Picture Anthology 1989 -1997?

It is very curious that they would announce Batman separately while the anthology has been MIA at the retail level since its announcement.

TheHDRoom has indicated that Warner Bros. responded with "All information about this title is embargoed until Feb. 24." when asked about the anthology's status. I'm starting to think it has been postponed.

I guess I'm happy I have the UK imports, even though the book looks nice. Maybe I will pick up a copy if it goes on sale. Still, the whole thing about the anthology is very curious.

 

[troy evans]

Yeah, you would think they would have a press release for that as well. I think it is still coming because this press states, "first time available as single for Blu-ray purchase". That implies a set on Blu to be released as well.

 

[Dave H]

I own the UK version of Batman which will be the same encode as the U.S. release. It looks okay, but clearly Warner has done some filtering. The image doesn't have a "Patton" look or anything waxy, but grain is virtually removed in many scenes. Just giving a heads up.

 

[Nick Martin]

If it resembles what is broadcast on HDNet, then NO ONE should bother with this one. NO detail to the image whatsoever.

 

[Fabien Renelli]

What do you mean by no detail? You mean the 2005 DVD is better?

 

[Jim_K]

Looks like I'll be picking this up and then possibly importing Returns.

It's odd that Warner is willing to release both the boxed set and individual titles in the UK but not in the US.

 

[Lord Dalek]

Batman did look surprisingly blurry when HDNet showed it last December but at the time I figured it was due to the rigorous compression standards of regular HDTV broadcasting standards. Who knows?

 

[Greg_M]

I love the book format. Otherwise it's just a disc

 

[Dave H]

I haven't seen the HD broadcast.

The BD doesn't look bad, however, I suspect the filtering has removed some of the finer detail. Again, there is hardly any grain left and the image is soft. With that said, the image doesn't look as digital or artificial as we've seen on some filtered releases. Another thing I noticed is the brightness level seems slightly elevated. I know this has always been a darker movie, visually speaking. At times I feel the brightness is a bit too high as they seemingly tried to compensate for the darkness (and I'm viewing on an ISF'd display in a dark room). I no longer have the 2005 DVD to compare, but I would say the BD is still an improvement, but not the kind of improvement we should expect. However, this is Warner we're talking about...

 

[Skoobooz]

I saw a 70mm print of Batman in 2003 at the National Theatre in London, and the BD seems to be a pretty accurate representation of what I saw. While this is a dark movie, it is not Blade Runner or The French Connection. It's a glossy movie, and as such, it's not grimy or supposed to look like a weathered 16mm film. I can't speak to the grain reduction (I don't recall the 70mm print being too grainy), but if it was done, it was done tastefully...the BD looks and sounds great.

 

[Nick Martin]

To add to that, the Blu-ray reviews and screenshots made available tell a different story of the film's image, so it's likely that the HDNet broadcast is not the same as the BD at all, because if screencaps of a BD reveal a lot more detail and reviewers mention that detail as well, this should be a pretty good disc to pick up.

If the shots/reviews lined up with that broadcast, then we would have a major disappointment.

 

[Brent M]

I've got the import Blu-Ray and it looks NOTICEABLY better than the HDNet broadcast.