DVD Review HTF REVIEW: Titanic - Special Collector's Edition (Highly Recommended) (1 Viewer)

[Mike Williams]

I thought the alternate ending was really horrible. I thought it made Rose out to be downright cruel and "in your face." It would have completely ruined the 3 hours that came before it had they left that in there. I much prefer the theatrical ending, where Rose does all that all by herself and no one ever even knows she had the diamond. A much better, more poignant ending.

 

[Jeff Whitford]

I'm shocked as well.

 

[Scott Kimball]

One frame represents approximately 0.00029% of the film, by my rough calculations. I'm not going to get worked up about it.

Perspective is a good thing.

-Scott

 

[dpippel]

Perspective is exactly what Dennis*G was referring to.

 

[Sam Davatchi]

I think it’s unacceptable. How many bad pixels should you get before it becomes a problem? 2, 3, 10, 100? Quality control is for that. With all the money spent on this high profile movie, there was no one checking the movie? It should be some people’s job to watch the movie from start to finish before it goes to mass production. It just means no one from the production wanted or cared to watch the movie from start to end! I find it kind of insulting to the customers.

 

[Paul McElligott]

Maybe it's a manufacturing problem.

 

[ScottR]

Everyone is getting all upset about a pixel, but when I mentioned a missing word on the Oz thread I was ignored....see, it's all about what you like.

 

[Sam Davatchi]

That’s just a technicality, it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t concern us. I mean fans see the problem at the first viewing, yet they don’t have someone to check their product at the end of their professional pipeline?

 

[Chris Stainton]

This may sound stupid but do you think this could be something like the number in the last Harry Potter disc? Maybe to identify it somehow.

 

[CraigF]

^^

Don't start that now!

I didn't see the number in the last HP, and I'll probably miss the pixel-blob in T...and I'll feel like I'm missing something.

I've noticed I have pretty good tolerance for "flaws" that are only a frame or two, because they're there and I don't see them except when purposely looking in slow-mo. I am very intolerant of teensy-tiny sound flaws though.

 

[Dave_P.]

I didn't notice the error when I watched it, so it's no big deal to me. Hell, if you buy an LCD monitor you can't even return or replace it unless you have eight or more dead pixels and they're always on the screen for the life of the monitor.

 

[Mikah Cerucco]

LCD monitor policies differ depending on the manufacturer and the store you buy it from.

There's no objective criteria for what visual defects are acceptable. I can notice so much as bad interlacing on NTSC TV DVD's, even though it only lasts a frame. Still, I don't lose sleep over it. I'm not too worried about folks who are in an uproar just because they know it's there, whether they can see it or not, but I do feel for those who will actually have their enjoyment of the movie lessened.

The reason it matters whether the error was created during manufacturing or not is up until the point of check disc, fixing it is pretty reasonable financially. But if you send the product off and ask for a million copies, trashing it adds up quick. Yes, for the consumer, it doesn't matter where the error comes in, but for the studio it does. I believe that's what the comment above referred to.

I'm not aware of encoding DVD's with tracking information and I'm not sure what good it would do anyway. Even if you see copy #1234567 on the internet, how would you backtrack to see who owns that retail disc? It makes more sense when you're talking theater copies where you know who got each copy of a film.

Shame about the momentary bad video, though.

 

[CraigF]

I hope I didn't give the wrong impression...I'm totally intolerant of equipment flaws too, whether audio or video, but that's a whole nother story...

And if it's a production flaw (seems it should have been noticed there) or manufacturing flaw (can't blame the production staff for that) that's one thing.

But really: do any of you people complaining watch anything made before, oh, say 2000? It is VERY rare you couldn't see obvious source flaws, and I mean obvious to everybody. The movie threads would be very long here if every speck or hairline etc. was documented.

I am not going to let my immersion in this movie be spoiled by trying to search for the flaw...but if it's obvious then I'll see it. But so what? I can't do anything about it, and I'd have to probably throw out all my movies if they weren't "perfect". I realise this is a mistake rather than a source flaw, but it still amounts to the same thing to my eyes.

I'm going to watch this later tonight, but just looking at the packaging and listed content etc. this has to be the DVD bargain of the year. I can live with a fractional second blob, especially if it's on LdC...

 

[Nick Martin]

You aren't knocking me for making that screenshot are you?

I don't care about the glitch- I was bored, and I'm new to making screencaps and thought this would make a useful test, and serve those who are waiting for other region DVDs who wonder what the fuss is about.

 

[Chuck Mayer]

Finished the deleted scenes tonight (with and without commentary). I have an aside about the set as a whole, but I'll chat about the deleted scenes real quick.

I'd only put part of one deleted scene back in (if I was given carte blanche). Rose initially going down to 3rd Class to find Jack (the second half of a Brock scene) is a critical element. The movie cuts to them talking, but her bravery and presence is awesome in the scene she does something she's not supposed to. It makes her active in their relationship early on, and informs her character.

Other than that, there were lots of little moments I liked and I might add in a shot or two here and there (well, quite a few from Carpathia, the other great deleted scene), but the editors did their job. I was not surprised the alternate ending died upon first editorial viewing. I mentioned earlier that I couldn't see that scene making it too far. And that was before I listened to the commentary. Clearly, it didn't Tony mentioned last night that: That MIGHT have worked. I agree that his moment of holding the Heart is pretty cool, and having the juxtaposition of Rose being saved from the back of a boat and her "saving" someone else on the back of a boat ("returning the favor") is a cool idea, but there wasn't enough meat for Brock through the film to work. Besides, the emotional pullthrough of Jack and Rose was simply overwhelming. I don't see it ever working.

The million dollar scene (Lovejoy in the dining room) was a great looking shot, but for once, the test audiences were dead on.

Some thoughts on the set as a whole. It's a bit tricky to explain, but as my little ymdb link states, Titanic is my favorite film. Has been since I saw it, since the very first showing on December 19th, 1997. As is typical for me, I overloaded in early 1998. Five theatrical viewings, four of them alone (Tim, don't laugh at the number), reading A Night to Remember, Discovery of Titanic, every magazine I could get my hands on, every article I could find, and a few other less notable books. I bought the LD, the dts LD, and the DVD a year later. But I'd probably only seen it fully once or twice since the DVD release in 2000. And I'm glad. I haven't watched the movie yet (just a little commentary here and there), but the deleted scenes and the extras are reminding me of my feelings for this film. I had worried for a few years that, while I still loved the movie, maybe it wasn't the same emotional experience for me. I bathed in it fairly completely in 1998. I thought maybe I had OD'ed But I have not. I welled up during a few of the deleted scenes this evening, and I remembered the simply purity of why Titanic *IS* my favorite film.


Other specific DVD thoughts:
The detail on the DVD is astounding (and I am wearing glasses for the first time seeing it ). I notice the tears in Lewis' eyes after Rose's rescue, I can see the detail on Lovejoy's gun.

Leo gave a much better performance than I remember. It's hard to be so "straight", but it's a critical role, and he makes Jack more than the script. It's not an Oscar-winning role, but his beats sell the characters.

Kate is even better than that. She got noticed as an actress more than he did, but frankly, she deserved it.

I'm going to watch the commentaries bit by bit this coming week. I already hear Jon Landau repeating information, but I know the historical one and Cameron's will be worth it Next weekend, maybe my mother-in-law will watch our devil child, and my wife and I can make a date of it.

Like any good long relationship, it's good to be reminded of why you fell in love in the first place!

Take care,
Chuck

 

[CraigF]

Nicholas: Oh no, I'm interested in seeing/hearing about details. Never even tried a screencap myself, so I don't blame you for trying to capture something people are talking about at all. I suppose it's obvious, but a cap doesn't give the feel of the whole.

I'm just a bit into the movie now, and it really does look VERY good, to be cliched: "worth the wait". The sound is *discrete* 6.1 dts, something I hadn't picked up on before, very nice and a treat for the ears.

Count me as a happy customer.

 

[TravisR]

Chuck, I hadn't seen the movie in a loooong time either and it was like seeing it for the first time again when I watched it earlier this week. I had the same reaction that I had back then of "Wow! What a movie!" I'm kinda glad that it had been awhile since I had seen, I think I enjoyed it more that way.



I watched the commentaries in order and, to me, it was more of the historical commentary that repeats info. Probably whatever one you listen to last will come off as the most repetitive though. Let me clarify that when I say repeats, it's more along the lines of some information is mentioned on other tracks. The bulk of all three tracks don't overlap but when you have that many people talking for three hours and fifteen minutes, you're gonna have some stuff overlap. It is kind of funny though when Lynch and Marschall wonder about something and I know the answer because it's on another track.

 

[Nick Martin]

Chuck,
I saw "Titanic" five times theatrically...always alone- I didn't have the luxury of seeing movies with other people.

I actually felt sick after seeing it for the first time - the images of those floating dead passengers prevented me from sleeping for almost two nights.

I had pre-ordered the widescreen VHS from Columbia House, but on release day I cancelled because I knew I could just go to a store and not have to wait for it to arrive in the mail. I bought the DVD before I had a DVD player to play it on, and even got the VHS collector's edition just for the hell of it. I remember waiting for a store to open just so I could get the "Back To Titanic" album in its release day prior to the VHS...

It's a film I don't need a break from, but if I don't see it for a long time, that's okay.

Craig, I wasn't serious. These things make me laugh...it's just like the Batman 'lint take' arguments.
I'm currently watching with Jim Cameron's commentary, and the image error DID NOT appear...weird.

 

[CraigF]

Nicholas: No prob, I didn't notice the blob after all, even though forewarned. There are enough in-your-face probs in some discs that I'm not going out of my way to "enhance" (to my eyes) a relatively minor one.

What a fine transfer this is, and a fine audio track, subtle but appropriate.

Edit: Nicholas, or anybody, do you have a timing for that pixellation? Thought I'd go back and look for it now, just for "scientific" purposes, to see if it really is there i.e. the possibility that it's not on all copies, a manufacturing thing (doesn't sound like that though). Thanks.

Also, I did notice a minor glitch of some sort, about when the "Molly Brown" character says something like "God almighty" when she's in the lifeboat. It could have been a layer change (my RP82 isn't the greatest at those...), but it was definitely something *I* noticed because my pre-pro switched out of dts 6.1 ES for a split second (I went back and forth on this a few times). Like I said before, I'm very sensitive to sound changes, and whatever happened perked my ears up. I'll check it out again, and see if it's the same with the DD track. Could just be my player, though I've yet to find a problem that's been its fault.

Edit again: The pixel-blob is at 1:19:19 of disc 1; pretty easy to see after all, at least when you're looking...

On disc 2, I suspect it was a layer change at 52:26 that I was hearing, since it's there for the EX track too. My mistake: it was a damn fast layer change for my player, so fast that I thought it must be something else...my pre-pro reverts to another dts mode for the backs if that ES flag disappears for even an instant...funny I've never noticed this before.

 

[Soah]

this may be odd if everybody here has the pixel problem, but on my copy of the titanic there is no pixel! i didn't notice it the first viewing but i deliberately went back to check after viewing this thread and there was still nothing.