March of The Wooden Soldiers (Laurel & Hardy) Blu-ray up for preorder $12.95 (1 Viewer)

[Ronald Epstein]

The good news is that the disc appears to be region free. It has
an A on the back cover which I presume means ALL REGIONS.

 

The bad news is, in my opinion, this disc is flawed.

 

Now I am going to ask all of you to wait for others to chime in

on this disc as I have read some fairly positive reviews elsewhere.

 

Admittedly, I only watched a few short minutes of the disc,

skipping through chapters -- but it was enough to see that there

appears to be no major restoration done on this film. The transfer

is totally littered with dirt and scratches. There is some shaky

video and a lot of video noise that I don't believe is limited to simple grain.

 

The colorized version seems to amplify the noise, though at
least they got rid of the flashing problem that appeared on the

colorized DVD version of long ago.

 

The opening credits are windowboxed which I don't quite understand.

Soon after we get a full frame 1.33:1 window.

 

I suppose one could say the image appears somewhat sharper

than what I would expect the DVD to look like.

 

Not knowing the condition of the original elements and reading

somewhat positive reviews elsewhere, it's hard to completely

trash this transfer. However, having been spoiled by excellent

studio restorations from the same period it's difficult to say that

everything possible was done to make this film look more pristine.

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Ron,Is it at least a very small upgrade over the fairly recent MGM dvd ???? Im not expecting miracles, but it has to be a little better,since its blu ray.

 

[TravisR]

Originally Posted by Ronald Epstein

The good news is that the disc appears to be region free. It has
an A on the back cover which I presume means ALL REGIONS.

I could be wrong but I think for Blu-ray, there's 3 regions- A, B and C. 'A' means that it's for North and South American, 'B' is for Europe, Africa and Australia and 'C' is for Asia.

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Also Ron, the region a means the region designated for USA and some other territories, but somehow its unlocked for region b. At least I hope that person isnt lying. My copy at amazon has entered the shipping soon phase, yikes !!!

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Ron, where are some of those reviews you mentioned ???

 

[Ronald Epstein]

 

 

I could be wrong but I think for Blu-ray, there's 3 regions- A, B and C. 'A' means that it's for North and South American, 'B' is for Europe, Africa and Australia and 'C' is for Asia.

 

 

I have never really looked at Blu-ray region codes. I am still stuck

on DVD region codes so perhaps that is where I am confused.

 

For the answer to your "other reviews" questions please look at

post #20 as I don't want to be forced to reference a competing site.

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Oh, that review Ron. I had seen that .Im hoping dvd beaver or this site does one.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

So nobody else wants to weigh in on how good

or bad this transfer looks?

Was looking forward to your opinions.

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Im really suprised at the lack of online reviews for this, just some comments on that blu ray forum .

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

 

Originally Posted by Tony Zannikos

Also Ron, the region a means the region designated for USA and some other territories, but somehow its unlocked for region b. At least I hope that person isnt lying. My copy at amazon has entered the shipping soon phase, yikes !!!

Unlike with DVD it is actually common for Blu Ray discs to be created in and labelled for one region without being locked for that region. A number of the BD titles in my collection came from Amazon.co.uk and are Region B. Some were much cheaper than their U.S. counterparts, despite the shipping and exchange rate (Gone with the Wind, The Boune Trilogy, Band of Brothers, The Wizard of Oz) or simply unavailable here (Zulu.) All play fine on my Insignia BD player and my brother-in-law's Panasonic. OTOH the current and upcoming Chaplin are all region-locked, which means the UK versions of The Kid, The Great Dictator and City Lights, aren't options for me. (Neither is the dual-format UK Modern Times, which is cheaper than the Blu Ray-only Criterion Region A disc.) Pity.
 

Regards,

 

Joe
 

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

I got mine in the mail today. I watched a little bit, its definitely a small improvement over the MGM dvd from a few years ago. My only complaint is the blu ray is so bright , I had to turn the brightness down on my tv a little bit. Thats the first time I ever had to do that for any blu ray.Im not commenting on the color version, but I might watch it out of curiousity one day.I dont support coloring.

 

[Brandon Conway]

Slight improvement over the MGM DVD at that price sounds like a worth while purchase in the near future.

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Yes, slight improvement. But remember to turn the brightness down a little.

 

[jim_falconer]

I was wondering if anyone had found a review of this yet?

 

[boppa99]

Can anyone tell me is the 3D any good in this Movie on blu-Ray??

 

[Brian McP]

I have both the 2D and 3D Legend Films versions and as a manic L&H fan, I think they did a great job with this -- the 3D version isn't "Avatar" but thought it certainly highlighted the effort the Hal Roach Studio went to with this production.


Watching it in this upgraded state certainly does highlight all the 1930s era production values -- but I loved this and I think kids sitting through this in 3D will probably admire the lack of cgi and major studio-like special effects -- it is a simple story about fairy tales and Mother Goose (in this case, literally) and it is not as full on as most movies for very young children are today -- and Stan and Oliver give immortal performances in this picture, for that alone I'd recommend it to everyone reading this now.


Regarding the state of the movie itself, as RAH would say, all the L&H materials have been 'loved to death' and it will be very rare to see anything with L&H looking pristine or even half good compared to other Hal Roach product of the era (Charley Chase,Todd/Pitts shorts etc) -- taking that into consideration, MOTWS here looks the best that I have ever seen it, don't know where this print came from but it looks pretty good for a L&H movie -- also I'm in the region B Bluray sector and these discs play fine despite their region A labelling.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Brian,


Where is the 3D Blu-ray available from? Amazon UK?


I would consider importing it.

 

[ABaglivi]

March of the Wooden Soldiers 3D Amazon US 14.99.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

March of the Wooden Soldiers 3D Amazon US 14.99.

Just bought it. Had no idea the 3D version was available here.


I have the same version in 2D that I bought several years back.


Thank you for letting me know.

 

[Brandon Conway]

It should be noted that the 3D disc only has the colorized version (in 3D or 2D), so you should hang on to the regular release for the original B&W version.