"Return to the 36th Chamber" & John Woo's "The Killer" - Dragon Dynasty (1 Viewer)

I couldn't find a thread for this, but apparently DD is releasing The Killer and Return to the 36th Chamber on DVD on March 30 (along with The Killer on Blu-Ray).

I'm not familiar with 36th Chamber, but I really hope they've done right by The Killer. After the disappointment of their Hard Boiled release, I hope they've taken a little extra care with this one.

http://www.kungfucinema.com/dragon-dynasty-to-release-return-to-the-36th-chamber-and-the-killer-12706

36th Chamber was actually released yesterday. It's available for shipping from Amazon as we speak.

Whoops; I stand corrected. I misread the date on the KungFuCinema page. Thanks!

As usual, 36th chamber was impossible to find on day and date - Dragon Dynasty seems notoriously sloppy about getting product into the shops on time. I ended up ordering from Amazon. Can't wait to see how they did with it. Haven't seen any reviews so far, but I believe it's a high-def transfer of the Celestial upgrade, so it should look good. This is one of the single best Shaw movies ever so my hopes are pretty high.

Weird, I just walked into Best Buy and pulled it off the shelf. Granted, I grabbed the only copy they had, but it wasn't all that difficult. I guess their distribution is inconsistent. I will say that it looked/sounded just fine. However, if you were looking for extras, you'll be unimpressed.

Well my point is yesterday was a week after it was released. I'm betting last Tuesday, you wouldn't have found it. Not that big a deal obviously - I was just in a snit because I wanted to see it ASAP. It's like if you were dying for a steak and all the grocery store had was turnips. You can order some rib-eyes from Omaha but that ain't gonna scratch the itch you have today.

Meanwhile, I'm still waiting for it to come from Amazon. Glad to hear you liked it though. That's encouraging. DVD Beaver was not so impressed but I am not typically as demanding as they are - not sure I could even tell the difference between interlaced and non-interlaced. The screen grabs looked pretty good to me.

Still and all I hope this Blu-ray does well. This is one of the most beloved Kung-fu films of all time, at least here in the west, so it would be good if it's a hit. Import BD's of kung-fu classics are still extremely expensive, so I really hope DD keeps them coming. The price is definitely right.

From a thread at the AVS Forum regarding the Blu-ray of THE 36th CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN:

"buuuut holy crap, this is the most unbelievably screwed up, mangled, flawed piece of crap Blu-ray ever released. The reason it runs 5 minutes shorter than the DVD releases is because it has mangled frame-interpolation from the 25fps/50hz master. It's 1080i60 but it doesn't have any inverse telecine to play at the original 24fps. Instead it's purely interlaced, every frame of it. So it can only be played at 60fps. Instead of 25fps to 24fps, they did 25fps to 60i with frame-blending. The conversion causes every frame to blended together, so there's constant blurring and chopiness. Also, the audio is an unlistenable mess, screwed from the conversion as well. It's completely distorted; pitched too higher, raspy, constantly echos. This just might be the worst disc on the format. I really can't believe this horrific thing was released for this classic. Avoid. Avoid. Avoid. Avoid. Avoid..."

Click to expand...

Doesn't sound good.

Original thread:

www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php

Ah well, I bought the SD so I wouldn't know anything about that. The SD is perfectly fine.

Yep, I got the regular DVD as well, which is fantastic and reportedly looks much better than the Blu-ray, ironically.

I was hoping they'd do right with this film as well as their first Blu-ray!

Don't forget, The Protector comes out on Blu-ray on April 6th. Another great classic. I just wish they would release the first two Police Story films.

They no longer have the rights to the first two Police Story films. Their deal with Fortune Star ended in 2009 and those two films, along with Crime Story, Royal Tramp 1 and 2, Shanghai Express, Above the Law, and Last Hurrah for Chivalry are now OOP

Looks like the Blu-Ray for The Killer has the same issue as 36th Chamber of Shaolin:

www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDCompare2/killer4.htm

It's either a Pal-NTSC upconvert, or an 1080/50hz transfer converted to 29.97. Sigh.

And apparently, this affects the DVD as well:

http://www.hkfilm.net/dvdrevs/killer.htm

Although, at least the subtitles seem to be accurate:

www.hkfilm.net/dvdrevs/killer2.htm

Still, no sale for me. It can't be that difficult to convert 1080/50hz into 24p instead of interlacing it.