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  1. Damin J Toell

    A Few Words About A few words about...™ 1776 -- in Blu-ray

    I watched this over the weekend, and was very, very happy with the results. It may not be absolutely everything one could dream for, but it was more than I hoped we'd ever get. I'm also glad to see that everyone seems to be on board with this release, and that adherence to things like the...
  2. Damin J Toell

    A Few Words About A few words about...™ Lawrence of Arabia -- in Blu-ray

    Thanks! Real life happened, and it has only been for the best (work, marriage, etc.). I've been a silent observer in the interim, but hopefully I can slice out a sliver of time to participate once again.
  3. Damin J Toell

    A Few Words About A few words about...™ Lawrence of Arabia -- in Blu-ray

    I am dusting off my HTF account after nearly 5 years of dormancy to congratulate RAH. Although my set hasn't shipped yet, of course, I take RAH at his word that this will be a home run. Just as Young & co. welcomed him into LAWRENCE all those years ago, Mr. Harris has been welcomed as a part...
  4. Damin J Toell

    What happened to highdefdigest.com?

    It works fine over here. You may want to try putting the www. before the domain, rather than simply highdefdigest.com
  5. Damin J Toell

    PS3 5 Free Blu-Ray Discs

    mitch: I purchased my PS3 within the first few days of December and received my five discs last week. I wouldn't be worried just yet, given that you bought your PS3 a whole month after me.
  6. Damin J Toell

    "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

    Just some quick notes after perusing what you've posted. I specifically quoted the above, as noting that your assertion that Bill Clinton was president in 1989 might tip you off that you've gotten a few historical bits wrong. :) Although the US joined Berne effective March 1, 1989 (with the...
  7. Damin J Toell

    IT's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World Restoration

    Not at all. The Criterion library includes titles licensed from all sorts of sources, such as Fox, Paramount, and Disney. As for MGM, they still have an ongoing relationship, as Criterion has licensed them supplementary content originally issued on laserdisc (e.g., commentary track for Raging...
  8. Damin J Toell

    The official BLADE RUNNER SE thread. (Check out page 8 and #790.)

    According to in70mm.com, at least, it would have had mono surrounds. Their entry for Blade Runner lacks the "SS" notation for split surrounds. Damin
  9. Damin J Toell

    Will we ever see decent transfers of Hitchcock's British years?

    Why do you say that? Easy Virtue was a Gainsborough production, so unless the rights were somehow sold off before, it should be in the hands of Granada International now. Damin
  10. Damin J Toell

    Will we ever see decent transfers of Hitchcock's British years?

    Canal+ Image UK filed for the restored US copyright on Juno and the Paycock in 1997, which they had acquired via UGC UK. Damin
  11. Damin J Toell

    The official BLADE RUNNER SE thread. (Check out page 8 and #790.)

    As the original 1992 Dolby SR soundtrack for the DC was analog, there would be no such thing as a "dump" of that soundtrack into Dolby Digital. Given the various home video releases of the DC, I'm sure the mix was optimized for HT long ago. Damin
  12. Damin J Toell

    The official BLADE RUNNER SE thread. (Check out page 8 and #790.)

    I don't see the comparison to the Final Cut. I never said that all 5.1 tracks are irrelevant. It just so happens that (as best we can tell) 2.0 surround is the original format for the DC soundtrack, but 5.1 is the original format of the Final Cut. There's no comparison. I think the much...
  13. Damin J Toell

    The official BLADE RUNNER SE thread. (Check out page 8 and #790.)

    Presumably, for the theatrical release of the DC, such a soundtrack would only have been executed as a 2.0 matrixed Dolby SR track. It seems beyond unlikely that, say, discrete 4-track magnetic sound would have been used. Given that, it would appear that 2.0 matrixed surround track (as we have...
  14. Damin J Toell

    The official BLADE RUNNER SE thread. (Check out page 8 and #790.)

    Charlie would be able to shed more light on this than I, but keeping in mind that Dolby Digital had its public debut earlier in 1992 and that the theatrical release of the DC was pretty limited (it never broke 100 theatres), odds are that a 2.0 matrixed Dolby SR track was the only option given...
  15. Damin J Toell

    "Ultimate Hitchcock Collection" Public Domain release

    The first sale doctrine, as it works in the US (and as it is memorialized in statute at 17 USC § 109), only applies to copies made within the US itself. So, if I were to import (in a manner in compliance with § 602) a DVD of Japanese origin into the US, my right to resell that disc would be...
  16. Damin J Toell

    New Hitchcocks -- June 20

    MGM has released quite a few other ABC productions to DVD. See, e.g., Space Camp, Prizzi's Honor, Silkwood, Impulse, Young Doctors in Love... DJ
  17. Damin J Toell

    Link to piece on restoration of Story of a Patriot...

    It had Todd-AO 6-track sound. RAH indicated that the DVD's DD 5.1 track is derived from that. DJ
  18. Damin J Toell

    IT's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World Restoration

    Fox may get the right to distribute MGM's DVDs, but they can't distribute something that doesn't exist. A distribution deal alone won't give Fox any unilateral authority to conduct restorations. DJ
  19. Damin J Toell

    New Apocalypse Now DVD set this year?

    All of that would have nothing to do with the fact that the DVDs are at 2:1 instead of 2.35:1. If they used Storaro's facility to do the transfers, he would have gotten paid no matter what AR it was done at. That would therefore certainly not be a situation where, as you suggested, Storaro might...
  20. Damin J Toell

    Star Wars discussion from The Bits...

    This gets suggested about every other day, even when there is no big magnet SW thread to get everyone talking about it. Even of the shots that you think didn't get new effects, many, many of them still had changes made. These were either in the form of new special effects (either ones that are...
  21. Damin J Toell

    Halloween: 25 Years of Terror

    Are you sure that they did use the cameras, film stock, and crew from the sequel to shoot those additional scenes? All they really needed from the original production was Donald Pleasence and Jamie Lee Curtis. The TV scenes may have just been a small parallel production that worked around the...
  22. Damin J Toell

    Halloween: 25 Years of Terror

    Well, you'd have to get the rights to put the two films together in the first place, so it wouldn't help anything in that regard. The films are simply owned by two different entities. DJ
  23. Damin J Toell

    Star Wars discussion from The Bits...

    "Optimized" is probably the more accurate term, for both 16x9-optimized and 4x3-optimized video signals. Whereas the pixels need to be stretched horizontally during playback on 16x9 screens for anamorphic/16x9-enchanced/16x9-optimized video signals, they need to be squished (compressed?) for...
  24. Damin J Toell

    Star Wars discussion from The Bits...

    Let's not go overboard here. Even if the D2 master being used for the upcoming release only has the 400 lines of resolution as per the LD, that still far exceeds the 240 lines that VHS offers. Saying that this might as well be a VHS release would be like, if you're unable to get the specific...
  25. Damin J Toell

    New Apocalypse Now DVD set this year?

    Reformatting AN after the fact still doesn't make it a Univision/Univisium production. It's just a standard 4-perf 35mm scope film. Univisium gets no royalty for reformatting a standard scope film to 2:1, regardless of what financial stake that Storaro might have in the company. DJ
  26. Damin J Toell

    New Apocalypse Now DVD set this year?

    I can't tell if you're kidding or not... DJ
  27. Damin J Toell

    New Apocalypse Now DVD set this year?

    Well, in that comment in particular, I meant what they say as to what their intended outcome was as to two possibly disparate technical aspects. Even Storaro doesn't claim that 2:1 was ever intended as an exhibition AR at the time. :P DJ
  28. Damin J Toell

    New Apocalypse Now DVD set this year?

    I don't think any blowups were done, although Redux did have the honor of getting beautiful Technicolor dye-transfer prints. As far as determining OAR for 35mm-originating films that do have both 70mm and 35mm runs, I don't think it's so simple as a race for whichever comes first getting the...
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