A Few Words About A few words about…™ The Deer Hunter - in 4k UHD Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Stephen_J_H]

In general, I think studios have pulled back from "crazy HDR" over time.

Seems like earlier 4Ks came with colors more "HDRed" than releases over the last year or so. HDR has appeared more tasteful to me as the format settles in.

And this may be part of the problem, as this 4K disc is likely the same master as the 2018 StudioCanal release in Europe.

 

[PMF]

I'm hesitant to open this disc up.

“Just do it.” - Nike

 

[ScottJH]

“Just do it.” - Nike

 

[Brian Husar]

Well if RAH got his copy before I blind pre ordered I would have never done it and stayed with the nice Universal blu ray that came out during the 100 year anniversary collection. But, I guess I have to see for myself now. I like the cover art that I see.

 

[Carlo_M]

So I just started watching this disc (I obviously won't get to finish it, I just wanted to see the PQ for myself).

I immediately saw what RAH mentions, the loss of shadow detail. Oppo 203D -> Sony XBR-65x900F TV. I've only seen this phenomenon as bad during WB's Unforgiven BD (which is sad given how much I love that film).

Just out of curiosity, I went into my settings and fiddled with a few things. There was one thing that helped immensely without totally washing out the picture or blowing out the whites/highlights. My TV has a "Black Level" setting which is usually set dead in the middle at 50. I bumped it up to 70, and suddenly the PQ looks much better. There is info there in the black, it's just lost due to the Dolby Vision HDR setting. The only downside is that the "black bars" are now considerably lighter, but what's in the actual film frame doesn't look blown out.

Obviously one should not have to do this on a properly mastered disc. But for those who have already opened it and can't return it, I offer this workaround for you to try.

Would be interested in hearing others' opinions on the effectiveness of this. Not interested in arguing that it shouldn't have to be done, because as I said I agree with that. But as the saying goes, let's try to make some lemonade.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

I started to watch this projected on my 110" screen in 4k.

While it does have a noticeable grain structure, it isn't overwhelming at all. However, I didn't watch more than 40 minutes of this film.

The last time I watched THE DEER HUNTER was on VHS

It's one of those films I find very difficult to watch. It's just painfully slow and way too long. I was reminded of that today as I felt I had sat through an entire wedding and reception in real-time.

Bought it for the prestige of a Best Picture film on 4k.

 

[Robert Crawford]

I started to watch this projected on my 110" screen in 4k.

While it does have a noticeable grain structure, it isn't overwhelming at all. However, I didn't watch more than 40 minutes of this film.

The last time I watched THE DEER HUNTER was on VHS

It's one of those films I find very difficult to watch. It's just painfully slow and way too long. I was reminded of that today as I felt I had sat through an entire wedding and reception in real-time.

Bought it for the prestige of a Best Picture film on 4k.

It's one of those movies that I now have to watch over two different settings.

 

[Vincent_P]

I have the Studio Canal UHD which is based on the same 4K remaster, and it looks stunning in Dolby Vision on my 65" LG OLED (not so good in HDR-10, which has some terrible artifacting, but the Dolby Vision later looks great). No regrets! Not sure if Shout messed with the black levels on their encode, though, as I have no need to buy it.

Vincent

 

[Noel Aguirre]

Proving my point once again that Vilmos Zsigmond's films do not lend themselves to 4k.

4K ok
HDR no way
It’s a good thing - his films don’t need any manipulation gimmicks.

 

[24fpsNinja]

And would hate to see the “day for night” scenes in UHD.

 

[TJPC]

I started to watch this projected on my 110" screen in 4k.

While it does have a noticeable grain structure, it isn't overwhelming at all. However, I didn't watch more than 40 minutes of this film.

The last time I watched THE DEER HUNTER was on VHS

It's one of those films I find very difficult to watch. It's just painfully slow and way too long. I was reminded of that today as I felt I had sat through an entire wedding and reception in real-time.

Bought it for the prestige of a Best Picture film on 4k.

Wow! I did not want to be Norman Negative until now. I saw this film theatrically only when it came out and at the time thought it was the most boring bum aching flick I had ever seen. I was rather bewildered by its positive critical reception. It was interesting that when this directors “Heaven’s Gate” received such a critical drubbing, many critics re-evaluated their reviews of “The Dear Hunter”.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Wow! I did not want to be Norman Negative until now. I saw this film theatrically only when it came out and at the time thought it was the most boring bum aching flick I had ever seen. I was rather bewildered by its positive critical reception. It was interesting that when this directors “Heaven’s Gate” received such a critical drubbing, many critics re-evaluated their reviews of “The Dear Hunter”.

You could get rid of the first 2 hours and still have a great film. Otherwise, it's like watching paint dry.

 

[Michel_Hafner]

My UK UHD looks fine in projection when tone mapped by the Lumagen.

 

[john a hunter]

Wonder how it looks with the Panasonic's current BD players tone mapping.
Have the UB 420 and intrigued.

 

[Britton]

Wonder how it looks with the Panasonic's current BD players tone mapping.
Have the UB 420 and intrigued.

Is 420 HDR10 only? I have the 820 and the tone mapping will do nothing if Dolby Vision is enabled.

 

[john a hunter]

The UB 420 is the same as the 820 without DV but you can enable to Optimiser for better tone mapping in HDR10.
Most find it works very well(and an absolute bargain as well ) so would be interested to see how effective it is with Deer Hunter.

 

[ScottJH]

Wonder how it looks with the Panasonic's current BD players tone mapping.
Have the UB 420 and intrigued.

I own the UK Studio Canal 4k disc and watched the entire movie a couple of nights ago on a UB420(set to Basic Luminance LCD & Projector) fed into a Benq HT3550. When toggling the optimizer off & on I didn't notice any improvement. I also spot checked it on a LG 55c9 with UB420 set to OLED and again didn't notice any improvement when toggling .

 

[David Wilkins]

Very good, but certainly not great. But I do wonder how much of what we’re seeing is the nature of the source material. With the exception of certain segments, particularly well lit outdoor scenes, has it ever been what we would now consider “outstanding”? I do think it could be substantially better, but would probably take an intensive, perhaps frame by frame treatment, at least for some scenes. I don’t see too much of an HDR problem.

This edition is most likely an issue of not being given a maximum effort to begin with. Going back and doing it again is an expensive and unlikely event. If it happens, it’s most likely going to be for the next decade anniversary.

Viewing hardware: LG 65” 4K OLED panel, and OPPO UDP-205

 

[john a hunter]

Thanks for the comments Scott.
Did you try to adjust the settings at all?
I'm running the Optimiser at +6
How would you rate the PQ?

 

[ScottJH]

Thanks for the comments Scott.
Did you try to adjust the settings at all?
I'm running the Optimiser at +6
How would you rate the PQ?

Changing the Dynamic Range Adjustment to 4-6 does bring out some shadow detail without being to harsh on the white level. I'm happy with the PQ considering the movie.