A Few Words About A few words about...™ The Perfume of the Lady in Black -- in Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

[Robert Harris]

I'm not quite certain what Raro Video is thinking, or who they might be going to for technical advise.

I've just had the unfortunate experience of viewing about half an hour of Francesco Barilli's The Perfume of the Lady in Black, starring cult favorite Mimsy Farmer.

I have no idea what the original color palette was, but colors are interesting, and extremely bold.

What I do know is that I've complained about their releases in the past -- odd choices of framing and image cut-off, removal of grain, etc.

Someone there may be listening to complaints, and not only mine, and their newest release, which has been digitally restored and remastered, has a very interesting patina of grain, or faux grain, or video noise. Something -- I'm not sure just what.

Whatever this is, it hangs in place, extremely evident in a 4k up-rez, and sometimes swims about, rather like watching amoebas attempting to swim upstream and spawn.

As I note -- interesting.

But extremely disturbing.

This is not the look and sound of perfect.

Overall, an extremely unpleasant Blu-ray to watch.

Image - 2

Audio - 5

4k Up-rez - 1

Pass / Fail - Fail


RAH

 

[Powell&Pressburger]

I imported the German Mediabook blu-Ray thru Diabolikdvd.com I have not had a chance to watch it yet, I'm told it is a better release than Raro but have been told it still contains the pesky scanner noise that seems to plague many Italian HD transfers.

 

[Robert Harris]

I imported the German Mediabook blu-Ray thru Diabolikdvd.com I have not had a chance to watch it yet, I'm told it is a better release than Raro but have been told it still contains the pesky scanner noise that seems to plague many Italian HD transfers.

This one isn't scanner noise. It's a wonderful layer of added goodness.

 

[lark144]

Darn. This was a film I was really looking forward to getting. How does the swimming, nodule-like grain compare with Olive's Blu ray of "1900" ?

 

[Robert Harris]

Darn. This was a film I was really looking forward to getting. How does the swimming, nodule-like grain compare with Olive's Blu ray of "1900" ?

Perfume is more impressionistic and artistic - a show unto its own.

 

[lark144]

Thanks! You make it sound like one of those late 40's-early 50's abstract animation shorts from the Canadian Film Board, by people like Len Lye & Norman McLaren. Unfortunate that a movie with plot & characters & yes: visuals that one might be interested in watching is underneath all those acrobatic swirls of color.

 

[Powell&Pressburger]

I watched my German MediaBook (region free) edition this evening and of course the transfer has the dreaded Italian scanner noise and at times the image worsens like there is a gauze look over the image. I couldn't detect an organic upward movement of odd grain on this edition as Robert noted on the US Raro release I would say Raro did more tinkering with their transfer and sadly ruined yet another US disc. I keep thinking of Raro as the designer imposter perfume of BLU-Rays.

I think the film aside from the not great transfer has a bold striking colorful look to it. I did notice the first time you see Mimsy's bedroom it looks more purple but on later scenes it looks more blue. I will say I loved the film and the score and the German disc has a couple of playable tracks that sound much better than the audio on the blu. I felt like the English track had audible hiss to it. I do have electrostatic speakers and it can sound worse than a regular speaker. The film was an interesting journey and I was never bored. Just love this giallo very daymarish.