haineshisway
Senior HTF Member
I know there's a thread about wanting this film on Blu-ray, in which no one seemed to have known it IS on Blu-ray from the UK, and it's all-region.
Even though this film had a very long run at a movie theater five blocks from where I lived as a kid, the Lido, I never saw it back then. I was twelve, although I had seen several foreign films at the Lido and enjoyed them. So, I didn't catch up with Two Women until the 1980s, first on VHS then DVD, but always in one of those hideous full-frame public domain transfers of the English dubbed version - the dub, BTW, was pretty good, with Loren dubbing herself. I really liked the film as much as I could given the presentation, but I didn't find it great.
When this Blu-ray was announced as being a new transfer off a restored negative in the proper aspect ratio, I jumped at it. And it's been sitting on my couch since the beginning of the year, waiting for the right time to view. I'm only sorry I waited so long, because the film achieved greatness for me thanks to finally seeing it in a presentation it's worthy of. And let me tell you, it's worthy.
I'd read old Dr. Svet, who was less than thrilled with this transfer in his usual way - again, I don't know what his expertise is, if any, but he's very wrong about this (and so many others) - I suspect he's just a guy on the Internet reviewing Blu-rays. He thinks whatever the raw scans are are probably great - like he would know what the raw scans are. But he says in his usual mangled verbiage that things have been done to those raw scans, which, for him, seriously compromised the transfer - he particularly calls out two sequences and points to three screen caps to illustrate his point. So, I went to the three screen caps and guess what - one is an optical, and the other is very gray because it was seemingly shot on a very gray day in morning light. Neither scene has had anything "done" to it, at least not that my eyeballs can see.
So, how is the transfer? Well, I found it pretty fantastic, even putting aside the public domain from hell things we've had to put up with. He decries lack of detail - well, the detail is amazing, fantastic, save for the opticals, which are - opticals. The clothing detail, the bricks, all of it, for me, looks great. I guess I just don't live in this alternate universe where wonderful transfers get middling reviews. Funnily, transfers he assigns high marks to, to my eyes, are frequently problematic - so, there's that. But I really hate the harm that's done, that people read that stuff and actually don't purchase the disc.
I'd love for someone to take a chance on this and post their thoughts. But I know film well enough to know I really could not be happier with this transfer. I don't know the company that released it - CultFilms they're called - I'm sure it was licensed from an Italian company, probably the one who restored it. Sophia Loren truly deserved her Oscar, and frankly Eleonora Brown, twelve at the time of the film's release, deserved one, too. There are two nice extras - an interview with Loren and a piece about de Sica. It's still an important film, all these years later and it hold up incredibly well. Highly recommended by
Even though this film had a very long run at a movie theater five blocks from where I lived as a kid, the Lido, I never saw it back then. I was twelve, although I had seen several foreign films at the Lido and enjoyed them. So, I didn't catch up with Two Women until the 1980s, first on VHS then DVD, but always in one of those hideous full-frame public domain transfers of the English dubbed version - the dub, BTW, was pretty good, with Loren dubbing herself. I really liked the film as much as I could given the presentation, but I didn't find it great.
When this Blu-ray was announced as being a new transfer off a restored negative in the proper aspect ratio, I jumped at it. And it's been sitting on my couch since the beginning of the year, waiting for the right time to view. I'm only sorry I waited so long, because the film achieved greatness for me thanks to finally seeing it in a presentation it's worthy of. And let me tell you, it's worthy.
I'd read old Dr. Svet, who was less than thrilled with this transfer in his usual way - again, I don't know what his expertise is, if any, but he's very wrong about this (and so many others) - I suspect he's just a guy on the Internet reviewing Blu-rays. He thinks whatever the raw scans are are probably great - like he would know what the raw scans are. But he says in his usual mangled verbiage that things have been done to those raw scans, which, for him, seriously compromised the transfer - he particularly calls out two sequences and points to three screen caps to illustrate his point. So, I went to the three screen caps and guess what - one is an optical, and the other is very gray because it was seemingly shot on a very gray day in morning light. Neither scene has had anything "done" to it, at least not that my eyeballs can see.
So, how is the transfer? Well, I found it pretty fantastic, even putting aside the public domain from hell things we've had to put up with. He decries lack of detail - well, the detail is amazing, fantastic, save for the opticals, which are - opticals. The clothing detail, the bricks, all of it, for me, looks great. I guess I just don't live in this alternate universe where wonderful transfers get middling reviews. Funnily, transfers he assigns high marks to, to my eyes, are frequently problematic - so, there's that. But I really hate the harm that's done, that people read that stuff and actually don't purchase the disc.
I'd love for someone to take a chance on this and post their thoughts. But I know film well enough to know I really could not be happier with this transfer. I don't know the company that released it - CultFilms they're called - I'm sure it was licensed from an Italian company, probably the one who restored it. Sophia Loren truly deserved her Oscar, and frankly Eleonora Brown, twelve at the time of the film's release, deserved one, too. There are two nice extras - an interview with Loren and a piece about de Sica. It's still an important film, all these years later and it hold up incredibly well. Highly recommended by
