Bad news about "The Thing from Another World" on BD (1 Viewer)

[Richard Gallagher]

Hi Rich, I would guess that you and Mr. Crawford are watching the DVD on an up converting all region DVD player , or an all region Blu-ray player. I have a ten year old all region Yamaha , so I probably won't see the improvement. I've been planning on getting a multi region bluray player for a while now , but haven't gotten around to it yet .

I watched it on a region-free Toshiba Blu-ray player. The restored scenes look very good, I haven't had a chance to compare it with the Region 1 DVD yet.

 

[Rick Thompson]

Yeah Criterion releases The Thing on blu-ray.... if only.


"film cutter" turned director Christian Nyby barely gets a mention in the review but how much of the film did he direct?

Hawks and Nyby were always insistent on Nyby being the director. Hawks was often there, and Nyby would confer with him. In Nyby's words (paraphrased from memory of an interview I saw back when), "This is my first film, and I've got one of the great directors standing there. Why wouldn't I ask his advice?"

 

[LouA]

I watched both DVDs on an Oppo 103 BD player.

From what everyone tells me , OPPO seems to be the way to go. If you have a lot of money invested in DVDs and Blu-rays it pays to go with the best .

 

[kinzoels]

the re-inserted scenes don't look half bad, and with today's technology, they could surely bring it up to snuff. I believe the laser disc, which I have, used 16MM elements for these scenes and they look awful...but I'm not so sure about the DVD as it looks so much better. Warners, who do some of the best work in video restoration and who I admire for such great BD as Casablanca (two of them to boot), How The West Was Won, the list is endless, are I'm afraid, dragging their feet on this one. Time to contract this film out to a top notch video house. It's one of the greatest Sci Fi films ever and never fails to amaze me every time I watch it (which is often).

 

[atfree]

I have a feeling things have changed:

https://www.hometheaterforum.com/co...51-restored-sequences.354142/#post-4524846HTF

 

[haineshisway]

Just to clarify something stated a couple of years ago - back in 1981 I directed my second movie, The Creature Wasn't Nice. It was a cast of five (amongst them Leslie Nielsen, Patrick Macnee, and Cindy Williams) and one sequence where the spaceship crew is watching a movie trailer in - wait for it - 2012 - the movie trailer being Dirty Harry Strikes Back with an old Clint still playing his role (Paul Brinnegar, who acted with Clint on Rawhide, played Harry). The DA is played by Ken Tobey. Between takes of course we all asked for stories about The Thing and when asked how much Hawks actually directed his answer was swift and simple as can be: "Every shot."

 

[Alan Tully]

It makes sense. Hawks the business man thinks a science fiction monster movie will make some money, but he's one of the top directors in Hollywood, so he doesn't want his name up there as director, he gives his editor, Christian Nyby the job, directing over his shoulder. Nyby doesn't mind, he's getting a credit & his directors ticket. Everyone's happy (little do they know that people will still be talking about this film 65 years later). As much as I'd love The Thing looking great on Blu-ray, I'd prefer the western Hawks made for RKO the following year, The Big Sky, I wonder if that will ever see the light of day?

 

[Robert Crawford]

It makes sense. Hawks the business man thinks a science fiction monster movie will make some money, but he's one of the top directors in Hollywood, so he doesn't want his name up there as director, he gives his editor, Christian Nyby the job, directing over his shoulder. Nyby doesn't mind, he's getting a credit & his directors ticket. Everyone's happy (little do they know that people will still be talking about this film 65 years later). As much as I'd love The Thing looking great on Blu-ray, I'd prefer the western Hawks made for RKO the following year, The Big Sky, I wonder if that will ever see the light of day?

Both films have basically the same problem with cut sequences too. I love both films and are personal favorites of mine.

 

[Robert Crawford]

Just to clarify something stated a couple of years ago - back in 1981 I directed my second movie, The Creature Wasn't Nice. It was a cast of five (amongst them Leslie Nielsen, Patrick Macnee, and Cindy Williams) and one sequence where the spaceship crew is watching a movie trailer in - wait for it - 2012 - the movie trailer being Dirty Harry Strikes Back with an old Clint still playing his role (Paul Brinnegar, who acted with Clint on Rawhide, played Harry). The DA is played by Ken Tobey. Between takes of course we all asked for stories about The Thing and when asked how much Hawks actually directed his answer was swift and simple as can be: "Every shot."

Interesting, Hawks was a great director and many of his films are among my favorite films.

 

[Worth]

An HD version of The Thing just popped up on iTunes for purchase. As it was only $10, I decided to take a chance on it. I didn't watch the whole thing, but did scan through selected scenes and the results are - not great. For one thing, it's been cropped to 1.78:1 and the picture quality is decidedly mediocre. I think it's probably a true HD transfer, albeit a weak one, as opposed to an upscale, but overall I'd recommend sticking with the DVD.

 

[Mark-P]

An HD version of The Thing just popped up on iTunes for purchase. As it was only $10, I decided to take a chance on it. I didn't watch the whole thing, but did scan through selected scenes and the results are - not great. For one thing, it's been cropped to 1.78:1 and the picture quality is decidedly mediocre. I think it's probably a true HD transfer, albeit a weak one, as opposed to an upscale, but overall I'd recommend sticking with the DVD.

Sounds like iTunes grabbed a broadcast transfer just to get an HD version up. I seriously doubt Warner was behind that decision as they would not have approved a cropped transfer. Did you check Amazon? They have it in HD and if you have a Movies Anywhere account your purchase should have transferred over there as well. Vudu appears to still only have SD.

 

[Peter Apruzzese]

That iTunes version sounds like the one that MonstersHD ran about 10-11 years ago.

 

[J. Casey]

Amazon is selling/renting that same cropped version in HD. Surely the Warner Archive would NEVER release an inappropriately cropped version of a film shot and exhibited in Academy ratio (1951)!

 

[aPhil]

That iTunes version sounds like the one that MonstersHD ran about 10-11 years ago.

That cropped version has also ran on TCM-HD

It's ugly

 

[Paul Penna]

I just checked the version currently running on FilmStruck. Academy ratio, looks like the same transfer as the 2003 DVD.

 

[Sadsack]

https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/The-Thing-from-Another-World-Blu-ray/48166/

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=311028