FUNNY FACE and SABRINA Eye Popping Blu-rays (1 Viewer)

[Mike Kuhns]

Does the FUNNY FACE Blu-Ray have an English language track? According to Amazon.fr, it only has a French dubbed soundtrack with English subtitles.

 

[gonda]

Both movies (FUNNY FACE and SABRINA) have:
AUDIO
English DD TrueHD (Funny Face 5.1, Sabrina Mono)
French DD Mono
German DD Mono
Spanish DD Mono
Italian DD Mono
Japanese DD (Funny Face 5.1, Sabrina Mono)
SUBTITLES
English SDH
Danish
Dutch
Finnish
French
German
Japanese
Norwegian
Portuguese (Sabrina only)
Spanish
Swedish

 

[haineshisway]

I've now watched the first fifty minutes of Funny Face and overall it's pretty pleasing - if they'd scrubbed it to death there would be no detail and there is plenty of detail on the Blu-ray, astonishingly so at times. The one area they do seem to have done grain management (DNR) on are the opticals. Maybe whatever anyone saw projected wasn't what was used for this Blu or maybe the projection system wasn't up to snuff - I suppose there could be any number of reasons, but the overall impression of the first fifty minutes is very good.

 

[Mike Kuhns]

Thanks for the feedback. I'm in.

 

[kagemusha98]

Thanks Bruce! I feel better about my thoughts about the blu of FUNNY FACE......I've subsequently shown it to many friends and all they all been very impressed.

 

[flixyflox]

Bruce, have you had a chance to compare it to either of the earlier SD DVD releases? It's here that you can see the sort of detail in faces, backgrounds, etc that simply doens't get translated to the HD image. One key example - Audrey wears little or no makeup (at Donen's direction) to do the "How Long has this been going on" number in the bookshop and you can see all the tiny imperfections in her skin when the camera cranes into CU. In the BluRay her facial CUs look like she's plastered in pancake. For the second half of the picture of course,as the "Quality Girl" model she's fully made up for every shot. .
What also strikes me as overdone is the erasure of fine level detail from backgrounds, things like the bookshelves, also in the Bookshop sequence. The split screen opticals (for "I'm Strictly Tourist") are as well managed as could be expected, and the matte optical of the TWA plane flying into Paris is "cleaner" than the SD but the half dozen short sequences with fog or smoke filters don't really gain anything from the higher resolution.
I am really dissatisfied with this result, after hte extremely strong SD renditions - I know it should have been a lot better than this.

 

[haineshisway]

Bruce, have you had a chance to compare it to either of the earlier SD DVD releases? It's here that you can see the sort of detail in faces, backgrounds, etc that simply doens't get translated to the HD image. One key example - Audrey wears little or no makeup (at Donen's direction) to do the "How Long has this been going on" number in the bookshop and you can see all the tiny imperfections in her skin when the camera cranes into CU. In the BluRay her facial CUs look like she's plastered in pancake. For the second half of the picture of course,as the "Quality Girl" model she's fully made up for every shot. .
What also strikes me as overdone is the erasure of fine level detail from backgrounds, things like the bookshelves, also in the Bookshop sequence. The split screen opticals (for "I'm Strictly Tourist") are as well managed as could be expected, and the matte optical of the TWA plane flying into Paris is "cleaner" than the SD but the half dozen short sequences with fog or smoke filters don't really gain anything from the higher resolution.
I am really dissatisfied with this result, after hte extremely strong SD renditions - I know it should have been a lot better than this.

On my set-up there is no comparison between the DVD and Blu-ray - the Blu-ray is so much sharper and has so much more detail. This is most evident, as someone above has pointed out, in Kay Thompson's face. By comparison, the DVD is fuzzy and soft. I guess we all see what we see, but I think the DVDs are off an internegative and the Blu is off a VistaVision transfer, which would yield nothing but very fine grain.

 

[flixyflox]

Quote: "On my set-up there is no comparison between the DVD and Blu-ray - the Blu-ray is so much sharper and has so much more detail. This is most evident, as someone above has pointed out, in Kay Thompson's face. By comparison, the DVD is fuzzy and soft. I guess we all see what we see, but I think the DVDs are off an internegative and the Blu is off a VistaVision transfer, which would yield nothing but very fine grain."
Well it's interesting to see such a difference of opinion on this - I'm clearly a solo voice for the negative. Of course I respect your knowledge about these things. I realize the DVD version(s) are entirely lower rez, and differenetly sourced but the representation, despite lack of cleanup, looks far more like the 35mm reduction prints to me.
FTR, in any case, my equipment is an Oppo BPD93 playing to a calibrated Sony VW60 with a 120 inch Screen Technics 16:9 screen. Audio is simple two channel through Audiolab pre and power amps and speakers are Monitor Audio Studio 20s.
ALso FTR I remember falling off my chair when the Searchers HD DVD came out in 2006 (I had been backing the wrong horse in the format stakes natch). To this day I cannot bear to watch it, on account fo the hideous mistakes with color timing and the over saturated yellow.
God forbid bitchery from me but Kay Thomson was no spring chicken when she made this, in fact no amount of makeup could disguise the.. err .. character in her face. She was of course one of the reasons for this picture's greatness. As were all the crew for what was really the last Freed movie without Freed and not at MGM but nonetheless a great Freed.

 

[haineshisway]

Certainly we agree on The Searchers I have the same player but I don't do the huge projection thing - I have a 55-inch LED that renders a fantastic image - I sometimes think that's the problem and I know there are wonderful projectors and screens out there, but the image gets so huge that obviously we're not looking at the image in the same way. At least I think that's how it works.

 

[bigshot]

I have projection and it looked great to me.

 

[Robin9]

I've now watched the first fifty minutes of Funny Face and overall it's pretty pleasing - if they'd scrubbed it to death there would be no detail and there is plenty of detail on the Blu-ray, astonishingly so at times. The one area they do seem to have done grain management (DNR) on are the opticals. Maybe whatever anyone saw projected wasn't what was used for this Blu or maybe the projection system wasn't up to snuff - I suppose there could be any number of reasons, but the overall impression of the first fifty minutes is very good.

What is your opinion of the Sabrina BRD?

 

[Patrick Mason]

I watched Sabrina last night, as well as the first 30 minutes of Funny Face. Sabrina generally looks very good. Funny Face does appear to have to have some amount of grain removed, with that trademark waxy look rearing its head. It's not Patton by a long shot, and there is still some wonderful detail, but it's still a missed opportunity. I can't imagine a VistaVision presentation would have had much grain to clean up anyway, so why bother?

Originally Posted by Bob Furmanek /t/320526/funny-face-and-sabrina-eye-popping-blu-rays#post_3923090
SABRINA began filming in late September 1953, 6 months after Paramount went 100% widescreen.
According to Boxoffice, the aspect ratio is 1.75:1.

After reading this, I also tried zooming in on the Sabrina disc to see how a few scenes looked in widescreen, and it does look strongly composed in a widescreen ratio.

 

[Bob Furmanek]

It was definitely composed for widescreen.

 

[Patrick Mason]

Easily fixed at home for the most part I guess (well, on most monitors), but you sure lose a lot of resolution. Too bad this couldn't have been released as originally intended.

 

[Mark-P]

Isn't it ironic that with all the "modified to fit your screen" butchering we've had to endure in the past, that a movie created in an aspect ratio that perfectly fits the screen would be modified to an AR that doesn't fit the screen? Hopefully if this gets a US release they will fix that gaffe.

After reading this, I also tried zooming in on the Sabrina disc to see how a few scenes looked in widescreen, and it does look strongly composed in a widescreen ratio.

 

[haineshisway]

What is your opinion of the Sabrina BRD?

It's here but I haven't looked at it yet - I'll try to do so tonight.

 

[Garysb]

The Film Forum in NYC will be screening the new DCP restoration of Funny Face for a week beginning June 29. From the Ad:
http://www.filmforum.org/movies/more/funny_face
1957) Relentlessly thinking Pink, Kay Thompson’s Quality magazine honcho (based on Vogue legend Diana Vreeland) and her minions swarm a Greenwich Village bookshop, but Fred Astaire’s photographer “Dick Avery” (based on visual consultant Richard Avedon) thinks the overwhelmed clerk, gamine Audrey Hepburn, is just the right face for that “new look.” Empty, shallow modeling contract vs. turtle-necked professor Emil Flostre’s “Empathicalism?” Oh, there’s a trip to philosophical hotbed Paris thrown in..., along with a score of Gershwin evergreens (and originals by Roger Edens); nightclub great/Eloise creator Thompson in one of only two major movie appearances; Astaire creating a courtyard bullifight with only a red-lined raincoat and an umbrella; Hepburn, in basic noir, letting herself go in a smokey bohemian boîte; the three performing together (in split screen) for the ebullient “Bonjour, Paris!” — through stunning locations of a city that never looked more inviting; topped by the equally-locationed fashion shoot and its electrifying finale: Hepburn, a scarlet Givenchy gown, and the “Victory of Samothrace.” One of the most visually striking of all movie musicals: this new DCP restoration brings back the look of its dazzling Technicolor and VistaVision as not seen in 55 years.
A PARAMOUNT PICTURES RELEASE

 

[TheVid]

I just watched the Scandinavian blu-ray of FUNNY FACE, which I assume is the same as the French release, and I was very pleased with it. I projected onto a 100-inch screen and it felt like opening night. Waxy isn't a term I would apply to it at all.
I'd recommend it to anyone, particularly since it's region-free and an impressive step up for anyone who enjoyed the latest DVD edition.

 

[John Hodson]

Funny Face comparison at Caps-a-holic

 

[GMpasqua]

That screen cap of Kaye Thompson in the Paris Square looks like it was shot yesterday. Is Paramount planning a US release?