HTF REVIEW: "Footloose" (with screenshots) (1 Viewer)

[Dave_P.]

I'm assuming this disc comes in the same paper packaging as Grease and Panic Room?

 

[Jeff Bamberger]

As of late, Paramount has me thinking about the Rolling Stones.....Sad Sad Sad.

SNF will be in my wish list for the Holidays.

Maybe Grease too.

Footloose....nope. A good job and some extras and it would have been a maybe.

C'mon Paramount. You can do a better job than this.....

 

[Will K]

You know, I don't think the folks at Paramount
are too happy with us as of late.

Their excellent efforts notwithstanding, perhaps there would be less to complain about if they did a better job. Their transfers this year have wildly varied in quality and it seems their has been a major shift in how many titles are presented(no trailers or extras of any kind on many releases). Far be it from me to be flippant(), but have the Disney folks migrated to Par?
Unlike the totally deaf Buena Vista, perhaps if Paramount would look a little closer to consumer comments and criticism, they could improve their product. I'll gladly complement them when they provide quality releases(Star Trek II SE, for example). However, because I do spend a good portion of my dollars on their DVD's, I have the right to call them on it when they do lackluster work and it seems economically logical that they'd take note.

 

[Rob Willey]

I've viewed my copy and there was none of the artifactoring (is that a word?) or picture freeze that Ron reports on my copy.

It's great to see Footloose in its OAR again and the transfer looks and sounds OK on my humble setup, but it's obvious that this is far from a reference quality disc.

Rob

 

[Jenna]

Thanks for the honest review, Ron. I could sense that you really wanted to heap more praise on this release, but the screenshots speak for themselves. The transfer looks very lackluster and washed out. AND I don't consider subtitles and widescreen to warrant a label of "SPECIAL FEATURES" either. (What's with that!?)

Unless they're giving this away tomorrow, I'll pass on it.

 

[Brent_H]

why, on my cover, does John Lithgow have a box around his name?? its like that on the back too......wtf....???

 

[Cary T]

The Footloose soundtrack has John Lithgow's name boxed as well. I imagine this is how it originally was. I'm guessing with Kevin Bacon not a big star at the time Paramount wanted to use Lithgow's name to promote the movie.

I'm still amused at the back cover stating "special features not rated"...what special features?

 

[Jamie Cole]

"Lackluster" is an understatement.

After seeing what Paramount did with movies like "April Fool's Day," "Saturday Night Fever," and even to a certain extent "Grease," well...

"Footloose" just plain sucks.

We are too far removed, perhaps, from the release of the film to remember that this was a MAJOR hit for Paramount, as was the soundtrack. It practically launched Kevin Bacon as a leading man. It was a cultural phenom in high schools around the country.

And it got a dirty, awful transfer and no extras at all.

Now, I'm not one to pour over lack of extras. But treat the film right. I've seen waht Paramount can do with small films. This wasn't a small film.

Am I glad to have "Footloose" on DVD? Yes. Am I glad to own this disc? Unfortunately, no. A rare and glaring disappointment from Paramount.

 

[Brian-W]

The other problem is that this transfer is pretty
lackluster. After looking at how perfect Saturday
Night Fever looked, and how decent Grease
came across on DVD, you can immediately see that no
great effort was put into the transfer of Footloose.

I've seen an HDTV version of Footloose, and it doesn't look much better than the DVD. I think that the film stock used for filming just wasn't up to snuff.

 

[Eric Li]

I have noticed that in the very opening sequence, there is no audio until about 5 seconds in -- I'm wondering if I have a defective disc or if they missed this in the transfer to DVD.

Anyone have the same experience??

 

[EarlH]

I had the same problems that Ron did with my retail copy. Artifacts. I exchanged the disk and had the same problems. My player is a SONY DVP-S7700. I also tried it on a SONY DVP-S3000 - the picture was fine but the sound was inconsistent. I did not try a third disk, I have no non-Sony players. Anyone else have similar problems with a player-disk combo? Thanks.