JAMES BOND ULTIMATE COLLECTION (1 Viewer)

[Terry Hickey]

I have enjoyed all 4 sets, and the Connery Bonds look fantastic. The only problem I have encountered is that 2 discs from Volume 4: "Moonraker" and "You Only Live Twice" have hung up in two different places in the movie. I have taken them back and exchanged twice already, and they do it in the same places on the replacements. So, I tried them on my other player and laptop and they play flawlessly. Go figure.
Other than that, I'm happy to have these sets.

 

[Kajs]

So I finally got sets 3 & 4 yesterday and took a look at Goldeneye, expecting this horrible picture that was made out to be. I was pleasantly suprised at how good it looked, and noticed nothing wrong with it. I have owned Goldeneye on VHS, VHS Widescreen, DVD, DVD SE, and now the 3rd DVD edition of it.

I also have to give kudos to Lowry for cleaning up optical effects on all the movies that have existed since the first print. To see the titles and gunbarrel logos without all those marks and scratches on them is very cool.

 

[Steve_Pannell]

I haven't watched those 2 yet but could that be a layer change? Or did they freeze up completely and not continue?

EDIT: Oops! I just noticed you said 2 different places. That wouldn't be a layer change, would it?

 

[Shawn DuHast]

Tomorrow Never Dies.

Can anyone confirm if all the burnt in sub titles are present & correct?

 

[brioni]

no doubt the running of the film on a monitor, properly calibrated home cinema screen or bog standard TV looks fine, but surely a screen capture is a fair representation of the actual picture - colour, framing everything. is it not a frame of MPEG2 thats directly encoded in the VOB file? it's from the dvd source, it's not like its a photo taken of the screen! and even if for some reason the software does not have it's options switched to "raw" settings, all the different sources that have provided caps show exactly the same issues, the R2 green harbour shot, the fight at dawn which is now night, the over blown, contrast boosted Live and Let die (yuk), the aqua LTK titles.

http://web12.dvd2web.de/007liveandle...eandletdie.htm
http://web12.dvd2web.de/007licence/007licence.htm
http://filmz.dk/articles/view/1100/
http://www.bulletsnbabesdvd.com/foru...forum.php?f=19

TV caps!

SE

UE



SE

UE


different sources, same issues.

incidentally I wasn't a fan of any of the SE either. Die Another Day was the only transfer I rated, I found the blacks very blocky - even the previous (later) Brosnan ones.

 

[Nelson Au]

Re: Goldeneye- I have taken a moment to compare the original MGM laserdisc, MGM SE DVD and the new UE DVD as I was curious about all the comments regarding the new framing.

It's true, both the LD and SE DVD are framed the same, but as shown some pages back, the UE is zoomed in a bit. I only viewed the bungie jump sequence, the Aston Martin/Ferrari motoring scene, the casino scene and the bit when the helicopter is stolen. It is also quite striking to compare the LD to the SE, the LD looks like VHS!

I have seen Dr. No, FRWL, Goldfinger, OHMSS and Thunderball. These are simply the best they've ever looked. It's quite amazing what Lowry has done to clean up the films!

 

[brioni]

I agree the films look immaculate, i'm sure not one piece of dirt can be found but i'd have preferred they kept it at that. there is always a worry that things get altered when computers are involved and that realisation has come true again. i just hope subsequent incarnations of these transfers don't inherit some of these issues.

as for the cropping, it's frustrating but your probably looking at below 15% thats missing from frame. so it shouldn't ruin the experience of watching the film.

 

[Jay Pennington]

IMO that amount of cropping is significant.

 

[GuruAskew]

I agree, you're missing the edge of 006's barrel and Bond's index finger! Let's find Lowry headquarters and burn them to the ground!

 

[MikeRS]

 

[Edward Schatz]

On an aesthetic level, does that picture make any sense to you the way it has been cropped?

 

[Christopher D]

You don't have to be anal-retentive to think that's significant. Definitely pretty sloppy.

 

[David_Blackwell]

My thoughts on volume 4 can be found here .

I am going through volume 3 and will add comments about how some of the SE transfers from the UEs look different (I never saw the SE transfers). I will probably have a review on it sometime after Christmas.

 

[GuruAskew]

Yeah but you have to be pretty ignorant to assume that the "missing" visual information was ever intended to be seen in the first place.

Like I said earlier in this thread: when the "Back to the Future" sequels arrived on DVD with different framing that previous home video editions there was no denying that something was wrong because actual visual gags were completely obscured and thus ruined. So far nobody has posted a "Goldeneye" screenshot with so much as a word or prop obscured, nobody has even posted one where the composition seems cramped or awkwardly cropped.

If you really want to judge the cropping someone should post, say, 10 different screenshots and randomly choose an SE *OR* a UE screenshot.

Forget stuff like the a/b comparisons above or the new UE shots laid over the SE shots, mix them up and see if the people acting like this is a huge abomination can actually pick out the ones with the "sloppy" framing.

 

[Edward Schatz]

As I explicitly stated, I was arguing from a purely aesthetic level which is subjective. Therefore, I am not arguing that I am correct. However, you are stating that it is simply "dead, useless space" which "indicates that it was never properly framed in the first place." Who are you to say that? Were you the DP on the set? Did you work on the movie? How do you know any better than anyone else here (unless you were on the production team) what was and was not intended? Your argument is as subjective as mine and therefore not entitled to your notion of explicit "dead, useless space."

 

[Ray H]

While what was lost seems to be mostly dead space, the cropping makes the films feel a little too claustrophobic for my tastes. While I can't say for sure what is the correct image, the old compositions just make more sense.

Personally, I just really want to know why Goldeneye and A View to a Kill were cropped so significantly. Aside from the color issues on some of the films, the cropping of these two seems like the biggest head scratcher in an otherwise excellent set.

 

[Edward Schatz]

Not that this is going to make any difference to MGM or Lowry, but I will not buy the three other sets until I hear/read/get an explanation as to why the films were cropped.

 

[Jay Pennington]

One person's "dead, useless space" is another's aesthetic framing of the important elements in the shot with a little breathing room.

But if you like, say, your high school yearbook photo to have the outer edges of your ears trimmed off, then fine. Most would want a little room around the head. But hey, your ears aren't important information, right?

Now, I'm not saying this an egregious amount of cropping, but it is not an insignificant amount.

 

[Douglas Monce]

As a still I don't know if it makes sense or not, but these are movies and with out pulling out my copy of the film I have no idea what happened before or after that frame of the film. Not every frame of every film is intended to ,or even could be "suitable for framing". With out seeing the action in that shot, a single frame means nothing to me.

Why did they crop it? I don't know, but I do know that while this restoration project was going on Martin Campbell was on hand to be consulted. He was in the offices of ION working on Casino Royale. Now I don't know if they asked him about it or not.

All of the cropping seems to have been done for a reason. It’s not like Lowry just did it at random. I mean they didn't do any cropping to the Indiana Jones films. For all I know those shots were cropped like that for the Theatrical release and improperly framed when transferred to video the first time.

Doug

 

[brioni]

I don't buy this explanation of the director asking for the framing to be altered. it's like saying John Glen randomly picked one of his 5 films and asked for changes to a film that’s had been presented in the same way for the previous 21 years. I don't believe it because it makes no sense whats so ever. And if anyone thinks an ex bond director has any sort of control like that over the current producers, Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson and studio regime they should think again.