John Carpenters The Fog (Shout! Factory) My Mini Review (1 Viewer)

[Paul_Warren]

http://www.shoutfactory.com/?q=node/217405

Shout! Factory have done another terrific job here on John Carpenters classic 1979 horror The Fog. Dean Cundey has supervised a brand new 1080P transfer. For the films budget & the era it looks about as good as it could there is some print damage in the way of speckles, hairs & other minor artifacts but overall its a pretty solid release & it goes without saying this looks the best it ever has on a home video format. Time to bin the previously awful sub-standard Blurays + HD-DVD. There is a LOT of grain on this release though & I mean a LOT mainly in the darker scenes. If they used any DNR here its minimal to non existant as that would have removed it all. Pretty much every night time scene has bucket loads of grain in the shadows.

Sound is remastered into DTS 5.1 sounds pretty decent with some deep bass for the era but the sound is pretty much all dialog based anyway for most of the movie although Carpenters music still sounds terrific & very atmospheric.

This has the usual Shout! Factory double sided poster (flip is the original home video image of JLC behind the door with the fog outside). Plenty of extras as well. The movie takes up 26GB the other 16GB is extras so not bad for a low budget but classic movie.

Well done to everyone @ Shout! Factory who made this happen I look forward to Prince Of Darkness receiving similar treatment in 2 months time shame about the Region A lock though (easily defeated with a PC BD Drive & or multiregion player though!).

Hope you enjoy some of the screenshots below taken directly from the BD compressed to JPEG format but still close to the onscreen image (I watched this on my 60" LG Plasma it looked pretty good overall).

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Paul,

Greatly appreciate the effort you put into providing everyone
with a very detailed review.

I have never seen THE FOG, mainly because I was never a
huge fan of horror films.

Nevertheless, I think it's time that I add this to my Blu-ray library.

Going to order it. Thanks again!

 

[Paul_Warren]

Paul,

Greatly appreciate the effort you put into providing everyone
with a very detailed review.

I have never seen THE FOG, mainly because I was never a
huge fan of horror films.

Nevertheless, I think it's time that I add this to my Blu-ray library.

Going to order it. Thanks again!

Ron,

Hope you enjoy the movie its a seminal late 70's classic thanks for the kind words. I look forward to the HTF review soon.


Thanks

Paul

 

[TravisR]

One of my favorite John Carpenter movies so I'm definitely looking forward to this disc. Thanks for the review!

EDIT: Somewhat related, Scream Factory announced some more titles at Comic Con (and Facebook):

JOHN CARPENTER’S ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 (Collector’s Edition) – The original classic siege thriller is intensified further with all-new ‘Scream’-produced extras. (Nov 2012)... EVE OF DESTRUCTION – The 1991 Gregory Hines android-gone-amok sci-fi thriller hits Blu and anamorphic widescreen for the first time.SATURN 3 – This post-Alien 1980 Kirk Douglas and Farrah Fawcett vs. Evil Robot flick gets a considerable upgrade to Blu-ray for the first time. New extras planned. (Dec 2012)DARKMAN (Collector’s Edition) – The 1990 Sam Raimi cult classic gets the full on ‘Scream’ treatment with all new extras. (Dec 2012)SCREAM FACTORY “TV TERRORS” –Two made-for-TV movies - 1978’s THE INITIATION OF SARAH and ARE YOU IN THE HOUSE ALONE? – will be packaged together on DVD for the first time at a good price. Fans have been asking us if we could exploit more of this made-for TV content so consider this an “experiment”. If this sells well, we would love to look into bringing you a “Volume 2”. (Dec 2012)CAT PEOPLE (Collector’s Edition) – The 1982 feline flick (with Nastassja Kinski, sex, violence and a great David Bowie single) arrives on Blu for the first time with all-new extras (2014.)We still have more tricks up our sleeves for 2014 and we are working feverishly on trying to close deals so that we can announce more favorites soon!

 

[FrancisP]

I actually believe this is Carpentar's best horror film. It doesn't rely solely on graphic gore to shock people. There is some gore but it does not rely solely on gore. The murders on the boat are graphic but the murders of the babysitter and weatherman are more suggestion than gore. The ending was definitely a shocker.

Shout has apparently created some new supplements as well as bringing over the supplements in the special edition dvd. Definitely a buy for me.

 

[Bryan^H]

I actually believe this is Carpentar's best horror film. It doesn't rely solely on graphic gore to shock people.

I think so too. I'm sure it will look better than the Studio Canal Blu-ray. I can't wait.

 

[FoxyMulder]

A new release of Cat People, i hope they redo the tranfer, the HD DVD edition is very poor with edge enhancement on show and a harsh processed looking image, i'd love to buy Cat People and will now be buying The Fog, thanks for the mini review.

 

[darkrock17]

Is The Fog from 1979 or 1980? The SE's from MGM say 1979, but Scream Factory and other sites like Wikipedia and IMDB list it as 1980, so which is it?

 

[Robert Crawford]

Is The Fog from 1979 or 1980? The SE's from MGM say 1979, but Scream Factory and other sites like Wikipedia and IMDB list it as 1980, so which is it?

The Fog opened in LA and NYC in February, 1980. Which means it was filmed in 1979.

 

[Bryan^H]

Here are some screecap comparisons between Shout's Blu-Ray, and the previous release. Courtesy of dvdbeaver:
http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film4/blu-ray_reviews_59/the_fog_blu-ray.htm

 

[FoxyMulder]

The contrast boost and saturated cooked colour on the old edition look awful, i like the new one, i wonder if DVDBeaver have fixed their issue with screencap smoothing caused by using PowerDVD, personally i use Media Player Classic and hand pick when i do screencaps, tried PowerDVD, it is poor for taking caps and when i tried it last month i found it was smoothing the image.

 

[Bryan^H]

The contrast boost and saturated cooked colour on the old edition look awful, i like the new one

It is pretty bad. I had to tone down the color on my tv when I watched it to compensate for the over saturation. Judging by the screencaps from beaver, and those that Paul posted above it looks like we have a winner with the new Shout release.

 

[Mark-W]

Very excited to hear about Cat People coming to Blu-ray.
Now if I could just get Tony Scott's The Hunger [the film] with Deneuve and Saradon on Blu-ray, every film I watch in October would be on Blu.

 

[Robert Crawford]

I viewed this latest BD release of The Fog and I have to concur that it looks very good. After all these years, the film still had me jumping during a couple film moments. It's right up there with Halloween.

 

[Todd Erwin]

An official HTF review will be up later this week.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

The Fog opened in LA and NYC in February, 1980. Which means it was filmed in 1979.

Is The Fog from 1979 or 1980? The SE's from MGM say 1979, but Scream Factory and other sites like Wikipedia and IMDB list it as 1980, so which is it?

A gander at the copyright notice on the bottom of the sleeve shows a StudioCanal copyright date of 1980.

 

[TravisR]

I viewed this latest BD release of The Fog and I have to concur that it looks very good.

Same here. Nice extras too.

 

[David Norman]

Oh yes -- Saturn 3 and most particularly Cat People which I think I saw both theatrically way back in the hinter ages.

OTOH, as soon as I saw Cat People an old version of a Randy Newman song jumps into my head and it won't go away.

Nasty little paws and nasty long tails,
long sharp teeth and an attitude to match.
Cat People got nobody to love.....

 

[Chuck Anstey]

Maybe I should try to watch this again given how many people on this thread think it is great. I remember watching this as a kid and thinking it was boring as hell with nothing happening until the last 10 minutes and the payoff was very weak.

 

[JonZ]

Always had a soft spot for this movie. It might not be a great film, but its atmospheric and creepy. Love it.

I remembe seeing a double feature of this and Halloween back in the early 80s.

Finally can get rid of my HDDVD.