International New to Region-Free. PLEASE Recommend Some Other Region Blu-rays! (1 Viewer)

[Mike Frezon]

After YEARS of being told that I should buy a region-free Blu-ray player (if I only had a nickel for every time I'd been told that!), I finally have done the deed.

Months ago I purchased an Oppo 203...and have just today ordered the region-free mod for it.

The title which finally got me to cave on the region-free hesitation is Paper Moon. I ordered today both PM and The Lion in Winter from amazon.uk.

So I now realize that I have just opened up a whole new world of potential titles for myself...but am rather overwhelmed to search through all of our INTERNATIONAL-tagged threads.

It would be hard for me to let you know all of the genres of film that I like. So I will ask (in a rather lazy manner) for the non-region-A titles in your collection that you are most happy to have. Or those titles you think may not come to region A for a very long time.

My hope is that this thread might turn into a clearinghouse of ideas for non-region-A titles for those people like myself who aren't aware of all that's out there.

 

[dpippel]

If you're a Hammer fan, the Region B Blu-ray release of Quatermass and the Pit is an essential as far as I'm concerned Mike:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Quatermass...swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1496260953&sr=8-1

The transfer is gorgeous, and the extras are well done. This film has not been released on Blu-ray in Region A yet.

 

[Dave B Ferris]

There was a limited edition UK release of Shane on BR, with all 3 aspect ratios included. That one may now be out-of-print, though.

If you are a history/war buff, there is a UK BR release of "World at War" with the correct aspect ratio. I think the US BR release monkeyed with the aspect ratio, and I think there has never been a correct version in the US.

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

 

[David Norman]

As usual depends on your tastes, but a few off the top of my head

Ratatouille 3D
The BFG 3D with Atmos (though there is at least one region version with both)
Many Hammer Horror though many of them seem to be coming to Region A finally
The Pianist

Space 1999 both seasons
The Prisoner Complete series unless you happened to get the Region A set when it was available.
Vincent Price items that were once part of Collection Vol 1 that are now OOP

Lost Highway and Inland Empire though I guess the German boxset of these is region free
The Lost Weekend

Plenty of PAL DVD stuff either in the original speed with NTSC conversion error/pitch problems or far cheaper UK
versions than the compromised US R1 versions
Allo Allo
Red Dwarf
Spooks (US title MI5) -- had a UK poster once ask me why the title was changed for US release. He reminded me of the humor Brits get from the "fanny packs" that US tourists always are inquiring where to purchase. Or of locals suggesting that tourists inquire at various places about searching for Rabbits in Britain.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Check out the Blu-rays From Germany thread...lot of good stuff coming out of there that's region B locked. I'm excited for some Jimmy Stewart westerns coming in September.

 

[Matt Hough]

If you like the sudsy Ross Hunter melodramas, I reviewed the Region B release of Madame X which you might want to check out.

 

[Peter Apruzzese]

The Day the Earth Caught Fire - UK
55 Days at Peking - UK

 

[Brent Reid]

Do check out German releases: after the UK and US, most of my BDs come from there. In addition to an endless stream of classic westerns, they've also issued many 1950s sci-fi and creature features that still show no sign of coming out elsewhere.

I reckon the UK's BFI are the best home video label in the world, bar none. The sheer quantity and quality of their output is just staggering, and most of it, being sourced directly from their own archives, is exclusive to them. Unfortunately, this means that due to rights issues their releases are almost always region B-locked. They're particularly strong on films and programming from the silent era–1970s, and foreign and arthouse films. They also have an online shop.

When I read the OP the very first BD I thought of was StudioCanal's Quatermass and the Pit, so post #2 is a good call! It's easily my fave Hammer and after years of waiting we were rewarded with an absolutely perfect, terrifying BD.

 

[dvdclon]

The Flight of the Phoenix (1965) - UK
Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid - UK

 

[Mark-P]

I'll start with a couple of Academy Award Best Picture winners that are only in region B:
The Lost Weekend
Hamlet

Some more recent purchases I've made:
Napoleon (1927)
Flight of the Phoenix (1965)
Darling (1965)
Romeo and Juliet (1968)
More American Graffiti
The Elephant Man

and more Westerns from Amazon Germany than I can enumerate here.

There are a couple of traps you should watch out for. Some European titles suffer from PAL speedup (mastered in 1080i/50). Also a very substantial number for French Blu-rays have French subtitles that cannot be removed when the English soundtrack is chosen. And finally if you are buying Foreign language films from non-English-speaking countries, make sure that English subtitles are available as often they are not.

 

[David Weicker]

Young And Innocent (early Hitchcock)
The Glass Key
The Blue Dahlia (both Ladd/Lake)
Comfort And Joy (Bill Forsyth - quirky Scot)
49th Parallel (Powell/Pressburger)
Colossus: The Forbin Project (Sci-fi)
Everyone Says I Love You (Allen - avoid the French release)

And votes for The Day The Earth Caught Fire and Quatermass And The Pit

 

[RichMurphy]

Circus World, 55 Days at Peking, Evil Under the Sun, Women in Love, and the BFI's DVD of The Devils

 

[ajabrams]

The Powell Pressburger Tales of Hoffman.

 

[bigshot]

There's some amazing classic British TV on blu-ray at Amazon UK... The Persuaders, The Professionals, The Prisoner, The Avengers. Lots of good modern shows too... Pyschoville, Inside No 9, Luther, The Missing, Broadchurch, Ripper Street... Nordic Noir series like The Killing, Forbrylheisen, Borgen, The Bridge.

Getting to see TV from other countries is the best part of being region free. Movies usually end up here, but not all TV does.

 

[JohnRice]

I have a LOT of UK Blu-Rays. Some because they weren't available domestically at the time and some because they were a fraction of the price.

Good Director Sets
Atom Egoyan
David Lynch
Alfred Hitchcock (multiple)
Coen Brothers
Stanley Kubrick

I bought the Egoyan set almost entirely to get The Sweet Hereafter

Some of those are region free, but lately I notice most newer titles aren't.

I recently got several Peter Greenaway titles. ZOO, Baby of Macon, Drowning by Numbers, Belly of an Architect, The Cook, The Thief...
I also got Videodrome, because I didn't want to spend $25 for it here.

I also have that 1968 Romeo & Juliet, Inland Empire & Mulholland Drive (MD wasn't on BR in the US when I got it)

Possession (Sam Neill), if you want some twisted sci-fi/horror type weirdness.

I've gotten a Universal Monster set, just because it was about 1/4 the price of domestic.

A one season TV show called Hunted, with Melissa George that's a decent espionage one. It wasn't released domestically on BR.

For starters...

 

[The Obsolete Man]

There's some amazing classic British TV on blu-ray at Amazon UK... The Persuaders, The Professionals, The Prisoner, The Avengers. Lots of good modern shows too... Pyschoville, Inside No 9, Luther, The Missing, Broadchurch, Ripper Street... Nordic Noir series like The Killing, Forbrylheisen, Borgen, The Bridge.

Getting to see TV from other countries is the best part of being region free. Movies usually end up here, but not all TV does.

The Broadchurch Blus work in region A players, if they can handle 576i. I know my Philips player plays them, but an old Magnavox I have just gives me a black screen.

 

[Tino]

I'm thinking of doing the same thing but what mod are you talking about? Doesn't it play all region out of the box? And it's the Oppo UDP 203 4K player $549 from Oppo right?

 

[Josh Steinberg]

All UHD discs are region free, so nothing needed for that.

The Oppo can be made to play region-locked DVDs by the one-time entering of a code in the player's setup menu.

But for standard Blu-rays, the Oppo needs to be modified before it can play zone-locked content. You can either have the player physically altered by having a chip soldiered into the inside of it, or you can (as Mike did, as I've done) purchase an unlicensed chip which plugs into a port on the back of the player and allows you to change the player's zone setting using your remote. When you want to watch a Zone B disc, you use the remote to set the player to Zone B, and when done you manually set it back to Zone A.

There is no zone free "out of the box" player available anywhere. Any BD player modified to be all region requires manually resetting the zone code when you want to watch something with another code.

 

[David Norman]

I'm thinking of doing the same thing but what mod are you talking about? Doesn't it play all region out of the box? And it's the Oppo UDP 203 4K player $549 from Oppo right?

No, the OPPO isnt natively region free. There is a module you can buy (Ebay) that easily makes it Region Free though - plugs into the computer port on the back of the unit so you don't even have to crack it open