What's new

Original Mono Soundtracks Missing on Blu-ray (1 Viewer)

MSC77

Agent
Joined
Aug 2, 2013
Messages
30
Real Name
Michael Coate
My one-sheet for "The Breakfast Club" lacks a Dolby Stereo logo. The film's end credits, just as Mark-P mentioned, also lacks any references to Dolby. Ditto for newspaper promotion. The VHS, Beta and LaserDisc (and I think even the very first DVD) releases all were mono. The DVD & Blu-ray releases that sport a 5.1 track were issued during the re-mixing era; nothing issued these days should be assumed to be the original mix. So...I think the reasonable conclusion is: "The Breakfast Club" was originally mono. (I welcome input to the contrary, though; I've encountered several people that swear it was in Dolby, and this very argument pops up on the forums on a regular basis.)
 

Jari K

Senior HTF Member
Joined
May 16, 2007
Messages
3,288
"But when they muck a mono track around for 5.1.."Many times these 5.1 mixes are actually pretty good and at the end of the day quite "monaural" (mainly faithful to the original track, but still adding some surround activity to the scenes where it feels natural). Some mixes are not good, but labeling all 5.1 mixes "bad" is not the best approach. Often they're mixed by the best in the business. And by the people who know and respect film (audio) history.I always choose 5.1 (well, 6.1, 7.1...), even for the older films. If the track sounds really bad, I switch to mono. It rarely happens with newer mixes, though. I just like that the sound is "full", just like life. :)
 

Brent Reid

Supporting Actor
Joined
Apr 27, 2013
Messages
813
Location
Nottingham, UK
Real Name
Brent
Ok, I removed The Breakfast Club from the main list after finding a scan of an original poster featuring the Dolby Stereo logo, but have reinstated it, at least for now. It'd be cool if anyone could weigh in with definitive proof either way!


I'm still happily surprised that substantially greater numbers of MIA original audio tracks haven't cropped up!
 

Brent Reid

Supporting Actor
Joined
Apr 27, 2013
Messages
813
Location
Nottingham, UK
Real Name
Brent
I'd like to draw attention to a post I made in the Sergio Leone Blu-ray thread recently. From this you'll see that including an original mono track on a BD is often a far from simple task. Naturally, not every mono soundtrack that's missing in (HD) action gets a free pass, but I think this does help explain a fair few of them...
 

Bryan Tuck

Screenwriter
Joined
Jan 16, 2002
Messages
1,980
Real Name
Bryan Tuck
I believe Halloween's original mono track was included on the 2007 BD release. However, the 35th Anniversary Edition inexplicably included a mono downmix of the 7.1 remix. This was corrected for the box set release earlier this year, where the original mono track was given a Dolby TrueHD encode. (Unfortunately, I think the standalone 35th release was never corrected.)
 

FanboyZ

Second Unit
Joined
May 19, 2009
Messages
283
Real Name
Zolly Shoah Ben-Becker
The theatrical cut of the Exorcist is 5.1, but it's really just the mono.
 

andySu

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Apr 7, 2006
Messages
2,858
Often some foreign language tracks on the DVD or bluray or HD-DVD will have some of the original sound effects Foley expect the English dialogue. If you doubt me go and pull one of you favorites and watch the film again and play the same scene over and over 10 times and listen.

The WIzard of Oz has a few extra tracks on DVD late 90's pressing as I see no sense buying the film again for cardboard liemax wooden 3d and 7.1 wtf. I might buy the THX laserdisc one day.

The Terminator, is a bit controversial on the first termination sounds like Dirty Harry, paid a visit rather then Terminator wtf, the gun sound effect sounded naff. I can't recall if one of the foreign language tracks on the DVD had the original sound effect, (has I not played the film in over a year) but the Laserdisc surely does as original as some have reported. So that will, "I'll be buying" again on THX laserdisc, not interested in remastered bluray. I like the upscale on the AVR to 1080p, suits laserdisc just fine.

I guess some would like Vertigo as well so maybe laserdisc early pressing.
 

Lord Dalek

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2005
Messages
7,090
Real Name
Joel Henderson
FanboyZ said:
The theatrical cut of the Exorcist is 5.1, but it's really just the mono.
Actually its the 1978 Dolby Six-Track version...which is basically just glorified mono.
 

Bryan Tuck

Screenwriter
Joined
Jan 16, 2002
Messages
1,980
Real Name
Bryan Tuck
Thought I'd bump this as I was watching Excalibur the other day, and the 5.1 on the Blu-ray (which I assume is essentially the same track that was on the DVD) is almost mono, too. A few slight expansions of music and sound effects, but it doesn't sound particularly revisionist (certainly not compared to something like The Terminator). I wonder how many 5.1 remixes of mono movies are similar, in that they are very slight expansions of music and SFX into the surrounds. Obviously, I always prefer hearing the film's original sound design when possible, but as long as there's nothing missing, a slight remix doesn't bother me too much.

Lord Dalek said:
Actually its the 1978 Dolby Six-Track version...which is basically just glorified mono.

I think the 5.1 on the 25th Anniversary DVD and the Blu-ray is actually based on the original 1973 mono. The 1979 six-track remix included some extra sound effects and a few gimmicky directional gags, which can be heard on the 1997 DVD (and probably most of the VHS and laserdisc releases). But these are not present on the 1998 DVD or the Blu-ray.
 

Lord Dalek

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2005
Messages
7,090
Real Name
Joel Henderson
Bryan Tuck said:
I think the 5.1 on the 25th Anniversary DVD and the Blu-ray is actually based on the original 1973 mono. The 1979 six-track remix included some extra sound effects and a few gimmicky directional gags, which can be heard on the 1997 DVD (and probably most of the VHS and laserdisc releases). But these are not present on the 1998 DVD or the Blu-ray.
More likely those were changes added further down the chain. Usually the 4.1 was done first and the engineers would rework it for the subsequent 2.0 mixdown.
 

Bryan Tuck

Screenwriter
Joined
Jan 16, 2002
Messages
1,980
Real Name
Bryan Tuck
Lord Dalek said:
More likely those were changes added further down the chain. Usually the 4.1 was done first and the engineers would rework it for the subsequent 2.0 mixdown.

Maybe so, but the extra bells & whistles are present in both the 2.0 and the 5.1 on the 1997 DVD, and I'm fairly certain they were in at least one of the old VHS releases.
 

Brent Reid

Supporting Actor
Joined
Apr 27, 2013
Messages
813
Location
Nottingham, UK
Real Name
Brent
Added Cannonball Run II (1984); am surprised to find this apparently wasn't originally in Dolby Surround. All available DVDs have mono audio and all BDs have 5.1, with some also having 2.0 stereo – presumably a downmix.
 

Lord Dalek

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Apr 4, 2005
Messages
7,090
Real Name
Joel Henderson
Should note that the original mono track for Enter The Dragon is on the recent Criterion edition.

On the filp side... the original Dolby stereo track for Shogun Assassin has apparently gone missing. Hence that cut of Lone Wolf and Cub is in mono on the Criterion set.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Latest Articles

Forum statistics

Threads
356,710
Messages
5,121,107
Members
144,146
Latest member
SaladinNagasawa
Recent bookmarks
1
Top