Some Twilight Time Discs No Longer Playing (1 Viewer)

[Thomas T]

Put in my TT blu ray of Pal Joey and it went through all the chapters until the end and it played without problems! My player is a Samsung BD-F5100 modified region free player.

 

[willyTass]

Spot checked all of these tonight: first 30 seconds of each of the chapters

Didn’t clean the discs for dust or finger prints

They all played perfectly on my Oppo 103

 

[Rob_Ray]

THE EGYPTIAN, NICHOLAS AND ALEXANDRA, and DESIREE all play fine in my Oppo 103.

 

[JimMiller]

Okay, the discs people say no longer play so far are:

The Blue Max 2-11-14
Body Double 8-13-13
Desiree 4-10-12
The Egyptian 7-12-11
Exodus 3-15-16
Experiment in Terror 1-15-13
Follow That Dream 8-11-14
Nicholas and Alexandra 2-12-13
Pal Joey 2-14-12
Picnic 1-17-12

And the known players people have are:

Oppo BDP-105
Pioneer BDP-320

Sony BDP-BX58

 

[jcroy]

Pretty sure Twilight Time discs were pressed at CINRAM, most of the rotted discs were pressed there

If they were manufactured by Cinram, they will have "IFPI 2U** " or "IFPI 2F** " stamped in the first transparent concentric ring of the disc (radially away from the center hole). One might need a magnifying lens to see this clearly.

IFPI 2U** = the former Olyphant, Pensylvania plant (closed down a year ago or so)

IFPI 2F** = Huntsville, Alabama plant

(The ** are wildcard alphanumeric letters/numbers).

 

[Ed Lachmann]

So, are the Samsung BD-F5100 or the Sony BDP-BX58 good alternative players if my Oppo someday goes haywire? I'd have to give one of these a whirl if I find more discs having problems. I remember those cheapo 90's players that would have problems playing perfectly good discs.

 

[bujaki]

Spot checked all of these tonight: first 30 seconds of each of the chapters

Didn’t clean the discs for dust or finger prints

They all played perfectly on my Oppo 103

You really like Bell, Book and Candle, right?

 

[AnthonyClarke]

I'll have to check Pal Joey on my Oppo 203 (which I bought the day after I heard the news Oppo was discontinuing production of Blu ray players). I'd better check out Bell Book and Candle too.....

 

[Robin9]

My disc of Pal Joey play just fine. Fabulous disc, hugely enjoyable film, hugely erotic Kim Novak!

 

[GlennH]

I checked my copy of Nicholas and Alexandra, which was still shrink-wrapped and thus had never been played before. Checked every chapter for a short while and It played fine on my Oppo BD-83 player.

I don't see any IFPI codes stamped on the inner ring. I see what looks to be MWS2 and M1S1 (characters are reversed as read from the bottom of disc). And the date of 01/17/2013.

 

[phillyrobt]

Violent Saturday on a Sony and Panasonic. at the 31:46 mark. TT contacted me back via email and offered these suggestions:
We have gotten no such complaints on that title.
Do me a favor and try the following....
1. Clean the disc with a soft cloth. Instead of using a circular motion, wipe the disc from the inner edge to the outer edge in straight lines going across the disc.If that does not work...
2. Try the disc in another Blu-ray player to see if it shuts off at that mark.
We just want to make certain that the disc is indeed defective before we arrange a return to us.

They did offer me a ticket of return but I haven't followed up (this was in 2016)

 

[Paul Rossen]

Violent Saturday on a Sony and Panasonic. at the 31:46 mark. TT contacted me back via email and offered these suggestions:
We have gotten no such complaints on that title.
Do me a favor and try the following....
1. Clean the disc with a soft cloth. Instead of using a circular motion, wipe the disc from the inner edge to the outer edge in straight lines going across the disc.If that does not work...
2. Try the disc in another Blu-ray player to see if it shuts off at that mark.
We just want to make certain that the disc is indeed defective before we arrange a return to us.

They did offer me a ticket of return but I haven't followed up (this was in 2016)

I received the same e-mail without the offer of return.

 

[rdf8585]

Are these reports giving anyone else pause about buying Twilight Time releases? Let's face it, these reports of faulty discs are concerning especially since Twilight Time releases aren't the cheapest out there. I was thinking about getting The Whole Town's Talking but now I'm not sure. I prefer physical media, but I could get a digital copy of the film for $11.99 and not worry about the disc going bad. I wouldn't be missing out on any extras because there are none.

It would have been nice if they could have gotten a Columbia short or two - like an Andy Clyde or Harry Langdon - as an extra for The Whole Town's Talking. It's not like Sony has any grand plans of their own for those kind of films.

 

[Thomas T]

Okay, I've put in my TT of Violent Saturday in my blu ray player and went through it chapter by chapter until the end and it played fine. So far all of the titles mentioned that I own play fine. Am I just lucky? Clearly it seems an isolated problem with some of the discs. Why are mine fine and others gone bad? Or will mine go "bad" next year? Two years? Never? I wonder if Twilight Time will address this problem.

 

[Malcolm R]

I wonder if Twilight Time will address this problem.

I'm not sure if it's been demonstrated yet there's an actual widespread problem. As you also said:

Clearly it seems an isolated problem with some of the discs.

 

[Arthur Powell]

It is to be expected that at least a small number of discs from any given pressing will ultimately be defective. I eagerly purchased the 1960s Batman blu-ray set the week it was released, and the first episode I tried to watch had a serious playback glitch. The replacement plays without issues. As far as I know, my case is an isolated incident. My experience with Criterion's Young Mr. Lincoln was somewhat similar. A playback error manifested itself in the courtroom sequence. Again, the replacement is fine. Almost every mass-produced DVD or blu-ray release will have a few defective specimens. In contrast to these sporadic failures are the ones marked by patterns of defectiveness as seen with the 2006-09 WB DVDs and many of the Universal DVD-18s. With all due respect and sympathy given to those who have had problems, the Twilight Time issues I don't think have risen yet above sporadic failures. The keyword though is "yet."

 

[Ethan Riley]

Any disc can have a defect, not just stuff from TT. There is no epidemic of faulty TT discs. Maybe you guys should just let this thread drop.

 

[Robert Crawford]

Any disc can have a defect, not just stuff from TT. There is no epidemic of faulty TT discs. Maybe you guys should just let this thread drop.

I don't think there is an epidemic of faulty TT discs either, but I don't see any harm in having this thread active for people to report issues with individual TT discs.

I tested each of the listed Twilight Time Blu-rays below on my Oppo-203. I spot checked each chapter by playing the first 60-90 seconds before going to the next chapter. I didn't clean any of the discs and each and every one of them played without any issues. I even played "Exodus" Blu-ray from 1.52 to 1.58 as well as each chapter's first 60 seconds without any problems.

Violent Saturday
Experiment in Terror
The Blue Max
Picnic
Exodus
Pal Joey
Bell, Book and Candle

 

[JohnMor]

Are these reports giving anyone else pause about buying Twilight Time releases? Let's face it, these reports of faulty discs are concerning especially since Twilight Time releases aren't the cheapest out there. I was thinking about getting The Whole Town's Talking but now I'm not sure. I prefer physical media, but I could get a digital copy of the film for $11.99 and not worry about the disc going bad. I wouldn't be missing out on any extras because there are none.

It would have been nice if they could have gotten a Columbia short or two - like an Andy Clyde or Harry Langdon - as an extra for The Whole Town's Talking. It's not like Sony has any grand plans of their own for those kind of films.

It *is* a bit. With all due respect to the naysayers, I have to wonder when I find 3 TT discs stop playing nearly back to back and 0 from any other label. And I don’t think you can attribute it to statistical manufacturing defect discs, as those usually have issues immediately. They don’t play fine for years and then stop, all seemingly around the layer change. Not to mention the chances of one person ending up with 3 random defective discs from a single label is too high to take for granted.

 

[JohnMor]

I don't think there is an epidemic of faulty TT discs either, but I don't see any harm in having this thread active for people to report issues with individual TT discs.

I tested each of the listed Twilight Time Blu-rays below on my Oppo-203. I spot checked each chapter by playing the first 60-90 seconds before going to the next chapter. I didn't clean any of the discs and each and every one of them played without any issues. I even played "Exodus" Blu-ray from 1.52 to 1.58 as well as each chapter's first 60 seconds without any problems.

Violent Saturday
Experiment in Terror
The Blue Max
Picnic
Exodus
Pal Joey
Bell, Book and Candle

Thanks for checking Robert. I appreciate everybody’s feedback. I’ll contact TT this week about the discs.