The Fog (1980) 4K UHD mini review (1 Viewer)

[Paul_Warren]

Hey Everyone, Just thought I would share a few thoughts after having watched the stunning brand new 4K UHD Studio Canal release here in the UK. UHD is region free but the 2 x BD’s (extras & the movie) are region B locked. You also get the soundtrack CD as well as a nice new poster, some picture postcards & a little booklet with a few decent archive interviews in. The overall package is very well put together the movie also includes a fancy new CG main menu. I did not watch it but understand the BD is also from the new remastered 4K transfer.
Picture quality is fantastic. Looks exactly as you would expect a 1980 low budget horror movie to look like. First 25 mins are very very dark & very grainy exactly as it should be. You will probably need to adjust the HDR on your display. I set mine to Technicolour Expert then it looked perfect before then it looked too bright I could see the compression blocks.
The new 4K image looks very sublime in many places especially the ocean waves...

Continue reading...

 

[Vincent_P]

I have this on order, can't wait! Thanks for your impressions!

Vincent

 

[Tino]

Has this been announced for the US?

 

[Robert Crawford]

Has this been announced for the US?

Not yet that i know of.

 

[Tino]

Not yet that i know of.

That stinks. The Fog is my favorite Carpenter film.

 

[JohnMor]

It’s just now beginning a theatrical rerelease here. I’m sure after that it will hit 4K and blu-ray.

 

[Bryan^H]

This is one of my favorite horror movies. I love the fact that UHD discs are all region free. I'm going to pick this up.

 

[Brian Kidd]

Thanks for the review. I pre-ordered this bad boy the moment I saw it appear on UK Amazon. Can't wait to finally get it. Bring on Escape from NY! November can't get here fast enough!

 

[Vincent_P]

There is some SERIOUS glitching and downright horrific compression during the scene where the Priest and Blake are holding the gold cross. The image "jumps" in and out of normal contrast in the middle of shots several times, and there are other problems as can be seen below (like that red tint to the first several frames of Tom Atkins when he runs over to grab the priest). During that really awful looking shot of Hal Holbrook with all the blocking, the bit-rate dropped to just 8.1 Mbps according to my Sony UHD player:

 

[Robert Crawford]

I've been waiting on the inevitable "but" as there is always at least one coming from somebody, no matter the title release.

 

[Dave H]

How many seconds total do the compression artifacts affect the movie? Those are rather horrible but I can deal with it if it's just for a tiny portion of the movie. There are some screencaps up: https://caps-a-holic.com/c.php?d1=12536&d2=12524&c=4925

I would not expect a US release any time soon given MGM holds the rights and those titles seem to be largely in limbo when it comes to UHD BD.

 

[Paul_Warren]

There is some SERIOUS glitching and downright horrific compression during the scene where the Priest and Blake are holding the gold cross. The image "jumps" in and out of normal contrast in the middle of shots several times, and there are other problems as can be seen below (like that red tint to the first several frames of Tom Atkins when he runs over to grab the priest). During that really awful looking shot of Hal Holbrook with all the blocking, the bit-rate dropped to just 8.1 Mbps according to my Sony UHD player:

Sorry your having issues but it's not the actual disc its either your player or HDTV or HDR settings & or both! The disc is flawless once I set the HDR mode to technicolour it looks great. Before then it showed some minor black compression blocks due to the black level being boosted too high. You need to either adjust your display, UHD player or get a firmware update from the manufacturer.

I did not get the same results as you posted either even with a different HDR mode it still looked good to me from a few inches away!

 

[Bryan^H]

My copy arrives Friday. IF I can tell the difference in 1080 going by this video, I can't wait to see it in true 4K!

 

[Vincent_P]

Sorry your having issues but it's not the actual disc its either your player or HDTV or HDR settings & or both! The disc is flawless once I set the HDR mode to technicolour it looks great. Before then it showed some minor black compression blocks due to the black level being boosted too high. You need to either adjust your display, UHD player or get a firmware update from the manufacturer.

I did not get the same results as you posted either even with a different HDR mode it still looked good to me from a few inches away!

No, actually it's a well documented issue that many people have with Studio Canal's THE FOG UHD, and several other Studio Canal UHDs, as well. I know how to calibrate my OLED, thank you very much! Apparently, the artifacting affects the HDR-10 layer, while the Dolby Vision layer isn't affected. So yeah, I suppose if I bought a new UHD player that supported Dolby Vision I'd be okay, but there's no reason for Studio Canal to be short-changing the HDR-10 layer on these discs like they are (THE DEER HUNTER is another one I have that has some really awful artifacting in HDR-10).

Vincent

 

[Bryan^H]

I watched "The Fog" and "Escape From New York" Saturday.

Overall I'm pretty impressed. The picture quality is great ( especially EFNY) the best I have seen.

The silent menu screen is odd to me. It seems like there should be a loop of original music or something.
Maybe there is and my player is glitching?

 

[SAhmed]

Happy to hear that the presentations are good!
No doubt that these will be released here in the USA eventually but has anybody heard of a timeline? These are OOP and are commanding high prices on places like eBay.

Bring on all of John Carpenter’s work in UHD is what I say

Regards

 

[Bryan^H]

Happy to hear that the presentations are good!
No doubt that these will be released here in the USA eventually but has anybody heard of a timeline? These are OOP and are commanding high prices on places like eBay.

I have the standard editions which are available now from Amazon UK. The chances of these being released in the U.S. I think are pretty slim. Shout Factory charges $30 for new single BD releases now, with higher replication cost for 4K I don't think the sales numbers would justify a release. That is the reason I bought the U.K. UHD titles.

 

[SAhmed]

Bryan - I did not know that standard editions had been released as I was referring to the 3 disc limited editions as you correctly recognized.
Thanks for letting me know although my wallet will hate you for it

Regards

 

[ScottJH]

I have the standard editions which are available now from Amazon UK. The chances of these being released in the U.S. I think are pretty slim. Shout Factory charges $30 for new single BD releases now, with higher replication cost for 4K I don't think the sales numbers would justify a release. That is the reason I bought the U.K. UHD titles.

When it comes to the actual discs do the standard editions omit the special/bonus feature disc or just the soundtrack CD?

 

[dpippel]

I watched "The Fog" and "Escape From New York" Saturday.

Overall I'm pretty impressed. The picture quality is great ( especially EFNY) the best I have seen.

The silent menu screen is odd to me. It seems like there should be a loop of original music or something.
Maybe there is and my player is glitching?
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Thanks a lot for making my wallet scream a little more than usual this month Bryan. I had no idea these had been released in 4K UHD across the pond, and I ended up ordering EFNY *and* They Live.