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UHD Review The Long Kiss Goodnight: Limited Edition — 4K UHD review (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Preston Jones
- Start date
Great review, my copy is set to be delivered tomorrow. A personal favorite film of mine.
Keith Cobby
Senior HTF Member
I look forward to your thoughts. It's a good film which I enjoyed theatrically but home video releases have been poor. I'm a fan of Renny Harlin and consider Cutthroat Island to be one of the great pirate films. The Bricklayer (2023) is also good and the German 4k disc is excellent.
Vegas 1
Supporting Actor
The release date is April 8th, how do you get it so early Robert?
Great review. However….
From your review.
“The Long Kiss Goodnight, which was previously only available in the U.S. on a fairly bare-bones, 25-year-old Blu-ray.”
The very first Blu Ray was released in June 2006. 19 years ago.
And The Long KISS Goodnight was released on Bluray in 2011. 14 years ago.
From your review.
“The Long Kiss Goodnight, which was previously only available in the U.S. on a fairly bare-bones, 25-year-old Blu-ray.”
The very first Blu Ray was released in June 2006. 19 years ago.
And The Long KISS Goodnight was released on Bluray in 2011. 14 years ago.
Thanks! And thank you for catching that - the release year was lodged in my brain, rather than the Blu-ray release date; I've corrected the review.
I didn’t wait for the domestic release date. I order a lot of stuff from Europe.
I’ll sample it but won’t be able to watch it in its entirety until after the Western Challenge is done.
I have only just started the movie. Not even through the credits, and already it seems to have one of the most improved soundtracks I can remember. The Atmos, at least, which it annoyingly does not default to. We’ll see how I feel about the entire soundtrack.
After watching it, the Atmos soundtrack is just nice. The movie is nearly 30 years old, and I expect it’s as good as the source material allows.
After watching it, the Atmos soundtrack is just nice. The movie is nearly 30 years old, and I expect it’s as good as the source material allows.
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Arrow discs typically default to 2.0 audio. I'm not entirely sure if that's because they have some sort of "Two-Channel Stereo Purist" philosophy or they're just catering to soundbar viewers.
Doesn't it simply default to the track closest from the original mix ?
Maybe. As I'm looking over my collection, I notice that most of the Arrow titles I own are for movies from before 1992 and would have had mono or Dolby Stereo mixes originally, so that may account for it.
I don't have a copy of Long Kiss Goodnight yet and can't verify what it defaults to, but as a production from 1996, this movie had a 5.1 mix theatrically. If they're going for "closest to original," then yes, it should default to 5.1.
As I recall, it defaulted to 5.1 HD
I have often found it puzzling why Arrow would bother to put remixed and remastered Atmos tracks on titles like, say, The Warriors or Conan the Barbarian, only to then have the discs default to the original mono. I suppose it may be that the remixing in those cases was paid for by the original rights owners and not by Arrow themselves.
TravisR
Senior HTF Member
Yeah, I always assumed that Arrow includes a remix only because it's available to them. I love that Arrow and some Shout titles default to the original track because it saves me a step of changing it from some anachronistic 7.1 mix back to mono or stereo.
Out of habit, I always manually set my audio and subtitles preferences, so I don't care what audio option is the default track.
That's the one thing I was unsure of. If so, you're right, and my theory would make the disc default to 5.1. It might however be player-driven on your side.
Same here. This way, I'm sure of what I'll be getting anyway.
The problem is that sometimes those mono or stereo tracks are not remastered or restored, and may sound worse than the remix. I think Arrow prioritizes the original mixes, so they generally sound pretty good. But, for example, I was watching the Shout! Factory 4K of Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey the other night. That movie is from 1991 and played theatrically in Dolby Stereo. (Dolby Digital 5.1 was introduced the following year with Batman Returns.) The disc defaults to a 5.1 remix which sounds pretty harsh and bright, so I switched to the 2.0 track and it was significantly weaker and duller. Of the two, the problematic 5.1 was better.
I don't think it's player-driven. If you go into the menu on the Arrow editions of Conan or The Warriors, the mono tracks are listed first. They're also encoded on the discs as Track #1. Arrow made a conscious decision to make mono the default for both those titles.
I do as well, but some studios (not Arrow, per se, but others) actively discourage this by programming their discs to auto-play the feature without going to a menu first. I hate that.
benbess
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I missed this movie when it came out in 1996 because I was busy with grad school and was a new parent. But thanks to the perceptive and entertaining review by Preston Jones above I gave it a chance, even though at $30+ it was a bit more than what I usually spend on a 4k. Here's part of the review above...
"...Thanks to the superb work of the cast, primarily the game-for-anything Davis and Jackson (whose work here echoes the fantastic sidekick presence he provided in Die Hard with a Vengeance one year prior), the absurdity of the plot is sold as deadly serious, even as jokes and one-liners fly like so much shattered glass and bullets. (Trying to narrow down the funniest Jackson quip is an exercise in futility, but I’m partial to “Yes, I’m a Mormon. That’s why I just smoked a pack of Newports and drank three vodka tonics.”)
The Long Kiss Goodnight also remains a showcase for the visceral pleasures of practical stunt work, as bodies fly through the air, fireballs blossom and hand-to-hand combat lands with punishing force..."
This is so true! Wow, what a movie. Very entertaining, but also really over-the-top. It's become one of my new favorite movies from 1996.
The package for this limited set is extravagant and informative. Thick booklet has four (!) essays by different movie critics, all of whom are fans of the film. Plus on the disc are commentaries, deleted scenes, etc. There's also an entertaining postcard featuring Samuel Jackson.
Samuel Jackson has even said that this was the favorite roles of all the ones he's played. Same for Geena Davis.
PQ is from the original camera negative and was approved by director Renny Harlan, and it looks great.
This thriller has one of my favorite noir tropes—the main character with a missing memory.
Anyway, I rate this movie an A and the PQ is also an A. Has rewatch value from my pov. Highly recommended for action fans.
I will definitely be looking for other 4k movies from Arrow. They really made a special package for this movie that's worth the extra money.
"...Thanks to the superb work of the cast, primarily the game-for-anything Davis and Jackson (whose work here echoes the fantastic sidekick presence he provided in Die Hard with a Vengeance one year prior), the absurdity of the plot is sold as deadly serious, even as jokes and one-liners fly like so much shattered glass and bullets. (Trying to narrow down the funniest Jackson quip is an exercise in futility, but I’m partial to “Yes, I’m a Mormon. That’s why I just smoked a pack of Newports and drank three vodka tonics.”)
The Long Kiss Goodnight also remains a showcase for the visceral pleasures of practical stunt work, as bodies fly through the air, fireballs blossom and hand-to-hand combat lands with punishing force..."
This is so true! Wow, what a movie. Very entertaining, but also really over-the-top. It's become one of my new favorite movies from 1996.
The package for this limited set is extravagant and informative. Thick booklet has four (!) essays by different movie critics, all of whom are fans of the film. Plus on the disc are commentaries, deleted scenes, etc. There's also an entertaining postcard featuring Samuel Jackson.
Samuel Jackson has even said that this was the favorite roles of all the ones he's played. Same for Geena Davis.
PQ is from the original camera negative and was approved by director Renny Harlan, and it looks great.
This thriller has one of my favorite noir tropes—the main character with a missing memory.
Anyway, I rate this movie an A and the PQ is also an A. Has rewatch value from my pov. Highly recommended for action fans.
I will definitely be looking for other 4k movies from Arrow. They really made a special package for this movie that's worth the extra money.
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