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The Right Stuff reviews - man am I stoked! (1 Viewer)

Craig S

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i heard of street date breakers, but 2 months in advance! I dont believe it!
Huh?? Street date is this Tuesday (6/10). Our friends in the UK quite often get their copies of R1 DVDs a week or so in advance.

Edit: Sorry, Tony, I posted this before I saw your followup.
 

Chad R

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The old flipper was 5.1 taken from the 70mm release.
 

Robin_B

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I hate resurrecting old threads but, I bought this DVD a few months ago and I just got around to watching it last night. What a huge disappointment. This has to be one of the worst looking DVD's I own and it's a Warner 2 discer!. I was expecting nothing short of perfection but what I got was a print that looked like someone had been dancing on it. I can excuse the flight footage as I assume they used stock for most of these scenes but the rest, well there's really no excuse.

Nearly all the WB 2 disc SE's I've bought so far have been exemplary. The only one that isn't, apart from this one, is Robin Hood but I just assumed that was because it's a Morgan Creek film. A lot more effort should of been put into this film's presentation.

I hope the new SE's of All The Presidents Men, Network and Dog Day Afternoon are a LOT better than this.
 

Robert Crawford

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Then you might be disappointed since film stock used from that time period usually doesn't make for great looking dvds.





Crawdaddy
 

Richard Matich

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I must agree with Crawdaddy on that point. The reason Martin Scorsesse shot Raging Bull in black and white had to do with the fact that the Eastman Kodak film stock used at that time was showing signs of fading color. I think [I could be wrong] Woody Allen shot Manhatten and Stardust Memories in b&w also becuase of this problem. Kodak fixed the trouble for future stocks but the films of the 70s and early 80s did not hold out very well. Star War had horrible fade problem. It was allmost not repairable. :frowning: Thank god for digital restoration if its done in time.
 

Robin_B

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Then you might be disappointed since film stock used from that time period usually doesn't make for great looking dvds.
I disagree. It's not the film stock that I have a problem with. It's prints that have dust spots and scratches etc and no digital clean up has been done that I have a problem with. I have films from that era that look just great. The French Connection, Marathon Man are two examples. I don't mind a little grain even a little softness at times but dirty and scratched prints are unnecessary especially when it comes to special editions.

Look what they did with the Indiana Jones films as a good example.
 

Robert Crawford

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Well, in your first post, you never mentioned what specific problems you had with "The Right Stuff" so we responded to what we thought you were talking about. As far as digital clean up, I've been to some of those facilities out in LA that do such work and depending on how many man hours and money the studio wants to invest in that process, I think all older films that are coming out on dvd do undergo that process to varying degrees. Now, as consumers we might not like the final outcome of that process because the studio made a financial decision not to go the extra mile in regard to certain titles because they determined that the dvd sales won't justify the costs of making that dvd look pristine to our eyes. That type of situation has always plagued this home video format and has cause some consumer complaints to be noted here.





Crawdaddy
 

Gordon McMurphy

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Richard Matich, wrote:
Then you might be disappointed since film stock used from that time period usually doesn't make for great looking dvds.
It's just like any film of any vintage: if prime film elements are not available or in good condition, then you'll have your work cut out. Digital tools help, but it takes time, knowledge and patience to do it right.

For The Right Stuff's 2-disc, Warner used the previous transfer, which didn't receive any digital clean-up. Also, being a 192-minute film on a DVD-9, it is going to have trouble with compression artifacts. It isn't their best transfer for a modern film of theirs, but I wouldn't call it one of the worst looking DVD's I own. This isn't Facets Video by a long shot! If done today, I'm sure that Warner would make a much better job of it. Look at how amazing the transfer for Point Blank (1967) is; cleaner and with much better colors than their excellent Laserdisc.

The new transfers for All The Presidents Men, Network and Dog Day Afternoon will look great, I'm sure. Network has already been shown on a HDTV channel and is said to look amazing - way better than the old DVD.
 

Robert Crawford

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Last week, I'd watched "Network" on HDNET Movies and it looked good, so hopefully, I will feel the same way about the upcoming dvd.





Crawdaddy
 

Dave Mack

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Wow. I had "The Right Stuff" in my hands this weekend. Costco, (newbie to Costco here, woah, what a brain bender after awhile...) has it for $12.99 which is VERY reasonable. Put it back for some reason.
Too bad about the transfer...

d
 

jim.vaccaro

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Well, I think the transfer is pretty darn good on a 42 inch widescreen HDTV. It's quite enjoyable. Maybe for the projection types it's not so hot, I don't know. I just think that people here are often too hard on DVD transfers sometimes.
 

Walter Kittel

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Aside from print flaws, I find both editions of The Right Stuff to be very watchable. Not the best transfer, but certainly not the worst either. Stated another way, I have plenty of DVDs that I wish looked as nice as The Right Stuff.

I suppose it depends upon your sensitivity to film speckling. For myself, the film experience is so engrossing, even after many repeat viewings, that I tend to not fixate on the flaws in the presentation. Easily one of my favorite films of the '80s and a film that I would put in my top 100 alltime list.

- Walter.
 

Felix Martinez

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Aside from print flaws, I find both editions of The Right Stuff to be very watchable. Not the best transfer, but certainly not the worst either. Stated another way, I have plenty of DVDs that I wish looked as nice as The Right Stuff.
I agree. While it's been a while since I've seen the 2 disc set, I recall it being very watchable on my 92in FP set up. So for $12.99, I'd definitely recommend it.
 

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