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Worst Anamorphic Transfer Ever - Dirty Harry(97 pressing) ? (1 Viewer)

Marc Carra

Supporting Actor
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Aug 31, 1997
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767
I watched Dirty Harry last night and was shocked by how bad the transfer was. At times it looked like a VHS tape! There was another more recent transfer which is supposed to be a bit better but this one was terribe. Most of the night scenes had pulsing red blacks and colors were horrible. It also looked like they applied an insane amount of noise reduction to the image which softened it big time. On the other hand, the sound was quite immpressive. Too bad the picture was so lousy.

Marc.
 

Rich Malloy

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Apr 9, 2000
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Fox Lorber's anamorphic transfer of "Yi Yi" is the worst I've ever seen. Fortunately, Starmax has released a R0/NTSC DVD of this film that does it justice (but beware: every other DVD version, and there are several others, suffers from some defect).
 

Patrick McCart

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See the DVD for Westworld. It has a few nice spots, but it's mostly awful. The first two reels are filled with print damage and is extremely grainy. I think MGM simply upscaled a laserdisc transfer to 16x9... not to mention it doesn't enlarge the prologue, which results in a tiny 1.33:1 image.

Dirty Harry isn't the best, but it's not terrible either.
 

Mark Cappelletty

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Jun 6, 1999
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Patrick,

You clearly never saw the LD for Westworld, which was so poorly-transferred that it looked like someone turned up the brightness knob on the telecine machine and fell asleep. I agree that the DVD isn't perfect, but it's MUCH better than the LD, which was one of the worst transfers I've ever seen.
 

Aaron Cohen

Second Unit
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The original anamorphic Unforgiven disc is pretty ugly looking. The 2-Disc Special Edition release is a real eye-opener compared to that rubbish.
 

Ken_McAlinden

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How about the Columbia "Once Upon a Time in China" which seems to be an upconversion of a non-16:9 transfer? I wasn't sure if that one qualified for consideration.

Regards,
 

Doug Schiller

Supporting Actor
Joined
Dec 16, 1998
Messages
766
The Masterworks: Ran is the worst, hands down.
It is just a straight Pal conversion from an interlaced source with all the arifacts coming along for the ride.

Not the worst, but I thought something wasn't correct with the Me Myself and Irene transfer.
It looks like they took the source, downconverted it to 4:3, then turned on the 16x9 enhanced flag.

Doug
 

Adam Tyner

Screenwriter
Joined
Sep 29, 2000
Messages
1,410
Elite's "Drive-In Discs" series.

I haven't watch Dead Alive in a while, Ken, but I don't remember thinking it looked all that bad. You are talking about the Peter Jackson movie, right?
 

Scott Pierson

Stunt Coordinator
Joined
Nov 20, 2001
Messages
99
"Enigma." Couldn't watch it on the front projector. Didn't look too terrible on the 36" tv, but on the screen, it was absolutely hideous. Good movie, though.
 

Steven Sims

Stunt Coordinator
Joined
Jun 17, 1999
Messages
70
What about the director's cut of Manhunter on the special edition that was released a couple of years ago. I heard that one was horrible. I just got the single disc version because I heard horror stories about the other one.
 

Mark Cappelletty

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Jun 6, 1999
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Yeah it's pretty bad, but it's a dub off a 1" master and they were fairly upfront about how crummy the elements were.

I put in "Forbidden Planet" earlier tonight and -- not having watched it in some time -- was stunned how bad it looked. Colors are faded, there's print damage and about zero contrast. I heard rumblings of a restoration-- please let it be true! This is an SE I would be glad to "double dip" in a heartbeat.
 

JonZ

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Dec 28, 1998
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7,799
DVD has come a long way in the past 6 years.

I remember reading Widescreen Review religiously when DVD first came out and both Unforgiven and Dirty Harry were given very high scores for video.

I dont think the Dirty Harry transfer is bad at all,but I dont have a 16x9 TV. I was actually overjoyed with the first release after years and years of P&S muddy VHS and poor sound.

This is a movie I really love, but its old and you may have to wait awhile(like HD DVD) before you see a better transfer.
 

Frank@N

Screenwriter
Joined
Sep 12, 2002
Messages
1,718
My votes for worst 16x9 transfer are...


Rob Roy (video noise to the max)

The Fugitive, Finding Forrester, Being John Mal (no blacks)

Suicide Kings (just nasty)

Scream 3 (jitter to the max)


Need to check out the original Unforgiven to see what everyone's complaining about.
 

Sean Patrick

Supporting Actor
Joined
Apr 22, 1999
Messages
732
my votes -

Barton Fink (and this was JUST released!)
Reservoir Dogs SE (just FLAT looking, no black level)
1st Unforgiven (yuch!)

dvd's i was surprised to see so many digital artifacts on after revisiting them :

Austin Powers 1
Wedding Singer
 

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