I got this off of NetFlix... haven't seen in 30 years.
And maybe there are different DVD versions, but the -look- is awful. It's in widescreen, but it has NONE of the really 'epic' look of Lawrence Of Arabia or Zhivago. Didn't look 'David Lean'. Looked -squished-.
Does anyone know if there are (better) renderings? Perhaps a re-master I should look for?
It's anamorphic 35mm it cannot possibly look like Lean's 70mm epics.
The "squished" look is possibly Cinemascope mumps, look it up.
Interesting. Thanks for that. Although, the Lawrence Of Arabia 2010 version I saw was pretty good. My guess is that they just haven't put the time in.
Another question I have: I don't have blu-ray. I keep wondering if it's worth getting a blu-ray player and HD TV because I'm not sure if the old movies will look any better.
For example, I just watched Easter Parade and it looks AWFUL on DVD. All the beautiful colours run together like wet paint. When they re-make these for blu-ray do they get 'fixed' or is it only better if the studio specifically re-masters?
35mm is 35mm. It always benefits from bluray. Movies have been HD pretty much from the start. By HD I mean that the frame contains more information than SD can do justice of. Still, there are limitations. A 35 mm cine film frame, even in case of anamorphic photography which uses largest possible amount of negative space, is less than half the size of still photography 35mm.
70mm like Lawrence Of Arabia is a different beast, three times the size of anamorphic 35 mm, approaching medium format in still photography terms. Equivalent of 8k or more. HD 1080p is not even full 2k.
So yes, a bluray should always be at least marginally better than a DVD, even if it's a completely botched, denoised to hell transfer. Plus, high bitrate and more advanced codecs should mean less compression related artifacts on a bluray.
Film on DVD can never look like film, on a good bluray it can look like an actual moving photograph, which is what film is, a sequence of photographs, nothing more.
All the beautiful colours run together like wet paint.
Wow. It's been so long since I've read a helpful/informative reply @ IMDB it took me aback. :D
Yes, I think the alignment is the issue. Now that you mention it, the look is like how early colour newsprint used to be... when the layers didn't line up.
It just bugs me that a lot of classic movies really look horrible. I guess one has to take it on a case by case basis, but I'd hate to fork over a ton of dough just to watch the same flaws.. except even more detailed. :D
Thanks.
You can find screenshots online.
Easter Parade that you were talking about before:
http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/dvdcompare10/easter-parade.htm
I don't see any colour alignement problems on the screens. Reviews mention nothing.
However, looks like it's possibly the same transfer and master as the last DVD so if you didn't like that...
edit: fixed the link so it now points to the review.
I had no idea about 'DVDBeaver'.
Obviously, there are a -lot- of people who geek out on this sort of thing about 100xs more than me. :D
Lots to research.
Thanks again!
The Blu-ray of "Bridge" has been has been out for at least a couple of years now and is definitely an upgrade over the older DVD release. The film went through a thorough restoration by Robert Harris and you will notice a big difference. I'm surprised no one has mentioned it on this message board, though it may have been mentioned earlier, I haven't looked. It's the version you'll want. Aside from the fact that it was filmed in 35mm Cinemascope, I think it has David's Lean's stamp all over it. The second half of the film in particular offers some spectacular scenery that rivals anything in "Lawrence" and Zhivago", in my opinion. The later 70mm epics may look more majestic but "Kwai" is really just as impressive a production as Lean's other big movies.
shareThanks. Good info.
shareYes. The Blu-ray is stunning. It says on the cover something about a 4K transfer. I think they struck the transfer directly from the negative. The colors are very deep and rich.
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