I was trying to remember the reviews here when shopping to make my decisions. Now I'm gonna go back and get some more, well, not now, but tomorrow or Sunday.
In the last week, I've seen 4 of the 5 Harry Potter movies available on Blu-Ray (SS, CoS, PoA, and OoP); I'll be watching the fifth (GoF) sometime this week. I can report that all of them are good disks with decent transfers. Order of the Phoenix has some shots, particularly in the beginning, that are so good, they look almost three-dimensional.
I picked up Terminator 3:Rise of the Machines, RoboCop, and The Simpsons Movie on BRD today. My local Fry's didn't have the new Blade Runner set; I'm still looking for it. 'Simpsons' got a 5-star video review from highdefdigest.com. RoboCop got only 3/5 for video, but as it was $14, I couldn't pass it up. Highdefdigest hasn't reviewed T3, yet. Reviews on all forthcoming over the next few days.
The problem I have with buying The Simpsons Movie on Blu-Ray, besides the fact that it completely sucks, is that with a cartoon I don't see the point of going with High Def over regular DVD. Don't get me wrong, I can tell the difference with Pixar stuff, but not with regular style cartoons like The Simpsons. I know the movie had some shots that would look better in HD but in all honesty I don't think it would justify the cost difference. I know I'm biased because I don't think The Simpsons has been good for nearly a decade now so there is no way I would justify buying it.
I hear what you're saying. Would it make sense, for example, to get a Hi-def copy of the South Park movie? If it doesn't, then the DVD version (which is cheaper) should show more-or-less the same picture. I haven't watched it yet; I'll let you know. I wasn't all that enthusiastic about a Simpsons movie, either. However, I saw most of it on the flight back from India in October and it made me laugh enough that I thought it worthwhile. YMMV. On the other hand, Terminator 3?
The Patriot and X Men 3 were both awesome. I give The Patriot 9/10 and X Men 3 an 8.5/10. I'm watching Mr and Mrs Smith now and it's pretty nice, so far it's a solid 8.
I watched the 'Final Cut' of Blade Runner last night and it's simply gourgeous. Highly, highly recommended. I also did a 10 minute preview of The Simpsons and, I have to say, it looks pretty damned good in HD.
A couple of quick ones: The Simpsons Movie is very worthwhile on Blu-Ray; it looks fantastic. And, yes, there are plenty of scenes where hi-def offers an improvement over regular DVD (the detail in the mob--hundreds of Springfield residents--coming to lynch Homer, for example). Robocop is, on the other hand, a disappointment. The review at highdefdigest.com suggested that would be the case, but since Fry's had the disk for $14, I decided to see for myself. A weak and often very grainy transfer that seems incapable of representing deep blacks is not good HD demo material. Couple that with the complete lack of extras and this one is pretty skippable. May be an okay rental.
Finally watched my Blu-Ray of Apocalypto last night. Great movie, great disk. Short synopsis: peaceful Mayan village raided by warlike Mayans, population--including main character Jaguar Paw--taken away in captivity while Jaguar Paw's wife and young son are trapped at the bottom of a deep pit, creepy little girl offers prophecy about the end of the world as the captives are marched by, population taken to be human sacrifices in Mayan city, Jaguar Paw makes miraculous(?) escape and flees toward home but kills the main badass's son on his way out, main badass and company pursue, the prophecy begins to be fulfilled... I really enjoyed this one, even though it's a very different kind of film than we're used to. The Mayans can be unbelievably savage. The chase sequence--and its very entertaining reversal--is very suspenseful. And always there in the back of your mind: will Jaguar Paw make it home in time to save the wife and kid? Highly recommended. 8/10
I got Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind for Christmas and finally got around to watching it. For such an old movie it cleaned up great. For clean up I give it an 8.25/10, for the entire package, 7.75/10. It was the first time I've ever seen it believe it or not, if you like the movie I think it's worth viewing, but maybe not the $35.00 price tag. Wait for a discount or rent it.
BBC: Planet Earth... It's 64.96 at Walmart here, worth every penny. I bought it because it's 20 cheaper than anywhere else I've seen. It's absolutely amazing. It will be my demo disk. 10/10 on everything. I'm only 2 episodes in on the 4 disk set, so I've got a lot left to see.
I just got this one yesterday as well, and to me, it's clearly the best Blu-Ray you can possibly buy at the moment. A must own. The photography in it is absolutely STUNNING. I can only hope to make possibly one or two of those shots in my lifetime, and here are these guys doing it on a regular basis. I've only done 1 of the 4 discs, but I was impatient, so I skipped ahead to disc 3 or whichever the jungle one was. 10/10 for me too. But I paid $89.99 Canadian for it. I should've checked Wal*Mart first, but it is totally sold out anywhere here. I picked up the second last copy.
I also picked up three other Blu-Rays over the course of the week. Underworld A great little Vampire flick, if you are into those. I am into those, as well as Kate Beckinsale, so this was an easy choice. My cousin says the story certainly wasn't as enjoyable as Interview with the Vampire, or Dracula 2000, but as far as guilty popcorn flicks go, it ain't so bad. The extras were great, and certainly contribute to me giving it a higher rating. There is a 'History of Vampires and Werewolves' that takes you into the historical background of these creatures. I would have bought that as a documentary alone, so having that as an extra was definitely a pleasant surprise. It also has an 'Outtakes' extra that was also pretty funny and enjoyable. Only problem though, is the extras are NOT in Hi-Def. A darn waste, if ya ask me! I am not sure how you guys do your Blu-Ray ratings, but as for me, I'm rating them based on the amount I enjoyed them vs. the price ($25), so I'll give this one a solid 8/10 Underworld Evolutions The sequel to Underworld, this offers more of the same thing, but dives deeper into the backstory of the Vampire/Werewolf bloodfeud. High-Def really holds up well on this one, as it allows you to see the intricate patterns on the medieval dark knight costumes that would just not be possible on standard DVD. The Kate Beckinsale sex scene was also very pretty in Hi-Def. I have not gone through the extras yet, but it seems like the second one has a few more features, but they are of the technical variety, such as going from storyboard to screen, or how they made the monsters. Boring. This one was a bit newer than Underworld 1, and a bit more expensive at $30. So I'll have to give this one a 7/10 Dragon's Liar This is one of those interactive game Blu-Rays. If any of you remember the arcade game from the 80's, well, it is back, and in high definition now. The frames look great, although it seems like in some parts, the film was either ruined or they just did not get it to the same quality as the rest of the scenes. Still, this only happens in one or two scenes, so for the most part, I'm being nitpicky. This game can be infuriatingly frustrating at certain levels, and as a game, is probably one of the worst arcade quarter-eaters of all time. Despite this, I was able to finish it in just under 2 hours or so, without using any cheats. The bonuses were also very good. It had lengthy interviews with the creators, who were now old men, as they sat there and reminisced about how that whole project came about, the infighting among different departments, and their bickering about what got put into the game and what didn't. Kinda surprised that they managed to make a fairly memorable game, despite what a gong-show it must've been to put it all together. If I were to give this a rating, I'd probably say it would vary, depending on if you grew up trying to master this at the arcades. Personally, I enjoyed it immensely, and for only $19.99, it was worth every penny. But if you have never heard of Dragon's Lair, or know what it is, you'll get a few hours of enjoyment out of what some people would call one of the shittiest games of all time. Now that I am older, the game really wasn't that hard. It just takes a lot of memory skills, and patience. For me, this was a 7/10 But your mileage will vary depending on what games you were playing during the golden age of arcades.
Okay - I admit it. I am trying to decide if I even want to upgrade (and I'm not going to go out and buy up all the movies and TV seasons I've already got on DVD) to either BR or HD. But what is the difference (besides one being akin to the old fashion Betamax, and the other being VHS)? Which one is better? (And if this doesn't belong in this thread, just move it to the right thread)
I think Blu-Ray can hold more gigabytes of information. So for some really long movies, with a lot of extras, you might see a HD-DVD need 2 discs, while Blu-Ray will only need 1. As far as I know, both formats do 1080p resolution, so quality is a toss up. I'd go with Blu-Ray now, considering just yesterday, Warner Bros. chose to go exclusive Blu-Ray, making it now a 70/30 split Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD. In terms of if you should upgrade or not, the quality is negligible on CRT TVs . I'd only do it if you have an HDTV and your screen is greater than 32". Otherwise, you are paying a lot for a very small increase.
In terms of what you see on the screen, they're the same. Blu-Ray does have a higher capacity, so it could store longer programs, but this is probably not an issue. HD-DVD is a little cheaper than Blu-Ray. An HD-DVD player costs about $100 less than a comparable Blu-Ray version. HD-DVD disks should be, in theory, cheaper to produce, too, but that doesn't seem to have any bearing on the price. The main difference is support by the studios. Blu-Ray has Disney, 20th Century Fox, MGM/UA, Sony/Columbia, and, now, Warner Brothers exclusively. HD-DVD has Paramount and Universal exclusively (Paramount was paid a large amount to stop putting out Blu-Ray product a few months back). Now that the momentum is entirely on Blu-Ray's side, I expect Universal to start and Paramount to re-start putting out conent in that format. Yesterday, if you'd expressed an interest in HD, I would've said go with Blu-Ray because it leads in sales and has more exclusive studio support. Today, I say: don't even think about it, go Blu-Ray. [And I agree with Scorp; you need to have an HDTV (duh!) and it should be fairly large in order for you to really appreciate the benefits of HD. The smaller the screen, the less the extra detail will matter.]
Reviews of the following coming soon: 3:10 to Yuma Pan's Labyrinth Sunshine Picked 'em up at Fry's this afternoon.
Can't wait to see stuff like the original Star Wars trilogy and the Lord of The Rings trilogy on hi-def. That'll be unbelievable (assuming Lucas doesn't fuck more shit up). Although the problem is I already own most of my favorite movies on DVD and I don't know if I could really justify replacing most of the collection. Star Wars and LOTR would be the obvious ones and any new movies of course... but I'll probably wait a long while before I actually get a BD Player and a big screen.
There's another version released by the Discovery Channel that has Sigourney Weaver narrating instead. I've heard the picture quality pales in comparison to the BBC version, too.
It's actually a Discovery Channel store exclusive, from what I understand. Linky EDIT - Ooh! It's one of Oprah's favorite things!
