Blu-Ray Best Of The Best - for discussing releases only

[Lyris]

Oh, my Ratatouille arrived. Flawless

All that water, those pixel-sized flour particles, all the fine detailed fur... and not a compression artefact in sight. I would like to meet this Rick Sayre guy at Pixar... when I saw some of their DVDs I always had the idea that they were encoded in-house instead of being farmed out. It's nice that the BD and I think also the DVD were encoded by someone who worked on the film!

[sj33]

I'm not really into DBZ, but I remember a fuss being made about the atrocious state the new "remastered" DVDs of the TV show were in. Apparently they were cropped to 16:9 and had dust and scratch removal problems everywhere (all the lines disappearing). Are these OK?

Not exactly cropped as such, they went back to the masters they had and made a 'cut' (what's the correct word?) that was 16:9. You likely know most masters have more image around the sides than you see on the DVD version. The end result was gaining more image on the sides, but loosing a bit on the top and bottom. Caused a lot of fuss obviously because of the idea that the show was originally intended to be 4:3. While I agree with this, it's overweighed by my desire to see DBZ in widescreen, and it does work really well. These are films anyway, so they're 16:9 originally.

You're right about the the latter, though in Funimations defense the masters given to them by Toei were dire and too high in contrast. All the more noticable when you compare them to the Japanese 'Dragonboxes' they did. Toei have a habit of treating the western licencees like **** though, as anyone who's into Sailor Moon will tell you.

Regardless, I find it hard to argue with £11.99, you can watch these 2 films without real prior knowledge of the series (you can work it out really), and the pics over at animeondvd look pretty if anything.

[JP]

Lyris, what's teh actual film like though?

For some reason it didn't appeal to me in the way that these type of films usually do so I've not seen it yet.

How does it compare to similar films?

[Geoff D]

Did Stranglehold come with Hard Boiled on Blu-Ray in the end? Anyone have it?

[Lyris]

Lyris, what's teh actual film like though?

Wonderful. The character design isn't the best around (hell, it never is with 3D), but it has plot, pacing, and at times is genuinely funny.

[JP]

I have the US limited edition on PS3 and the film is included as an exra on the disc!

Not watched it yet but gave it a quick spin and it's not exactly top notch but it's fine as an extra.

Will post impressions when I get teh chace to watch it. I did notice there was the option to sub or dub but you have to chose that at the start of the film.

It is only watchable in a PS3 rather than Blu-ray players which I thought was a shame.

[Geoff D]

I didn't realise it was on the same disc - was hoping to buy it & flog the game :/

[ruarai]

Can someone please help in regards to US vs UK planet earth.I've just got a PS3 and a 40 inch 1080p lcd,so which is best to buy for my set up?Thanks

[JP]

Go for the UK edition as you can get it cheaper, quicker and with an extra disc of HD goodies!

One of the US versions has Sigourney Weaver doing the commentary and if Sigourney Weaver happens to light up your Christmas tree then there's one reason to go with that version!

I'm going for the UK version though...

[saif]

Plays in a region A BD player? I have a JPN PS3.

[ruarai]

Go for the UK edition as you can get it cheaper, quicker and with an extra disc of HD goodies!

One of the US versions has Sigourney Weaver doing the commentary and if Sigourney Weaver happens to light up your Christmas tree then there's one reason to go with that version!

I'm going for the UK version though...

Only in alien 3

[Daragon]

I thought planet earth wasn't done in full 1080p tho? Doesn't it only go to 1080i or am I off my head?

[sj33]

I remember reading the US one is 1080i, the UK one is 1080p.

[Number45]

As long as you get the BBC version (Which isn't the one narrated by Sigourney Weaver) you're fine with either US or UK I believe.

Review of the US BBC version, and Ripley version. Including technical data.

[ChrisF]

My Cars arrived yesterday. Can't wait to give it a watch. Anyone checked it out yet? I'm expecting nothing less than perfection