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Thanks Drac.

31 DAYS OF HALLOWEEN

LET'S TALK BLU-RAY'S

THE THING (1982)



I spent like 6 hours going through this blu-ray the other day. There's new special features plus ones from the 90's DVD. It's a bit repetitive but still nice to have. The 2K transfer is fantastic. Although I'm not as picky as Dracula so I can't say it has the full seal of approval. The movie holds up pretty well. It's a bit of a slow burn but the great moments are still great. Now here's the part that stood out to me. Since the special features are a mixture of old and new stuff, you're able to compare the various film qualities. There's the original theatrical trailer in all its 1982 glory. There's TV spots in their... betamax quality? I think that was still the industry standard at the time. In the 90's documentary, you see clips from the DVD. The main difference in all four is the lighting. The trailer and the DVD clips are really dark. There are scenes where you barely see what's going on. The TV spots and the 2K blu-ray are bright. Even in nighttime scenes and low-light interiors you can see every detail. I thought that was very interesting. From what I saw, there's no feature on the 2K restoration, but it's possible the details are included in the commentary tracks.


ARMY OF DARKNESS (1992)



This blu-ray features FOUR versions of the movie: theatrical, director's cut, international and the TV version. I don't have time to watch all four before Halloween and I don't think I need to. I watched the director's cut. The only difference from the theatrical version is that sex scene, which is in the TV version so you've probably seen it already, and the original ending. Also, I think some shots linger a bit longer. The movie felt slower than I remember. Then again, I'm probably just thinking of the TV version. I've seen that one more than the theatrical cut. The special features are pretty standard. I'm assuming the past DVD's and Blu-Ray's didn't have much features cause there isn't too many old stuff here. Most of it is brand new. They even manage to plug Ash vs Evil Dead on Starz. The one thing that stood out is the clips from the theatrical version. The colors seem very... artificial. It's possible they may have tampered with it. I'm gonna have to watch the theatrical version and see what's going on. The director's cut has the natural looking colors you associate with the movie. It also doesn't have that new-looking quality that come with most blu-rays. It has that 90's film quality. It's possible they just cleaned it up and upgraded it to 2K, but didn't do a restoration. To me it's fine. I can live with both. The Indiana Jones blu-ray is a great example. Temple of Doom and Last Crusade look brand new, but Raiders still has that 80's look to it. I don't know the details of why things like that happen. I just go along with it as long as it looks good.

Bluray's, now we're talking!

So The Thing looked good with the 2K?  Should I upgrade maybe?  I'm not really a fan of that cover, but if the picture upgrade is worth it then sure.  Also, kind of neat of the progression of looks of the special features.

As for Army of Darkness, the philosophy behind restorations can be different.  Some like to make the movie look new, and so they try to get rid of the film grain with digital noise reduction.  But its widely believed that this actually removes detail from the picture and it can end up looking really waxy and with unrealistic fleshtones.  My Batman Begins bluray is like this, and the previous release of Spartacus i famous for it.
However, companies have mostly taken the philosophy that movies should look pristine but still look like the time they were made in.  Great examples are the Jaws bluray and North by Northwest.  So if this bluray has a 90's film quality, its likely a success.