ernestrp

Just received The Beverly Hillbillies Volume 2 released by MPI. While the episodes on disc 1 and 2 seem comparable to the episodes on volume 1. When you get to the episodes on disc 3 and 4 of volume 2, the quality goes way down with lots of white streaks, specks and damage, etc. The package cover of states "newly-restored". Maybe the elements were to badly damaged to restore? Seems kind of funny to me like they decided not to restore the episodes on disc 3 and 4 of volume 2.

ken_572002

There's a rumor that Paramount is planning on releasing this, which is why I've held off on the MPI releases.

ernestrp

From what I understand Paramount has the rest of the seasons but not the first 2 or what was released MPI. I was pretty pleased with the volume 1 from MPI and the exrtas are probably far more than Paramount will or would do.

I sent an email to MPI to ask them about the quality change. Maybe the duplication place received the un-restroed episodes instead of the restored episodes?

rw2516

The "newly restored" may refer to the re-inclusion of the opening credits and theme song which are missing from the public domain releases.

sparks

Let me tell you something about MPI. I bought vol. 1 of the "Cisco Kid" when it first came out. I really had my hopes up, because I have other DVD's with quite a few episodes and they look just terrible. As if the are slightly blurred and needed to be tweaked to become clear.

Well, I play the first episode and it's not any better than the other cheap DVD's. I was so pissed that I had spent that kind of money for crap.

And there, on the back, in the tiniest print I have ever seen on a DVD is printed: Please note: Every possible effort has been made tp produce the highest quality DVD release. Due to the age of the original elements, some audio and video imperfections may be experienced.

What a load, every episode is crap!!! Even though nothing is said about any restoration, at least they could have done something to them...something!

I'd never buy anything for that company again. I'll stick with the crappy PD editions. At least they don't charge an arm and a leg for theirs.

Falc04

Most of the shows from the 1st two seasons have already been released by various PD companies. I'm not sure how, or why, only those particular seasons fell into PD, but I'm positive Paramount's releases would look substantially better than any released up to this point (including MPI's two releases).

I can hold off for the official release of this show as well.

ernestrp

Unfortunately, the quality of the source material varies among the episodes
made available to us, so that's the cause for the difference in the material
presented. Every effort was made to present the material in similar
formats, but the source material for some of the episodes did not make that
presentation possible.

Thank you for your inquiry.
MPI Home Video

Falc04

i.e...they are telling you that they found the best possible episodes available in the PD world.

ernestrp

Yes, I guess so.

Eastmancolor

They didn't go back to the original film elements to make new transfers. They used pre-existing videotape masters and some were better than others. MPI likes to keep their costs as low as possible, so rarely will you see anything of outstanding quality come from that label.