bayork

So, has anyone heard if Universal will ever get it right, and offer the entire "Road to..." series as a complete collection?

RevKarl

I don't think they could even if they wanted to. The Road to Hong Kong was a UA release and is currently available on DVD from MGM. Road to Rio and Road to Bali seem to be PD titles and are both available on DVD from Brentwood and United American.
(By the by, does anyone out there know which versions of those titles has the best transfer?)

bayork

Arrrgh. I didn't realize that. BUMMER.

I guess the only hope is that we'll at least see a custom case to hold all 7, from Design Paul Champagne or the equivilent.

I second TheRev's question...Brentwood or United American versions: which are better?

bayork

FWIW, I bought the Brentwood version of Road to Bali over the weekend. It's nothing spectacular, but also has no glaring problems that I noted the first time watching it.

....and the format of the packaging more closely resembles those used by Universal for the Tribute Collection than the UA one. Not a big point, but if you plan on collecting the entire set, it's one way to make the choice between the alternate versions available.

RevKarl

Glad to hear about the Brentwood Rio To Bali. Since no one in the form answered our questions, I did a little looking around the Internet. According to a dealer on eBay, Brentwood and UAW used the same masters for their Hope DVDs (Not having bought anything from him, I cannot vouch for his honesty, but he was auctioning copies of both collections.) Personally, I have the Brentwood Son Of Paleface and am pretty happy with the picture quality (minimal chaptering and no extras, however.) Checking customer reviews on Amazon, people had the same reaction as I to Son Of Paleface and were very favorable to Brentwood's Road To Rio & The Seven Little Foys, but complained about the washed-out images on The Great Lover and The Lemon Drop Kid (going so far as to say their old VHS copy looked better), bad P&Sing on Paris Holiday, etc... (It should be noted that Amazon groups their customer comments on films together, so it's tricky sometimes to tell which DVD version of the film they are reviewing... under Brentwood's Rio To Bali, someone slams the picture quality, but it turns out they're talking about the Madacy version.)

Unfortunately, I couldn't find any customer reviews for the United American versions, and my only experience with UAW was a bad one. I bought their version of Orson Welles' The Stranger and it is by far the worse DVD transfer I've owned (please note: past tense; I replaced it with the ROAN version); it looked like it had been recorded off cable TV on a rainy day when the reception was off (wavy lines and all.) As such, unless someone I TRUST tells me differently about the UAW's Hope DVDs, I'm staying away from their product (Fool me once...)