Princess Bride SE: Differences among the 2 versions?
 

I ordered the Buttercup edition of PRINCESS BRIDE, and I must say I'm very disappointed with the video quality of the release. I noticed:

1. The movie has been crammed onto a single-layer, single-density DVD with an abominable bitrate. The feature only consumes 3.1 GB of space!! Resulting in a lousy, soft picture, and many compression artifacts. If a higher bitrate was used (and a RSDL DVD) the "High Definition Remaster" would have been noticable. Instead, it seems to be a mess.

2. The 2-Disc special edition isn't really "special" because given number 1 above, they could have crammed the Special features & movie on one RSDL DVD. (The Special features have also been crammed onto a 4.7 GB DVD) Instead it is another example of "making the consumer think he gets more" when he does not.

3. The release was unnecessarly botched because of a bad transfer and bad compression job.

Surely, I can't be the only one to have noticed these annoying problems! Seems someone needs to hire a better DVD Authoring Person(s).

Is the DREAD PIRATE edition different in any way?

no, it isnt. not in any way.

I have yet to read a single review that thinks either of the previous releases have a better video presentation that the latest Buttercup/Dread Pirate editions; however bad you think it is, it's still apparently the best it's ever been.

Thanks for the info, whotony.

Well, I agree this is the "best" it has looked on DVD so far (certainly better than the non-anamorphic 1st version). However, the potential was there to make it look super, if the compression "artists" had done a better job encoding the material in MPEG2 during the DVD authoring process...

Hmm... How does it compare to the previously released SE? I assumed it was the same transfer. I watched that title before I got my big screen TV, so I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary.

As implied above, no, it is not the same transfer and as indicated above, every website I've encountered to date says it's the best transfer of TPB on DVD thus far.

Doesn't anyone read the DVDTalk Reviews?

I'll be honest, I'm not very good at reading the reviews, if there's something massively wrong with a title, I keep informed from reading the forums. I wasn't planning on buying this title anyways (I'll wait for the HD release).

I'm happy with my SE, good movie but it doesn't seem worth it to double dip.