House Of Flying Daggers
08-21-07 | 03:08 PM
#1
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House Of Flying Daggers
I remember when this came out that the reviews weren't too good for the quality of the transfer. I think I also remember some saying that it could possibly be problems with the Samsung BD player as it was the only one available at that time. Has anyone watched this with a player other than that 1st Sammy? Do these "bad" reviews still hold for the other BD players as well?
dvd talk review 1
dvd talk review 2
dvd talk review 1
...The worst offense that this transfer commits is the lack of sharpness. Many areas, though by no means all, are very soft. So soft that the image looks like it's slightly blurred. Where Mei is pulling Jin across the landscape near the end is a good example. Mei's green cloak is indistinct and the lines are blurry. Other scenes however look fantastic, with razor sharp lines and images that just pop off the screen. It is a shame that the entire movie couldn't have looked that way...
...Here's the problem: although this disc is an improvement over the comparable (mediocre) DVD, it's quite awful by High Definition standards. It looks essentially like the DVD should have looked, not like an HD disc should look. The picture is distractingly soft....
08-21-07 | 03:25 PM
#2
DVD Talk Hero
The movie was shot like a throwback to old school chinese cinema. Not unlike David Lynch's Inland Empire, it's only going to look so good, even when encoded at extremely high resolutions, the source material wasn't exactly pristine by todays standards.
So no, it is not the BD Players fault.
So no, it is not the BD Players fault.
08-21-07 | 10:23 PM
#3
DVD Talk Legend
The disc looks just as crappy on other Blu-ray players, but RichC2 is incorrect when he blames the movie itself. It actually had quite beautiful photography, that isn't captured very well at all on the Blu-ray.
08-23-07 | 10:03 PM
#4
DVD Talk Hero
I don't know how much truth there is to this, but from what I've heard, Sony doesn't think they can do much better based on the source materials they have, so this title isn't planned on being redone (ala THE FIFTH ELEMENT). I hope this is wrong, and that a better disc can be produced some day.
08-24-07 | 03:04 PM
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From: NYC
The Sony Pictures insider on the other forum said they would not do a "Fifth Element" type remaster because that was the best they could get from the film elements they had. I find that a little hard to believe since I have seen a Japanese dvd that looked better than the BD. I will say that the uncompressed PCM sounds amazing though and it's the best I've ever heard the movie.
