Didn't notice any excessive darkness whatsoever when watching the actual disc. Looked great to me. You know how those AVS folks are, there will always be someone inventing something to complain about no matter how good a transfer is.

But just looking at those shots, I certainly don't think it's out of line to say it doesn't look as good as the comparable version(s). Are you saying it looked more like the HDTV caps when you watched it and those blu-ray shots are not accurate? That was my initial question.

What I'm saying is screenshots are worthless in lieu of actually watching the disc and the disc looks great, certainly much better than the film has ever looked on DVD.

The people on AVS who are saying this is as bad as Gladiator and needs to be recalled - without having even watched the disc - are, to put it bluntly, stupid as fucking hell.

Nevermind, we'll just see what the consensus is this wk when others get a chance to view it.

It dropped to $14.99.

I may bite on this.

I'll wait...love the film but iffy on the features. how long is that making of?

42 minutes, and there's a director's commentary as well. Seems a little silly to gripe about the bonus features when I'm pretty sure this is the first time the film has been released with any.

exactly. This isn't the type of film that will be released w/ an uber 2-disc set anytime soon, if ever.

I'm biting on this great deal from Amazon. thanks for the heads up!

Movie: 5
PQ: 3
AQ: 3
Extras: 2
Overall: 4

The blu-ray is a slight upgrade from the DVD.

Night scenes look like DVD quality. Bright day scenes look like solid blu-ray quality, but a bit flat. They should have put a bit more work into this blu-ray because half the movie is filled with dark and dimly lit scenes.
And the audio has the same issues as the DVD - the sound effects are mixed too loud, meaning, the only way to watch this movie is loud. There is no way to watch this blu-ray at low volume, because to avoid loud cannon or gun fire, the volume of the dialogue is going to be too low to understand what the characters are saying.

But at least Madeline Stowe looks hot in every scene she's in!

And the extras are director commentary, trailers and an interesting making-of feature.

I love this film. It's too bad it didn't get a better video and audio transfer, but it's still an upgrade from the lousy DTS DVD version.

UGH!!! I couldn't agree more. I am SO disappointed in the PQ. I'm not even sure I could give it a 3/5. More like a 2.5. It's just too damn dark. And not very clear even during the daytime scenes. WTF!? Folks, stick with your SD. It's not worth the upgrade. Thanks Amazon for dropping the price to $14.99 the day after you ship it to me. And I had it on pre-order since the title was announced.

Not that it's any excuse for a dark transfer, but it does remind me of when I saw it in the theater. I distinctly remember the opening scenes during the elk hunt, then later when Hawkeye does those sniper shots so the messenger can run through. Those were very rough and very muddled and dark looking.

The studios really aren't even hot on catalogs right now because of poor sales. Don't bother waiting for a feature packed edition because you probably won't see one.

I'm not iffy cuz of it's lack of features...I'm just iffy on the features cuz I don't know the quality of that Doc. I enjoy Mann talking..so that's fine. Don't care about the trailer. I'm still bobbing my head now that toddly6666 talks about the PQ. $14.99? eh....I dunno, man.

This is probably in the top 3 of my favorite all-time movies. Might even be #1, but that's hard to do, pick a #1 out of the millions of movies, it keeps changing from time to time.. But with the iffy descriptions of the bluray I may just have to wait a bit longer to buy this. I'll have to wait for a drop down to the $9.99 range, even if it takes a few years. But damn, I've been waiting for this ever since i heard about the release, what a let down.
But yes, Stowe is beautiful in this movie, she just about takes my breath away as Cora.

Really, is $5 worth yrs, especially for a fav movie? Lol, I do the same thing sometimes... but than I tell myself if I just eat out one less time that wk I can buy the movie now!

Really? You can gauge that after the disc has been out for less than 24 hours? All the opinions I've seen so far have been pretty evenly mixed. You may not be trying to be a jerk, but you're definitely trying to jump the gun.

Well that's interesting. The Clannad song is back in - but this time it's in Irish. Theatrical release (and laserdisc) has the song I Will Find You in English on the few lyrics that are sung. The BD has it all in Irish this time.

I removed my post before I saw your response. I was mainly irritated with the dismissive attitude earlier, I just concluded there wouldn't be any kind of reasonable discussion from that so I opted out. In all likelyhood this is the definitive release we'll have for many yrs to come, so I'll definitely pick it up. The pic issues has lessened my enthusiasm though. If it is a deliberate director decision than so be it, hopefully we'll hear something at some point in the future.

Solid Snake and Joe,
If you love the movie, definitely buy it! Once again, concerning the video: I would give day scenes a 4/5 and I would night scenes 2/5....

This blu-ray will probably be sold cheap Used at Amazon as well pretty soon..

I hope that I will have it buy then, and i probably will. I was just disappointed that some reviews have said it's only slightly better than the standard dvd that I already have. If it was excellent or awesome, etc. I would buy it this week. I'm also waiting for the DVDTALK review of this to judge when i actually buy this one.

actaully my initial impression of the disc by watching select scenes, is that yes, the new transfer is definately darker, on the flip side though the gore that was missing from the prior director's cut is well... restored - hooray!

Just watched. Great movie, the picture is great! If not good at dark scenes, maybe the TV and blu ray not good enough. I don't like the case, it was cat inside to same some plastic?

Got around to watching this one last night, thought it looked and sounded good.