Tesis (Thesis) to be released May 15 according to DVDGo:

- 2 disc Special Edition
- Film remastered in anamorphic WideScreen 1.85-1
- Audio: Digital Dolby 5.1 Spanish
- Subtitles (feature only) in English, French and Spanish for hearing impaired.
- Director's Commentary.
- deleted Scenes.
- Filmographies.
- Film, storyboard comparisons.
- Photo Gallery
- Original Trailer.
- Making of documentary.
- Mediometraje Himenóptero, short film directed by Alejandro Amenábar.

Note that the extras are all in Spanish and are not subtitled.

The short film is a student film made by Amenábar when he was 19.

This looks like just what I've been waiting for and will make a fine companion to the Spanish DVD of "Abre Los Ojos".

Sounds sweet! A definite must-purchase.

Any chance they might English subtitle the extras? My Spanish is decent enough but not perfect.

I can't say for certain, but as a general rule extras aren't subtitled, so I don't expect them to be.

Thanks for the info, Damfino!

I just ordered this from Alivedvd.com, as it was about $5 less for me there and I've used them before and was happy with their service.

The new Region 1 release from Vanguard will contain the same unimpressive transfer as their original release, with the addition of a featurette, a trailer, and filmorgraphies.

This is why I stayed away from the R1 release. As I recall, the R1 was also cut wasn't it?

Would you mind posting a small review of the disc as time permits
when you get your dvd? Mahalo!

No problem!

Just a bump to say that my copy of "Tesis" arrived today. I probably won't get to watch it until this weekend though.

Mine arrived today as well. All that I can say is, if you speak Spanish, you're going to have a ball, as none of the extras are subtitled. But, the film itself looks and sounds great (far superior to the Vanguard version) and that's why I bought it.

Looking for confirmation, is the disc optimised? From what i've read it isn't

It is anamorphically enhanced. See review (in Spanish) here:

http://www.dvd-reviews.net/dvdtesis.htm

Where's the cheapest place to buy this? thanks!

I got mine at DVDGo.com for around $28 shipped. Didn't do much shopping around though.

Nice review. Worth a look if you can read Spanish.

I have updated my original post. I am taking the reviewer's word for it on the anamorphic issue since I don't have a wide screen TV.
Oddly there is no mention of this on the DVD packaging.

hum, well, it might say 16:9 or enhanced for widescreen. Generally i've found reviews to be accurate on this sort of thing. My problem is that I couldn't figure out the damn site!

I think I finally got the point where I was ready to confirm but it wasn't clear to me if I was getting the international price which subtracts the VAT: And since shipping was a bit high for disc, I was trying to find something else to get as well, and try to get it in under the import limit in Norway. So if you have any recommendations... let me know.

FaustBos,

You can translate it into English with the Translate utility on altavista.com (Alexander Amenabar - I love it).

I recommend any of Julio Medem's films. Note that Los amantes del Círculo Polar DVD is non-anamorphic.

Also, Solas, by Benito Zambrano. In my opinion, better than most of Pedro Almodóvar's films on 'ordinary people'.

Thanks for the tip, I've used that for some other sites. Actually dvdgo has an english language page, its just the interface isn't the best and I kept getting stuck in a loop, but I eventually figured it out.

keep the recommendations coming though! I'm sure i'll place my order soon

Jim

Can anyone confirm where is the cheapest place to buy this 2-dvd set??

...re Tesis... the review lnked above states "Se presenta en formato 1.85:1 compatible 16:9." - unless the reviewer is lying through his teeth this means that YES, the transfer is ANAMORPHIC 1.85:1...

...the "16:9" is, generally, the 'European way' to indicate whether a transfer is anamorphic or not... HOWEVER... when they just say 16:9 and do not mention any other AR, that means that a title is 1.78:1 - in that case it may or may not be anamorphic... if they say "16:9 anamorfico" or something similar we're back to anamorphic 1.78:1...

...ALSO: note that a nasty habit is forming of changing the original 2.35:1 AR of certain movies[*] to a widescreen-TV-friendly 1.78:1 --- anamorphic or not: this is severe cropping, no matter how you look at it...

[*]...e.g. the 'Benelux' (a.k.a. 'Belgian', a.k.a. 'Dutch' ) versions of U-571 and Memento were treated thusly ... although, perhaps to make up for this, they were 'enriched' with a genuine dts soundtrack...

. . . . . .

Hendrik, do you have any other examples of cropped widescreen anamorphic titles?. I've worried that this would happen as well as 16:9 TVs get more common. This is something I've begun to check when I buy films. I don't assume that a widescreen title is OAR, but prefer to do some research before the purchase. I can't think of any titles though, but I have see some.

I was concerned that Grease was cropped because I've seen some incorrect specs which state that its 1.85:1 when in fact it was filmed 2.35:1. happily the specs are incorrect and it is not cropped.

I'm still annoyed that many 1.85:1 titles seem cropped a bit, though I understand this may have to do with the TVs unviewable area.... however I won't believe that until I get my projector. :-)

"...I'm still annoyed that many 1.85:1 titles seem cropped a bit, though I understand this may have to do with the TVs unviewable area.... however I won't believe that until I get my projector."

...yeah, that's known as "overscan" - which exists to a smaller or larger degree on every TV, regardless of whether it's a 'standard' 4:3 model or a 'widescreen' 16:9 one...

...as I understand it, when viewing a DVD on a computer, you do get the actual full image as transferred to the disc (there is no 'overscan' on computer monitors), so that might be a way of checking whether the claimed AR of this or that DVD is actually what the cover says it is...

...in any case, 1.85:1 into 1.78:1 (meaning that on a 16:9 TV you don't actually get to 'see' the - admittedly very narrow - black bands that, strictly speaking, should be there) is not too bad, really (just think: the majority of pre-1953 sound movies viewed on a 4:3 TV also are 'cropped' ->->-> 4:3 = 1.3333333:1, whereas the 'Academy aperture' was actually 1.37:1)...

...but... 2.35:1 into 1.78:1 is bad, bad, bad...! ! !... (IMNSHO, of course!)

...I sometimes see 'cropped-to-1.78:1' movies on TV - thus one may get to see a movie starring your and my favourite villain laus Kinsk or favourite hero lint Eastwoo
in a movie that was filmed in glorious anavisio... to add insult to injury, these are broadcast anamorphically(!) in PAL-Plus...

. . . . . .

ah right, overscan. It all comes back to me now :-) I never thought about checking it on a computer. I never watch DVDs on my pc, but i'll give that a try, especially with some of the films where its more obvious.

Yeah, the 1.37 versus 4:3 has always kinda bothered me but thats the best we have I suppose.

We are upgrading the home entertainment center, in fact we are building a new entertainment room (we are either very committed or at the very least should be ).

I wonder if projectors will also do away with the problem.
Anyway, as always thanks for the input.

Jim

"...the 1.37 versus 4:3 has always kinda bothered me but thats the best we have I suppose..."

"strange but true" ...the reason for that discrepancy is that TV experiments predate sound-on-film by several years... as a result, we have been stuck with the TV AR 1.33:1 (4:3) that is based on the standard film AR of silent movies, which in turn was based on the film AR used by Thomas Alva Edison from the mid 1890s onward!...

. . . . . .

French TV aired Seven and Grease in the past few weeks and they both were cropped to 1.78:1. Disgusting.

The Spanish DVD of Heartbreakers (OAR 2.35:1) was cropped to around 1.78:1. Even more disgusting.