Only if you assume that the trivial shot extensions were part of the extended footage that the director intended, and not that he had 20 minutes of completely new scenes on the cutting room floor.

It's 107 minutes, to be precise.

Got my copy of the HK Director's Cut today. The video quality looks the same as on the HK theatrical cut release. The disc encoded time is 1 hr 49 mins.

Hero - Theatrical HK R3 - 00:15:03


Hero - Director's Cut HK R3 - 00:15:37

Thanks for the info, Josh. That actually does seem interesting but I'd rather save up for the Japanese release (for the better subtitles and better transfer than the R1 release).

As for the fights themselves, do they extensions make the fights less intense? That's what I'd heard so I'm curious.

Thanks, dleedlee!

Squirrel God, thanks for the screen caps! My copy is still in transit. This disc is suddenly a lot more promising.

The "better" transfer of the Japanese disc is debatable. Although many people have claimed a preference for it, I find the colors highly inaccurate to the intended visual appearance of the film's photography. They are appealing on a certain superficial level, but they are not correct to what the movie is supposed to look like.

I seem to be in the minority in this opinion, however.

The subtitles on the Japanese release are identical to those on the R3 editions from Hong Kong and Korea. Only the American release has dumbed-down subtitles. The Korean disc is my preferred copy of the movie (similar color transfer to the HK release from Edko but better compression).

Yes, they are generally less intense and more "poetic", "lyrical", and frankly repetitive. The duel in the Golden Forest has a full 90 seconds of extra shots of the two women hopping around between trees. That gets old real fast.

Care to elaborate. I had heard nothing but praise for the Japanese transfer so I'm curious as to your opinion. In what way are the colors inaccurate? Oversaturated or are they the wrong hue?

That's what I had heard which is why (in addition to being told that the new dialogue added nothing of value) I've not been too excited about the extended cut. Just curious.

The hues are all wrong. It looks like some tech at the telecine made an artistic decision that the characters' faces looked "too pale" and fiddled with the colors to make them more flush and "natural". Like I said, this has a certain superficial appeal, but it isn't accurate.

I've been working on a definitive multi-region comparison review for the movie on and off for a while now. Don't know when I'll be finished. This is what I wrote about the Rentrak disc:

Colors are darker overall and more deeply saturated though less eye-poppingly vibrant. Flesh tones that are pale in every other edition have been pushed to a more “flushed” reddish hue. Dramatic differences can be found in the calligraphy school scene, which has been changed from a bright, vivid red to a duller brownish-red, and the Golden Forest duel, which no longer looks golden at all; the leaves of the forest now exhibit a mix of reds and browns as opposed to the explosion of yellows and orange elsewhere. Some reviews have described the Rentrak disc as “by far the best” and the “definitive version” of the movie. Personally, I simply cannot believe that this color transfer is accurate to the intended look of the film. Although in certain respects it may seem more “natural” and pleasing on a superficial level, it takes too many liberties with what are clearly intentional stylistic choices. Maggie Cheung, for instance, is obviously wearing pale makeup in the Golden Forest scene too look almost spectral, but the effect is lost with the red skin tones that Rentrak gives her. Watched on its own, I can see the Rentrak disc being satisfying, but in comparison, especially on a large screen, the differences are too questionable for my taste.

I see. Well you've sold me on Maggie Cheung alone as I think it'd be weird to see a non pale Flying Snow but when you said "the Golden Forest duel, which no longer looks golden at all" you really drove the point home as that is one of the most beautiful looking scenes in the film. So, thus far, you believe the Korean release to have the best transfer? Is this still available and reasonably priced? If not, which would you consider second best?

Posted some rough screencaps comparing the new Edko disc to the Mainland Extended and Japanese DVD of the original cut here. This new Edko DVD will be my choice of viewing from now. Must say I agree re. the points about the Japanese discs transfer. Whilst the actual encoding is still the best of any DVD of Hero to date (I've owned them all at one stage or another), am in agreement that the colour scheme, specifically the red push on skin tones, is dubious to say the least.

As per my comments, I actually personally prefer the extended cut over the theatrical. While I think the improvements are slight, I do feel the additional narrative, particurly in the case of Zhang Ziyi's character, help flesh out the characters for the better. Definitely wouldn't say any of the additions hurt the film in any way, including the more now slightly more indulgent 'action' sequences.

Blimey, that Jap disc looks terrible from your screenshots!

That's the highly praised Japanese transfer? The heck with that! Thanks for saving me my money, omenII? You too, Josh Z.

I think I may just give this new Edko release a shot since it's so cheap anyway and I already have the theatrical release (albeit with dumbed down subtitles).

Not sure what ya'll are seeing, but that Japanese set is not only gorgeous physically (the slipcase is wonderful), but also has correct 3:2 pulldown and a gorgeous transfer.

Anyway, I don't think the 2-disk Japanese release is still available. I heard it went OOP.

The Korean (Starmax) and Hong Kong (Edko) releases have the same transfer, but the Korean has slightly better compression. It's not a huge difference.

I'm not sure if the 2-disc Starmax is still in print (I can't find it at DVDHeaven or KoreanDVDs), but oddly you can still get the 3-Disc Limited Edition here:

http://store.yahoo.com/hanbook/heuledr3dvwi.html

The packaging is the primary incentive to the LE. The documentary on the 3rd disc has no English subtitles.

Those screen-caps are perhaps slightly misleading, in that they make the disc look even darker than it really is, but you can see from the Zhang ZiYi shot how "tinkered with" the flesh tones and leaves in the background look compared to the Edko screen-cap below it.

The 3:2 flagging is not an issue if you have a DVD player with decent motion-adaptive deinterlacing.

It's been replaced with a lower-priced single-disc edition. Most of the supplements on Disc 2 were in Japanese anyway. The only featurette in half-English, half non-subtitled Mandarin is included with subtitles on the R1 Miramax release. Those who are still interested in the Japanese release despite my personal dislike of the colors can still obtain a copy from CDJapan:

http://www.cdjapan.co.jp/detailview.html?KEY=REDV-80

Well, I got mine yesterday and watched it. Yes, the image seems to be similar to the theatrical cut Edko release (except for maybe a few shots here and there that seemed a bit blown out). What amazed me is how this director's cut is not just extra scenes thrown in, but different editing, different shots, and different score as well. Here are a few things I noticed that haven't been mentioned here: (Caution: possible spoilers)

*The opening text scrolls instead of fading in and out a section at a time (and yes, it's only in English)

*Sky is shown paying the musicman at the chess place right after fighting the first gang of Nameless' officers

*When Sky and Nameless first start fighting, a bit more of the fight is established before cutting back to the old musicman packing his things and leaving (I always thought this was a strange cut in the theatrical version because it's the first real duel and as soon as it starts, it cuts away)

*There is a quick scene with Moon fighting off some of the arrows from the Qin army

*The Golden Forest scene actually has the Kodo drums removed from the score until the very end after Moon gets stabbed and throws Flying Snow's sword back at her (and even then, it is very subdued, soft drumming)

*The scene added where Moon takes out her swords while talking to Nameless deals with her trying to commit suicide, not trying to attack Nameless. Nameless draws his sword to throw off her attempt and save her life.

*The shot that everyone has seen with Flying Snow and Broken Sword standing in front of the waterfall is indeed different (camera shot is further back and they seem further apart), but you can also now hear the waterfall nice and loud through the surround channels

*The closing text has been shortened. The mentioning of Nameless' legacy and what became of Sky has been removed.

*The song during the end credits that had the female vocals has been replaced with score from the film.


That's what I can recollect from last night. There might be more, but I was steadily getting drunker as the movie went on.

Cheers for the breakdown re. the differences, dullboy. I probably wouldn't have spotted so many if I weren't comparing both side to side. Mind, it has been awhile since I've sat through the theatrical cut. I do personally prefer this extended cut, though I also still think that whether it's the actual 'directors cut' is open to debate until ZY confirms either way. Re. the DVD - agree that some shots/scenes do seem a little boosted on the contrast and colour scale in comparison to the old Edko disc. Nothing major though, and certainly no obvious alterations of overall colour schemes as per the Japanese DVD.
Josh is right. The caps are only rough, so would only use them for a general guide to the differences in colour and contrast schemes across the 3 versions. Overall, I'd take this new Edko disc over any previous release given a single choice. Noticed no problems with compression or ghosting (which was supposedly present on the original Edko release, though I never noticed it at the time) on a FP display and, as mentioned by Josh, the interlaced aspect is easily sorted with DCDi. So, from a techical point of view, it's as proficient as the Japanese disc, but with more accurate colours when using the right gear. Plus, you get a proper, full bitrate DTS-ES discrete soundmix. The R2J is only 5.1.

A comparison with the Face release has been added with screen shots at dvdanswers:
http://www.dvdanswers.com/index.php?...7687&n=1&burl=

On this point, it should be noted that there were many different variations of the opening and closing credits for different countries. This is reflected in many of the DVDs. Some have only Chinese text, some have a mix of Chinese and English, some have country-appropriate text (such as the Rentrak disc which has Japanese text), some are scrolling, some are presented one screen after the next. So that change isn't something specific to this new DVD.

The most radically altered credits are on the R1 Miramax, which play only in English over the image of a map of ancient China. And of course, Miramax's subtitle translation is way different than anyone else's as well.

I just received the new Edko disc today but unfortunately won't have a chance to play it on the big screen for a few days. I spot-checked a few scenes on my small monitor and the colors look pretty good.

Perhaps to convey to the Chinese audience a small taste of the frustration that non-Chinese speaking viewers have had to endure for the past few years?