Natural City - 06/26/2015

[alexavril]

Distributor: DVD Top

[wesslan]

Is that distributor any good with their movies? Have it on dvd.

[ericf]

Don't know anything about the distributor but there's the German bluray:
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Natur...Blu-ray/33546/
It's a bad upconvert of an inferior source.

I don't think this is one that has been copied if that is what has happened.
I find it hard to believe that this distributor, which has released mostly American and European movies before, would copy someone else's disc.
http://www.kimchidvd.com/en/good/goo...r&word=DVD+TOP
I will wait for someone to buy either Failan or Natural City so I can find out if this is indeed a proper HD transfer.
ericf

[Phesstve]

Is this movie worth checking out and even keep in the collection ?

[PGW]

I bought the DVD years ago and found it tough to watch even once. Just a pretentious mess, plot-wise.

[toddly6666]

Originally Posted by Phesstve

Is this movie worth checking out and even keep in the collection ?

It's a good live action adaptation of your typical sci-fi anime, has good score, worth a look for influence of Blade Runner, and has a bunch of cool visuals. Was tough to get through though as I remember. It is part of the group of Korean films that got me into Korean films (Shiri, Volcano High, Resurrection of a Match Girl, Nowhere to Hide).

[Naiera]

It's not really influenced by Blade Runner, it's more based on the same book as Blade Runner.

[Tempus]

There are much better things to spend your money on than this film. Just a totally limp story. Sure, some visuals are cool, but why not find a film with both visuals and story?

[grazina31]

Just received this and can confirm it plays on my sony bdp-6500 uk model.
Always liked the movie and think the picture is very good. The dts-hd sound is amazing. Overall, I'm very happy I decide to import this from korea. No idea how it compares to the german disc, but this one has english subtitles.

[wesslan]

Originally Posted by grazina31

Just received this and can confirm it plays on my sony bdp-6500 uk model.
Always liked the movie and think the picture is very good. The dts-hd sound is amazing. Overall, I'm very happy I decide to import this from korea. No idea how it compares to the german disc, but this one has english subtitles.

Can you get video bitrate? I have no doubt this looks better than the german disc and korean discs usually have very high quality.

[Sky_Captain]

What are the subs like? The DVD I used to own, they were gibberish in places.

[ericf]

Here's some info about different releases of the movie.
I've compared the Korean, US, French and Korean Bluray releases in these images.

From a post I made on a different forum:
Here's a demonstration of the Natural City Korean Blu Ray compared to DVD releases.
I think it's clear that it is in HD but that it's been so severely scrubbed from grain that the French R2 release is the best option.

The whole movie was processed to get a specific look. The crush you see is more apparent in the French DVD because they chose not to brighten the transfer up. The Bluray transfer was obviously brightened but doesn't bring in much more detail in the dark areas.

I have no idea why the French company chose to crop the film for its release, but it contains much more detail than the other DVDs and that's why I prefer it.
When a film contains a lot of grain, that grain has to be presented on screen in order to let you see the details. The Korean DVD is sharper than the US DVD but it's poor in comparison to the French one.
I think that the French DVD came from a new film transfer compared to the Korean DVD because the colors were so different. It may be that the transfer was in 2:35:1 but the release was cropped to 1:85:1. No idea why.

Do note that the German Bluray is a straight upscale and it's horrible.

Note that the images are png and might have to be saved to be viewed.

ericf

[wesslan]

Damn what a shame