Shanghai Blues 4K UHD (1984) - Spectrum Films

[nicwood]

Spectrum Films just announced a 4K release of Tsui Hark’s film for November: https://x.com/spectrumasie/status/17...969035755?s=46

The above post refers to the 4K restoration premiering at Cannes this year and they replied below that a 4K is coming together with a book. I assume all French-friendly only. Their Millennium Mambo UHD was very good though!

[Sleazeaddict]

Nice, bring on Green Snake now

[nicwood]

The first 4K screenshots of the restoration (on the app, you need to manually select load in 4K for each picture) and info about a new dub that’s been made:

https://x.com/kingsigy/status/1783669346620842317?s=46

[nicwood]

Bad news from Cannes. Ritrovata is confirmed to have done the restoration of the film and it already shows on the image shared on the Cannes website:

https://www.festival-cannes.com/en/2...tic-interlude/

[r32]

https://www.facebook.com/spectrumfil...M2sTgwk6bYY7vl

[French Manu]

[nicwood]

I’ve ordered a copy and am looking forward to it! Very expensive but this is a small label that did great work on Millennium Mambo, another title no other label released in 4K

[French Manu]

Originally Posted by nicwood

I’ve ordered a copy and am looking forward to it! Very expensive but this is a small label that did great work on Millennium Mambo, another title no other label released in 4K

You have a second movie on bluray "A Light Never goes Out"

[nicwood]

Originally Posted by French Manu

You have a second movie on bluray "A Light Never goes Out"

I know but I wish I hadn’t. I really don’t like sets like this if the bonus film doesn’t have any real connection to the main feature. This one has Sylvia Chang in the lead as well but it’s not advertised as a collection of her works and that’s why I’m not too happy with this. If I had the option between the bonus film or 5€ cheaper I would go with the second one. Nonetheless, I placed my order to support Spectrum and am fine with it if the technical quality of the 4K UHD disc is excellent.

[alexrinse]

Is this cut, as per the version apparently on Mubi?:
https://bsky.app/profile/dylancheung.../3li5kb6qgls2c

[hipsofjw]

Originally Posted by alexrinse

Is this cut, as per the version apparently on Mubi?:
https://bsky.app/profile/dylancheung.../3li5kb6qgls2c

https://www.spectrumfilms.fr/prochai...405250130.html

Release date is now the 27th of February so I guess we'll find out soon.

[apollo828]

Originally Posted by alexrinse

Is this cut, as per the version apparently on Mubi?

Yes, but apparently Spectrum included the cut scene on the regular Blu-ray disc. I don't have my copy yet but I'm told that it is included. The strange thing is that it may not even be in the menu. You may have to manually play the correct M2TS file in order to access it. (EDIT: It is in the Blu's menu, and marked as a deleted scene. It's definitely from a good HD source. Somebody with editing skills could add this back to the rest of the film and add a decent copy of the original dub.)

Also, the audio is wonky. There are two dubs included: A "Cantonese 2024" dub that apparently doesn't even use Cantonese but instead uses Mandarin and Shanghainese, and a "Cantonese 1984" track that is mostly the original Cantonese but still has some tinkering applied. Supposedly, it's not possible to license the original Cantonese dub, or even apply it from a different source (e.g., the LaserDisc). I can only assume that Tsui decided to give the film the George Lucas treatment.

[nicwood]

I’d love to find out myself too but Spectrum are just awful service-wise. I’ve ordered this one with them directly and only found out afterwards that it’s actually available at other retailers as well. They’ve delayed this release and others several times, sadly without notice. The official release date was end of March but they just didn’t ship my copy even though they had stock available and proudly proclaimed on X/Twitter that they’d already shipped all orders and the release is close to selling out. I had to inquire multiple times across multiple channels (email, website contact form and X) after my polite messages were either not answered or contained false promises, such as "we’ll ship it today", "you’ll get your tracking number later today", "it’ll ship Monday etc." They’ve now marked my item as shipped but without a tracking number, so we’ll see.

Based on this most frustrating experience I’m debating whether I’ll actually review / discuss the 4K or not even though niche releases like that should be supported. It baffles me to no end why a label like Spectrum would make it so hard on the comparatively few customers they have and risk putting them off.

[apollo828]

Yeah, I'm not terribly fond of Spectrum, honestly. I think they're trying. I just find their work to be terribly inconsistent. I don't think their Don't Play With Fire Blu was ever even offered on their site. You just had to troll various French retailers in order to find out that it was actually available, and even then, I almost missed out on getting a copy. (To top it all off, they apparently used an improperly converted PAL->NTSC copy of the DC footage, screwing up the runtime and, presumably, the audio pitch.)

[r32]

Spectrum has not ship out my order yet, one of my friend got his disc from a local shop in Hong Kong already.