Right then, the audio. Now I don't usually do this for my write-ups as I very rarely fire up the ol' AVR (Denon X2200) to even bother listening in surround sound, I just don't enjoy it like I once did and my damaged hearing is testament to that. If anything I don't want to damage it further (just visiting the cinema two days in succession for First Man and then A Star is Born left my ears ringing for days afterwards) so I try to space out my uses of the AVR. But in this case, with STM's 4K disc reportedly having a 5.1 track newly derived from the 70mm mix, only surround sound would do.
The four main sources for comparison are the 5.1 remix as heard on both the SE and theatrical Blu-rays, the 2.0 original 35mm Dolby Stereo on the theatrical Blu-ray, and the 5.1 70mm and 7.1 Atmos 'core' on the 4K disc. For a bit of orientation I flicked back and forth in the 2.0 mix and it wasn't actually as bad as I remember it to be, it's quite low in fidelity but upmixes quite well with Dolby Surround. But when playing the 70mm DD 5.1 mix on the 4K, oh mai.
The thing that hits you about the 70mm mix is the directional dialogue panning across the front speakers, there's so much of it that it's almost a rarity when dialogue actually comes from the centre channel! A favourite moment is when Lex is in his 'library' and Otis pushes the ladder away, when Lex starts yelling "N, as in 'nincompoop!'" it comes from the front right channel and when the ladder slowly tracks back from right to left across screen Lex's dialogue tracks with it, ending up firmly ensconsed in the front left channel as he sits and talks about meteorites, it's a terrifically old-school effect. What's interesting is that the 2.0 theatrical mix retains some of this steerage, it's nowhere near as precise as the 70mm but there's definitely a sense of it there, whereas the SE remix and the 7.1 Atmos core lock the dialogue firmly into the centre throughout the entire scene, as they do throughout the majority of the movie.
Yes, the remixes add a very modern sense of constant ambience and a tightly-knit soundfield that both of these theatrical variants lack, and I've said recently that I didn't find the remix to be all the way sacrilegious, but now that I've heard the 70mm the remixes also seem more constrained at the same time without the directional dialogue. And while the 35mm 2.0 mix lacks for bass the 70mm 5.1 mix has some very nice moments of LFE, like when the dome opens up in the trial scene; there's something of a rumble with the 2.0 but the 70mm 5.1 really adds some heft to it. There are true split-surround effects in the 70mm also, like the shot of the two cars escaping from police at the docks that zoom past camera, one flies off into rear left and the other into rear right. As I said, nothing like the wrap-around ambience of the modern remixes but good moments nonetheless.
Would lossless have greatly benefitted the 70mm 5.1 mix? I'd like to think so but I can't recall a moment where it sounded overly harsh or reedy, and the music sounds better here in 640 kb/s DD 5.1 from 70mm than it does in lossless DTS-HD MA 2.0 for the 35mm mix. And lossless certainly wouldn't make it sound more cohesive in terms of the surround field, as it is what it is. But if you love that old-school directional dialogue then you're gonna be in heaven with this 70mm mix regardless.
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