National Lampoon's Van Wilder 4K UHD (2002)

[McCrutchy]

I love that most major studio releases, including all Fox discs and all Disney releases so far, up to and including the 152-minute Star Wars: The Last Jedi, are on 66 GB discs, but the 94-minute unrated cut of National Lampoon's Van Wilder is on a 100 GB disc from Lionsgate.

EDIT; I guess the feature file would fit on a 66 GB disc, but still, they used another 20+ GB to encode extras that are probably upscaled from 480i to 1080p.

The majors gotta get hooked up with the Lionsgate UHD Blu-ray authoring deal.

[Geoff D]

Hah! I've said that before too, whatever special rates they're getting it'd be swell if they could pass the coupon on to Fox and Disney. Or perhaps, just perhaps, because Lionsgate actually release UHDs on a fairly consistent basis they're able to amortise the costs more efficiently. Weird how economics work.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Markgway

Ya gotta love a company that puts out Van Wilder before Basic Instinct or Total Recall.

Eh. The bigger the film the more fingers can end up in the pie when a new version gets released, and I think StudioCanal are the ones who actually own both films anyway (Lions merely have the distribution rights in the US) so any remastering effort would have to come from them first.

[Agent Kay]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Eh. The bigger the film the more fingers can end up in the pie when a new version gets released, and I think StudioCanal are the ones who actually own both films anyway (Lions merely have the distribution rights in the US) so any remastering effort would have to come from them first.

And if they mess up the smaller films less people will care.

[Geoff D]

Sure, but I don't think that's their main motive here. They've found a way to release 4K that clearly works for them financially (they're a mini major after all) and they're keeping things ticking over with all this small potatoes stuff that seems to wind everyone up so much, with bigger stuff waiting in the wings as and when the content owners are ready to provide it. They've already spunked their biggest franchise onto UHD already (Hunger Games).

I think they're doing a great job. A perfect job? No. But they're learning as they go (no more transfers from film-outs, ta) and their commitment to UHD cannot be questioned.

[jaaguir]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

They've already spunked their biggest franchise onto UHD already (Hunger Games).

It could be argued that would be the Twilight movies. They were 5 films, so all put together they earned more than the Hunger Games movies (4 movies), I think. And without diminishing the income from one movie to the next, as it happened for the Hunger Games movies after 2. And they surely will release them some day.

[Geoff D]

Fair point but they only got Twilight when they bought Summit in 2012, Hunger Games is still their biggest home-grown phenom and they got it onto UHD in pretty short order. This being the 10th anniversary year of Twilight I'm surprised that nothing's happening on that front.

[jaaguir]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Fair point but they only got Twilight when they bought Summit in 2012, Hunger Games is still their biggest home-grown phenom and they got it onto UHD in pretty short order. This being the 10th anniversary year of Twilight I'm surprised that nothing's happening on that front.

Still plenty of time for Christmas announcements, I guess. Fancy, expensive stuff seems to fit Christmas better than Lionsgate's cheapie catalogue prices though, so maybe they'll release a box-set so it feels a bit "special" and not quite so shabby as their usual catalogue releases (which I love and hope they continue releasing in droves). Not that I'll be buying it anyway, trying to whittle down the collection. Unless I change my mind in a few months, like I always do.

[Pieter V]

https://www.caps-a-holic.com/c.php?d...2=12191&c=4802

[Agent Kay]

Thats an upgrade right there.

https://www.caps-a-holic.com/c.php?a...2&l=1&i=0&go=1

https://www.caps-a-holic.com/c.php?a...4&l=1&i=9&go=1

[Geoff D]

Yeah, it looks decent enough. Anywhere near the level of 35mm goodness that Fox or Sony could bring to the table? Nah. Still enough to smack the old Blu silly? Ohhhhhhh yeah.

[gkolb]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

... Still enough to smack the old Blu silly? Ohhhhhhh yeah.

Write that down!

[andreasy969]

Not interested in the movie, but interested in what Lionsgate is doing, and this honestly looks rather ugly to my eyes: Sharpened and not natural at all (I'm really sick of movies looking like that). Of course it's better than the terrible BD, but I really hope that this is not a sign of what to expect from upcoming Lionsgate titles - Psycho in particular comes to mind here (should it look like that, I'll just stick with my Aussie BD).

[Geoff D]

Hah! Speak of the Twilight 4K, and it shall appear...

[jaaguir]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

Hah! Speak of the Twilight 4K, and it shall appear...

I was wrong though, it seems they want to milk individual releases before they present a box-set.

[TheSweetieMan]

**** you, Lionsgate.

**** you for putting out one hell of a transfer for VAN WILDER, while half assing releases like DREDD and 3:10 TO YUMA.

But if nothing else, this now leaves me feeling incredibly optimistic for EVIL DEAD and HALLOWEEN.

Maybe now they are prioritizing catalog releases as much as their new ones.

[Synchg]

I can see there is more detail in the 4K release, so there's that to look forward to...

i remember catching bits and pieces of this on tv back in high school, but never committed to finishing it. i'm watching for free now on VUDU, and I dont think i'm gonna resume if it doesnt improve in 10mins. I dont understand the appeal, apparently the writers/director did two other movies after Van Wilder then dropped off the map.

If you would have told me back in 2002 that the guy from Van Wilder would helm the role of Green Lantern in a movie 9 years later, I would have told you...

[bbwiscfan]

Originally Posted by TheSweetieMan

**** you, Lionsgate.

**** you for putting out one hell of a transfer for VAN WILDER, while half assing releases like DREDD and 3:10 TO YUMA.

But if nothing else, this now leaves me feeling incredibly optimistic for EVIL DEAD and HALLOWEEN.

Maybe now they are prioritizing catalog releases as much as their new ones.

I bought 3:10 but haven’t seen it yet, it was on sale. Sucks to hear it was a bad transfer....

[boldizariv]

Finally... see it the way it was meant to be seen.

[Geoff D]

Nice little transfer this. To my eyes it has not been sourced from the camera negative, it looks like an interpositive though I have no way of corroborating this (unless Cliff happened to be reading this and decided to throw me a frickin' bone). That's not to say it still doesn't smash the old Blu-ray into a million pieces though, the DNR on that disc smoothes away so much stuff it's unreal. The UHD brings back oodles of fine detail on faces, hair, clothing, backgrounds, you name it, with a constant presence of grain throughout, save for the opticals where the detail hardens up and the skin tones look a bit more yellowy, that's par for the course however.

The transfer itself is very clean, unlike the Blu which has lots of dirt (despite the DNR) and jitters about like mad. Some of the titles might still look a bit jittery on the UHD like the Artisan logo (ah, those were the days) but that's likely baked in as part of the optical itself, the rest is good and stable. Doesn't seem like the Lionsgate random DNR generator for UHD has been at work here, nor is there any sign of sharpening running rampant. So, while this won't be troubling any of the best efforts of the majors in terms of 35mm transfers - the effect is very much like looking at a decent 1080p Blu-ray, which again proves that interpositive material isn't optimal for 4K viewing and I don't believe that this is a film-out - it's still a gigantic step up over the old BD.

The HDR is very natural, gently helping the image along and doing the usual trick of pulling down more highlight detail. It does seem more subdued than the old BD in terms of overall image brightness and colour saturation but that's not a detriment by any means. Black levels seem a touch lighter than the BD but again, it doesn't harm the image.

Overall: not bad. Demo material this ain't, but it's an exceedingly natural-looking presentation of Deadpool Goes to College and that's about all I could've hoped for. Write that down.