Fatherland (1994) - Oct 6, 2023

[jonali]

https://bluray-disc.de/blu-ray-filme...vaterland_1994

[Tibor Lugosi]

Great news, thanks jonali! I liked this movie so much that I bought and read the book it's based on. The fact that this is region free makes it a sure buy for me! Can't wait!

[mrkoernchen]

Will be the same HDTV/720p Master from HBO since "Voulez Vous" is one of the infamous fake labels used by "MIG Film GmbH" wich is notorious for their unlicensed releases, especialy Warner Bros. Movies in Germany.

Wouldn't have to much hopes for this release.

[James Luckard]

My BD arrived today.

It's region-free.

I watched the first 30 seconds or so of each chapter. It looks nice. Clearly an old master, and clearly a bit of scrubbing was done, but it looks like an upgrade over the DVD.

I'll do an A/B later to compare the two.

My BD drive is broken, so I can't do caps, unfortunately.

[dodgysteve]

Lossless screenshots from the BD:

[Show spoiler]

[James Luckard]

Excellent! My DVD drive still works, I'll do comparison caps of some of those frames.

[James Luckard]

I did DVD caps of the first 3 images and didn't bother with any more.

I was nervous that, if the BD is based on a 720p master, it might be the DVD master, only scrubbed to look less low-res and losing detail because of the scrubbing.

That's not the case. There's a tiny bit more detail on the BD, and the colors look better.





Warners never got into doing BDs of their catalog HBO Films titles, and this is one of the more obscure ones. They also put pretty much their entire BD/DVD catalog OOP when they launched the short-lived HBO Max streaming channel. I don't see this ever getting physical a release anywhere else. I think this BD is the best we'll ever get.

This is my favorite novel ever, and while the TV movie is an imperfect adaptation, I like elements of it a great deal, especially the performances of Hauer and Richardson (who won a Golden Globe for it). The rest of the cast is also great, and the production design is really impressive for a low-budget TV movie, considering they had to create an entire sci-fi world, much like The Man in the High Castle, but with a fraction of the money.

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by dodgysteve

[

Dodgysteve, can I ask you to do one more cap? Can you cap this frame at 14:57, as Miranda Richardson says "No, I don't think so" while she's handed the envelope?



I'd like to see how the fine detail in the pattern of her coat looks between the two.

Thanks!!!!!

[dodgysteve]

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by dodgysteve

[

Thanks so much!!!!

It looks like they're likely based on the same 720p digital master, as someone else said earlier, the DVD is NTSC.

There's not a huge amount of increased detail on the BD, if any, but the upscaled image looks better thanks to the increased file size and less compression.

I do think they applied some sort of filter to it, but it's very subtle and looks good.

This is the best this sadly-forgotten TV movie will look for the foreseeable future, because there's zero chance that HBO, which has never even released it on DVD and does not stream it in the US at all, will remaster it at 1080p or 4K any time soon.