Titanic 4K UHD (1997)

[PowellPressburger]

Originally Posted by Count Orlok

One thing I noticed in the Atmos mix is Jack no longer says"This way!" to Rose.

I wonder if the missing line can be heard on the 2.0 mix? Unless it’s a direct downmix of the multi channel.

Whats funny is I recall watching the 3D blu about a year ago and I kept thinking he said that line several times as they were making their way through the crowd. (Unless I’m mistaking it for another line, or maybe the fact names are said a lot.) You mentioning the line Might be why I’m remembering it, I almost wonder if Cameron eliminated it thinking it wasn’t needed.

But when lines are missing it’s kind of jarring when you know films by heart, it’s like hearing a song 100 times and all the sudden a word or line is missing.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by Chad Rouch

Because no matter how many old prints are scanned or screenshots from other formats are produced, no one here knows to any degree of certainty how the film was originally intended to look or what the image on the negatives/interpositives really looks like.

That's the X factor anyone here has to admit. They can make very smart, educated guesses from a wellspring of knowledge, but unless they have direct access to the original source and/or direct knowledge of Cameron's artistic thinking, they don't know what it's supposed to look like. Outside of a couple shots where the VFX was changed, no one can say it is definitively revisionism and not a much better presentation of the original source.

Ehhhhh. If we were discussing colour timing alone then I'd be inclined to agree (moving targets and all that) but there's a massive difference between the inevitable vagaries of photochemical film and the kind of purely digital enhancement that Cameron - and Lucas, and Jackson - applies to his films decades after the fact.

What it looked like in 1997 - even in 2012 - is irrelevant, what it looks like on the OG negative is irrelevant, this is about how Cameron wants it to look now and he will use whatever means necessary to achieve that goal. I mean, we've literally got those gorgeous negative scans from 2012 to compare to the 2023 iteration and one looks entirely filmic, infused with the visibly noisy dye clouds of the 500-speed emulsion of the time, while the other has had the grain eradicated, the detail sharpened up and a layer of gentle but entirely fake grain laid back over the top - which is something that Cameron has done to several of his movies on prior transfers, in case you weren't aware.

Titanic's UHD looks astonishingly sharp but it's now a new product, some kind of film/digital hybrid that does things to the source no one thought possible in 1997. It is unquestionably revisionism but if people just want to say that it's betterer because they like it like that then they should do so, they don't need to rely on the comfort blanket of Schrödinger's Cat-type reasoning to soothe their conscience.

[Law212]

I saw this at walmart yesterday. I was so tempted to get it. I'm tempted to go back today and pick one up.

[matbezlima]

Originally Posted by Riddhi2011

My observations after having gone through the Titanic 4K remaster (2023):

In majority of the closeups, the skin looks rubbery, dry and has a sort of plastic laminated, reflective quality about them. The sharpness in closeups is unnaturally high, to the point that it felt strenuous to my eyes. Most of it looks overly synthetic and excessively processed.

The organic qualities of 35mm film are not apparent anymore. It's like some fan took the master copy and used Topaz to upscale it. The grain looks frozen in many places, like the scene when J.J. Astor talks with Jack during the dinner. All in all, a weird and artificial-looking image that does not feel like professional work to me, especially given how great some 4K restorations have been.

The Blu-ray looks far more pleasing to my eyes in terms of sharpness and detail, even though the colours are overly yellow and green on that one, unlike the original 35mm look that was more balanced and had better colour separation.

Given that Cameron has said "we shouldn't have to do it again," and that a higher resolution release will reveal "the grain more clearly," which he thinks we wouldn't want to see, then it's safe to say [in Cameron's own words] "this is it."

I don't think we will ever get a proper restoration of Titanic, ever again, in our lifetime. Maybe, a 100 years later, if the negative survives and if physical media survives till then. I also think, most people will like this, since it looks cleaner and shinier. The overwhelming positive response among reviewers will encourage Cameron to further damage his past photochemical films.

I feel Titanic deserved a much, much better restoration on home video than what Cameron did to it. If this was in the hands of Criterion, it would have looked glorious.

I wouldn't say a lifetime necessarily. At least for me, I'm 24 years old. I hope that I'm gonna live for many decades after Cameron has died.

Whatever new restoration Titanic gets decades from now though, it will be released in some future format that will definitely not be discs, at least not as we know it. Maybe all films would be stored in personal hard drives for those who want to truly own their movies locally (as compression and storage capabilities get better and better, in future and cheaper services in the style of Kaleidescape), but who knows what technology they will come up with? 4K HDR blu-ray would have been way beyond the wildest dreams of people in the VHS era.

By the way, Criterion wouldn't be able to do a proper restoration, because it would still have to be supervised by Cameron. See the 4K blu-ray that Criterion released of In The Mood For Love, personally supervised by director Wong-Kar Wai, who bathed the whole film in green and said that revisiting it without changes would be pointless. Not in these exact words, but he pretty much declared himself to be revisionist.

[Riddhi2011]

Originally Posted by matbezlima

I wouldn't say a lifetime necessarily. At least for me, I'm 24 years old. I hope that I'm gonna live for many decades after Cameron has died.

Whatever new restoration Titanic gets decades from now though, it will be released in some future format that will definitely not be discs, at least not as we know it. Maybe all films would be stored in hard drives for those who want to watch them that way (as compression and storage capabilities get better and better, in future and cheaper services like Kaleidescape), but who knows what technology they will come up with? 4K HDR blu-ray would have been way beyond the wildest dreams of people in the VHS era.

By the way, Criterion wouldn't be able to do a proper restoration, because it would still have to be supervised by Cameron. See the 4K blu-ray that Criterion released of In The Mood For Love, personally supervised by director Wong-Kar Wai, who bathed the whole film in green and said that revisiting it without changes would be pointless. Not in these exact words, but he pretty much declared himself to be revisionist.

You are right.

[Modren]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

I really can't help but to admire how a lot of people in this forum seem to know better as to how movies should look on home video, even more than directors, even more than people who know film..

Moreover, I think we, as mostly spectators, have been spoiled by amazing 4K restorations/remasters of very old, analogue filmic remasters, that we're expecting that a 26 year old movie from 1997, with lots of digital work on it, should look exactly as analogue as a 40 year old film.

There's no denying here that Cameron did touch up the movie and filter a bit, probably used AI a little, but the work here, is not as AWFUL as T2, no denying there's issues if you stop and pixel peep, but the final result is pretty decent and watchable if you just, you know, sit down and watch the movie instead of trying to nit pick every single frame..

Me? I also love the look of grain, analogue film remasters, but I'm not out here trying to scholar people on how all films should look based on my fetish for it nor expect movies from this era to look like movies from 50 years ago.

My perspective is that I don't understand why anyone would prefer this sort of processed look over a more straightforward scan. I understand there will be limitations in terms of how consistent it might look, and there might be a need to "massage" the image a bit to account for that, but the blanket AI processing on display here seems unnecessary. If Cameron wanted a sharper look, why reuse the same decade-old scan? Titanic is one of the most beloved and profitable films of all time, and Cameron is obscenely rich. Between himself, Paramount, and Disney, surely a brand-new 4K or higher-res restoration could've been performed if the will was there. Combined with the HFR added to the latest theatrical release, it feels less like Cameron trying to present the film in its best possible light, and more like he's using it as a test bed for his new toys.

[matbezlima]

Originally Posted by Mierzwiak

Considering how all the work on 4K remasters of Aliens, The Abyss and True Lies is already finished - it doesn't really matter. And I don't think he even cares about the reviews.

I don't need my UHDs to be badly encoded, thanks, but Titanic from Sony or Arrow would be great (of course without any Jim's involvment)

Criterion has plenty of well-encoded UHDs. They are far more reliable than Studio Canal or Paramount. Criterion is not the best at encoding, but also not the worst. They're OK.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

I really can't help but to admire how a lot of people in this forum seem to know better as to how movies should look on home video, even more than directors, even more than people who know film..

Moreover, I think we, as mostly spectators, have been spoiled by amazing 4K restorations/remasters of very old, analogue filmic remasters, that we're expecting that a 26 year old movie from 1997, with lots of digital work on it, should look exactly as analogue as a 40 year old film.

There's no denying here that Cameron did touch up the movie and filter a bit, probably used AI a little, but the work here, is not as AWFUL as T2, no denying there's issues if you stop and pixel peep, but the final result is pretty decent and watchable if you just, you know, sit down and watch the movie instead of trying to nit pick every single frame..

Me? I also love the look of grain, analogue film remasters, but I'm not out here trying to scholar people on how all films should look based on my fetish for it nor expect movies from this era to look like movies from 50 years ago.

See my above reply. If you like it then you like it, but as with matey above there's no need to play the old "so you know betterer than the filmmakers do you?" card to try and assuage your own conscience by bringing down other people. Besides which, the only person who keeps mentioning this and T2 in the same breath is YOU, I think I already put it to you that you're trying much too hard here and you just need to dial down the outrage a tad. It's okay for people to discuss these things and aside from Riddhi and starmike getting banned for having a quarrel about tangential bullshit I'd say this thread's been remarkably civil considering, say, how poisonous the LOTR thread got.

It's really quite simple: this is in no way a photochemically faithful representation of Titanic. In several respects it could never be anyway, even with the best of intentions, but what it does represent is Cameron's final say on the movie using all the modern technology available to him. Whether we like it or not doesn't even matter, his artistic ideals have been attained and so it is 100% faithful to what the filmmaker wants.

[PonyoBellanote]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

See my above reply. If you like it then you like it, but as with matey above there's no need to play the old "so you know betterer than the filmmakers do you?" card to try and assuage your own conscience by bringing down other people. Besides which, the only person who keeps mentioning this and T2 in the same breath is YOU, I think I already put it to you that you're trying much too hard here and you just need to dial down the outrage a tad. It's okay for people to discuss these things and aside from Riddhi and starmike getting banned for having a quarrel about tangential bullshit I'd say this thread's been remarkably civil considering, say, how poisonous the LOTR thread got.

It's really quite simple: this is in no way a photochemically faithful representation of Titanic. In several respects it could never be anyway, even with the best of intentions, but what it does represent is Cameron's final say on the movie using all the modern technology available to him. Whether we like it or not doesn't even matter, his artistic ideals have been attained and so it is 100% faithful to what the filmmaker wants.

Well, when you put it with such a way, can't say you're wrong.

[Mierzwiak]

Originally Posted by Geoff D

what it does represent is Cameron's final say on the movie using all the modern technology available to him. Whether we like it or not doesn't even matter, his artistic ideals have been attained and so it is 100% faithful to what the filmmaker wants.

The analog era is long over, so even if the original source is 35mm, Jim is not looking at it as on film anymore. I'm not defending him, but I can understand his approach.

The rest is, like I said, a matter of taste.

[PierreFrancois]

I'm confused, why has Blu-ray.com not reviewed this yet?

[BrandonJF]

Originally Posted by Riddhi2011

I just found it odd looking, especially due to the added sharpness. It looks less noticeable on the Blu-ray and sort of blends in.

Blu-ray -

Attachment 297690

That's just going a bit too far for me, I guess. I get wanting this to be less revisionist, but her hand is not exactly the focal point of the scene, it's never looked the way it sounds you're wanting it to look ("wet"), and, to be fair, I doubt anyone's initial viewings of "Titanic" were under the kind of microscope that is being used here.

[matbezlima]

Honestly, while being respectful to artistic intent is extremely important, it really isn't a perfect argument against all cases of revisionism of old works.

Lucas believes that no one should alter the works of an artist besides the artist himself. Preservationists say that not even the artist can.

Point is: non-revisionist restorations aren't really all about artistic intent.

[Satellite of Love]

Originally Posted by PierreFrancois

I'm confused, why has Blu-ray.com not reviewed this yet?

I'm sure the good Doctor is feverishly writing up a report as we speak.

[mar3o]

Originally Posted by PonyoBellanote

I really can't help but to admire how a lot of people in this forum seem to know better as to how movies should look on home video, even more than directors, even more than people who know film..

Moreover, I think we, as mostly spectators, have been spoiled by amazing 4K restorations/remasters of very old, analogue filmic remasters, that we're expecting that a 26 year old movie from 1997, with lots of digital work on it, should look exactly as analogue as a 40 year old film.

There's no denying here that Cameron did touch up the movie and filter a bit, probably used AI a little, but the work here, is not as AWFUL as T2, no denying there's issues if you stop and pixel peep, but the final result is pretty decent and watchable if you just, you know, sit down and watch the movie instead of trying to nit pick every single frame..

Me? I also love the look of grain, analogue film remasters, but I'm not out here trying to scholar people on how all films should look based on my fetish for it nor expect movies from this era to look like movies from 50 years ago.

So "pretty decent and watchable" is what we, the studios, and Cameron himself, should be striving to deliver on UHD? When there are small labels that offer truly stunning presentations of chintzy 70's/80's horror films on UHD, shot on a shoestring budget, you seem to think one of the greatest films of all time should strive for "pretty decent and watchable"? That's some pretty low standards there. DVD was "pretty decent and watchable". We expect better on UHD because we've seen better on UHD. In this case, better as in "more accurate to how it should look", not better as in "looks like it was shot digitally yesterday with all the filtering and processing".

And we all know how films should look because we've seen thousands of them over our lifetiime, because that's our thing in here - watching films is our passion obviously. Yes Cameron's thing is making the films we see, so he should know how films should look too, and that's what's baffling - he's become obsessed with the modern digital look, to the degree that he's betraying his older films because of it.

I'm not saying this is a trainwreck. I have the standard edition now and have shuffled around and watched a number of scenes. It's indeed "pretty decent and watchable". In fact at times it looks stunning. But it looks wrong. It doesn't look like how it should. That would be even more stunning.

[matbezlima]

You and PonyoBellanote are basically having the half-full (PonyoBellanote) vs. half-empty (you) argument.

[Mierzwiak]

DoBlu's review:

https://www.doblu.com/2023/12/06/tit...4k-uhd-review/

[mar3o]

Originally Posted by matbezlima

You and PonyoBellanote are basically having the half-full (PonyoBellanote) vs. half-empty (you) argument.

Not even. He's just being far too defensive and not able to see other's points of view in here.

As I said, I think it looks rather stunning, and I'm eager to see it all the way through. But it doesn't look the way I'd expect it to. It's certainly sharp, I'll say that.

To quote the great Jeff Goldblum in Jurassic Park, Cameron and his "scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should."

I'll also say the "other side" is really stretching too, in terms of pointing out dry hands under extreme close-ups. Some are taking this too far.

[BrandonJF]

Originally Posted by mar3o

I'm not saying this is a trainwreck. I have the standard edition now and have shuffled around and watched a number of scenes. It's indeed "pretty decent and watchable". In fact at times it looks stunning. But it looks wrong. It doesn't look like how it should. That would be even more stunning.

Then maybe it's time to consider this his "Titanic 2023 Special Edition" and bemoan the fact that, like the original "Star Wars" versions, "Titanic 1997" is history.

For what Cameron's goal here was, I do think it turned out pretty impressive. I just do not hold the original 1997 theatrical dear because it does not exist in my memory. Well, I guess it has to exist, but I have no details accessible as to color timing/grain/details and it would take comparison screenshots of "what could have been" to get me to try to be upset (that 35mm 4K comparison does not get my blood boiling). I can't say I wouldn't have prefered what others are wishing they got myself. I don't know. Aside from the VFX (and really, I guess if Cameron was going to go this far to make it look modern, I wouldn't have been upset if he went all the way and touched up the VFX as well since they seem to stand out even more), this DOES look like a release that takes advantage of the format and I would not go back to an earlier version.

I guess the bottom line is I'm not mad. I watched it. It looked pretty. They can quote that on the next reissue.

[Jbabler]

There's how it looked in 1997, how Cameron thinks it should look today, and then how I'd expect it to look today.

I don't know or care how close this is to the first. And I KNOW it isn't close to the third. My personal benchmark for how "older" movies should look in 4k is The Shining.

Titanic is no Shining. And that is disappointing to me - but only mildly so.