An Affair to Remember (1957) - Feb. 1

[rezpekt]

All About Eve has it's own thread so this deserves it's own thread as well.



An Affair to Remember Blu-ray

An Affair to Remember Blu-ray Review


Review at DVDBeaver. Region free and looks good.

[lottigee]

Excellent, I'm a sucker for a digibook!!

[in2video2]

Been looking forward to An Affair to Remember for a long time now... and it's a Digibook as well!

[RipleyLV426]

At kmart.com it's $18.45 ( .99 shipping). Worth telling amazon for PM for those interested.

[RipleyLV426]

$5 off coupon!!!

Go to "Entertainment" and it's under there

[Jimbo976]

Mine's on the way - can't wait. This and All About Eve will soon be in my collection.

[aherron]

Will be headed to Wallyworld tomorrow and use my $5 off coupon bringing it down to $15. Someone in another thread saw this over there for $20 and I think it's a digibook.

[paul_66]

Originally Posted by aherron

Will be headed to Wallyworld tomorrow and use my $5 off coupon bringing it down to $15. Someone in another thread saw this over there for $20 and I think it's a digibook.

They're both digibooks. Believe it or not, I have seen digibooks at Walmart before, like Midnight Express, Batman and 300. But that was quite a while ago and haven't seen any sense.


Anyway, I look at the DVDBeaver review for An Affair to Remember and I can't help but think the picture looks sort of "stretched" in the screen captures. I also noticed this on The Bridge on the River Kwai's transfer and I found it quite distracting in my viewing.

[rezpekt]

Originally Posted by paul_66

Anyway, I look at the DVDBeaver review for An Affair to Remember and I can't help but think the picture looks sort of "stretched" in the screen captures. I also noticed this on The Bridge on the River Kwai's transfer and I found it quite distracting in my viewing.

Robert Harris explains:

Because CinemaScope films were photographed through lenses, be their prime or adapter, which compressed the image, the resultant image was never as sharp as might be attained from a pure prime lens. As to the "mumps," it was an optical distortion which made anything center screen appear wider, and anything at the far end, narrower. It was unavoidable, especially with short focal length original CinemaScope optics. AAtR is filled with wonderful examples.

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/foru...ber-in-blu-ray

River Kwai was also shot in CinemaScope format.

[paul_66]

Originally Posted by rezpekt

Robert Harris explains:

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/foru...ber-in-blu-ray

River Kwai was also shot in CinemaScope format.

Ah, thank you very much for that. I'm glad there was a reasonable explanation. That made me more willing to go out and buy it. So I did and I went home and watched it, and I really enjoyed it. I now have three Cary Grants on blu-ray.

[shinseiRomeo]

Review is live:

An Affair to Remember Blu-ray Review

[Arkadin]

some of the earlier info about the camera process might explain why I was somewhat underwhelmed also by this bd.
imo it's just a strange film to have filmed in scope anyway, as it features mostly dialogue scenes with the two main characters facing each other in the middle of the screen.
There are very few close-ups which would benefit from the 1080p bump, and so the viewer is left with all these medium range shots that are too far away to look like they are in complete focus.
It is very frustrating for sure, as they are very close to being really clear, but just never quite get there.
I was under the impression that Fox did not create a new master for this bd, but simply used the master prepared for the 50th anniversary dvd, which did not come out that long ago.
are people really sure that this bd is based on a new transfer created after that one?
I don't think it is, but obviously I could be wrong.
there was certainly no effort made to digitally correct the leader blurriness that accompanies each scene change, and I would think they would have been able to correct much of that if they had in fact done full digital restoration for this release.

[42041]

Whatever the age of the master, there's nothing wrong with it. The resolution is very strong. Anamorphic lenses back then just weren't very sharp.

[Arkadin]

that may explain a lot of it.
I was just saying that the nature of the way the movie was filmed with the lack of close-ups certainly doesn't help any.

[Clark Kent]

Originally Posted by Arkadin

there was certainly no effort made to digitally correct the leader blurriness that accompanies each scene change, and I would think they would have been able to correct much of that if they had in fact done full digital restoration for this release.

That problem is an unavoidable side-effect of how films were edited and made at the time. Optical dissolves and scene-to-scene transitions were a couple of generations removed from the negative, creating the problem you mention. It was unavoidable at the time because of the limited technology.

[Arkadin]

but aren't they able to lessen this effect through digital editing since everything is composed and edited from the DI when they do a full restoration on bd?
that's what I was getting at--it doesn't seem like Fox made the effort to lessen this effect which I thought had been done on a number of other blu-rays of older films.

[PRO-630HD]

Originally Posted by 42041

Whatever the age of the master, there's nothing wrong with it. The resolution is very strong. Anamorphic lenses back then just weren't very sharp.

The master must be very new, because it is clearly not the same master as used on the 2008 dvd as per the dvdbeaver screenshots. Robert Harris states a scan was taken form the OCN so not alot to compain about here. I own this and was not dissappointed. Clearly Fox put some effort forth into this bluray release.

[Deciazulado]

Originally Posted by Arkadin

but aren't they able to lessen this effect through digital editing since everything is composed and edited from the DI when they do a full restoration on bd?
that's what I was getting at--it doesn't seem like Fox made the effort to lessen this effect which I thought had been done on a number of other blu-rays of older films.

But the Digital element is scanned from the film and the film on the dissolve and opticals sections is further generations down from the original image than the non dissolve/opticals parts (opticals were made by rephotographing the image into another piece of film, and then splicing the resulting effects into the original film) . The only way to make the dissolves/opticals look exactly the same as the rest of the film would be if they had the trims for those few seconds, of the original exposure, and redid the dissolves now. If they were discarded or are not available, you'll see the shift in image quality when the dupe material passes through the film. The high clarity of BDs let's you see this all the more clearly. (I could always tell when a dissolve was coming when I watched movies a log long time ago because of the sudden shift in color/contrast/sharpness/grain before the dissolve started.)*

* unless they did them with A / B rolls

[rezpekt]

I have not received my copy yet, but based on blu-ray.com screenshots, I think it looks fantastic. In DVDBeaver's comparison it has different framing and colors than all the DVD releases so it could be from a new master.

[Arkadin]

Deciazulado----lots of great info!
thanks!