Physical & Digital EST: The Future of Home Video Discussion Thread

[octagon]

Originally Posted by Vilya

I don't even own Above The Law...

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by JohnAV

Some people just like to debate.

[Show spoiler]YouTube

Whom might they be?

I bought the Monty Python's Flying Circus: The Complete Series Norwegian Edition box set just three weeks ago. One of my best acquisitions of the year so far!



https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Monty...Blu-ray/78922/

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by octagon

[Show spoiler]

I see one can buy the triple pack for $12.99 on blu:



https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Above...Blu-ray/32800/

How's the sequel Under Sieve 2: Dark Suppository?

[octagon]

Good question, actually. I think I've only seen it once and didn't think much of it.

TBH, one of the reasons Above the Law and Under Siege belong next to each other is they're the only two really good ones. Hard to Kill and Marked for Death are fun enough for what they are but things really started to go off the rails with Out for Justice.

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by octagon

Good question, actually. I think I've only seen it once and didn't think much of it.

TBH, one of the reasons Above the Law and Under Siege belong next to each other is they're the only two really good ones. Hard to Kill and Marked for Death are fun enough for what they are but things really started to go off the rails with Out for Justice.

Just looking at the screenshots for the sequel I can see that the movie is set onboard a thinly disguised Amtrak train; all of the cars are Amtrak Superliners that have been given a red paint job. Just the use of an Amtrak train is enough to make me and to give me flashbacks of my conductor days.

[CV19]

Originally Posted by octagon

TBH, one of the reasons Above the Law and Under Siege belong next to each other is they're the only two really good ones. Hard to Kill and Marked for Death are fun enough for what they are but things really started to go off the rails with Out for Justice.

I'm not a fan of Seagal although I didn't mind his earlier work, but I reckon things went further off the rail from about 2002 onwards when his films started to go straight to video. I recall watching a couple of them, from memory one was Belly Of The Beast (2003) and the other Pistol Whipped (2008), and I'd be lying if I said I liked them.

[CV19]

Originally Posted by Vilya

Just the use of an Amtrak train is enough to make me and to give me flashbacks of my conductor days.

Can I take it then that those weren't the happiest days of your life?

I can understand though - not that I disliked my job, but I wouldn't want to necessarily watch something which reminded me of it. Take for example when I was at school (late 70's/early 80's), we had a TV series on BBC called Grange Hill which was shown around teatime during the week, and was set in a fictional school. Lots of kids in my class watched it but I never bothered as after a day in the classroom, the last thing I wanted to do was to get home and watch more school on TV.

[bhampton]

I also keep my collection alphabetized and whenever I add I move one from every shelf till the end of the line.

Helps that for now the 4K and Blu Ray are separate because I mostly buy 4K titles now and for the moment that's a more manageable sized collection. For me the 3D are mixed in with the regular Blu Rays.

I generally prefer individual cases to box sets but it solves the Above the Law and Under Siege problems that I wasn't haveing. The Fast and Furious and Harry Potter Sets have pretty good design in terms of being able to get to the content easily while saving space and organizing a bit at the same time.

I have been buying Blu Ray more often lately though because I stopped buying online copies and some new releases don't initially come to UHD BD.

Most of my DVDs have been put in storage.... if a reason to watch those comes up I know where to find them.

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by CV19

Can I take it then that those weren't the happiest days of your life?

I can understand though - not that I disliked my job, but I wouldn't want to necessarily watch something which reminded me of it. Take for example when I was at school (late 70's/early 80's), we had a TV series on BBC called Grange Hill which was shown around teatime during the week, and was set in a fictional school. Lots of kids in my class watched it but I never bothered as after a day in the classroom, the last thing I wanted to do was to get home and watch more school on TV.

The following is an entirely off topic reply about some of my trying times as a conductor and it includes a short youtube video of one difficult day in particular. I put it all behind spoilers for those that do not care to read further.

[Show spoiler]If you watch this 2:34 second youtube video you'll get an idea as to why some of my railroad memories are unpleasant. This is a video of my train. I was working as the assistant conductor that day; I was made conductor shortly afterwards as the conductor was injured and relieved of duty. I can be seen at time stamp 1:19-1:22 and again at 2:22-2:23. I am the conductor not wearing a jacket in the short sleeved white shirt seen holding a fire extinguisher.

We were doing 79 mph before engaging the emergency brakes. The impact knocked me down as I was inside the second car behind the locomotive. Thankfully, injuries were all non-life threatening. About 350 people had to be evacuated and transferred to buses.

The train was now without an engine; the impact had disconnected it from the train consist and it was heavily damaged. I and the engineer had to stay with our damaged train and we had to wait for a new locomotive to arrive so that we could bring it back to our base in Los Angeles, minus our heavily damaged locomotive which was in no condition to be moved except into a spur track in order to clear the main line. When you bring back a crippled train with no passengers onboard it is known as a "hospital train." It was late afternoon when this happened; I did not get home until after 2 AM.

Train crashed into a truck Oxnard, California | firefighting - YouTube

Completely unrelated to the above incident, I have had 6 fatalities in my time at Amtrak of which 2 were suicides. 5 of the fatalities were direct train/ pedestrian collisions (we referred to them as "trespassers" in railroad parlance because they were on the tracks where they should not have been). When a train hits a human body at 90 mph (max speed on my routes), suffice it to say it is not pretty and the images NEVER leave you. As conductor, I had to inspect the train for human body parts, check valve handles, connections, and test the brakes. I also had to survey the general area and help find the rest of the human remains until emergency responders arrived. I had to keep onlookers away as well. An incident like this can delay a train for hours with the conductor having to be on scene the whole time and having to deal with very upset passengers.

Not all days were horrible like these were, but such events sear themselves into your memory. I still see them all.

[bhampton]

Amazing.

[Wendell R. Breland]

Originally Posted by Vilya

When I accumulate a bunch of new titles I start at the letter "A" within each format and slowly and steadily shift the entire collection to accommodate my latest additions.

Have been doing the same with CD's, LaserDisc, DVD, D-VHS and Blu-ray. Never had to do near as many as you. Recently added a fair amount more shelf space so have changed my methodology. My shelves are in columns with several shelves in each column so on the bottom right I leave a space for several disc. Now I can add a few titles to that column without effecting the other columns. At some point it will require another major right shift.

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by bhampton

Amazing.

If you are referring to my little war story, it was just a day in a former life.

[Wendell R. Breland]

Originally Posted by Vilya

The following is an entirely off topic reply about some of my trying times as a conductor and it includes a short youtube video of one difficult day in particular.

Sights like you have experienced can be tough to live with. And as you grow older....

One that did not bother me for years but later got tough to handle, Taps. I served in several Army funerals and seeing family and loved ones deal with their loss, especially during the playing of taps can be haunting. If a movie has a scene where taps is played and I know it then I will leave the room during that scene.

[bhampton]

Originally Posted by Vilya

If you are referring to my little war story, it was just a day in a former life.

Yeah... Well a video like that is sooooo scary I"m glad it's spoilered. I actually had my sound off which I"m thankful for if it had sound.

I am glad to know you better as a result of reading it.

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by bhampton

Yeah... Well a video like that is sooooo scary I"m glad it's spoilered. I actually had my sound off which I"m thankful for if it had sound.

I am glad to know you better as a result of reading it.

The video definitely had sound, but the only serious casualty that day was produce.

I have some lasting scars from my career, but I am doing okay.

As to the incident in that video there was some humor to be had in the aftermath:

[Show spoiler]The semi tractor trailer rig that we hit had a full cargo of 55 gallon steel drums filled with frozen strawberries. After the impact, there were frozen strawberries in all directions for hundreds of yards. At first, they were as hard as rocks and no different to walk upon than the usual railroad ballast; ballast is the name for the large gravel found along railroad tracks.

I and the engineer were stuck at this scene for many hours awaiting our new locomotive and all those strawberries thawed into a giant slippery fragrant mess. My engineer that day was a short woman with red hair and on the railroad we all had nicknames. From that day onwards she became known as "Strawberry Shortcake."

[CV19]

Originally Posted by Vilya

The following is an entirely off topic reply about some of my trying times as a conductor and it includes a short youtube video of one difficult day in particular. I put it all behind spoilers for those that do not care to read further.

Thanks Vilya, and I appreciate you taking the time to post your comment. That's one hell of an incident to experience, and I completely understand why you would rather forget about those images you have personally witnessed. I'm glad to read the injuries were non-life threatening, but it's nevertheless still an unpleasant event for anyone to go through.

[JohnAV]

Note HBO Max finally has Gone with Wind back on. From CNN

The new version includes a 4-1/2 minute introduction from Turner Classic Movie's Jacqueline Stewart, professor of cinema and film studies at the University of Chicago.

[Show spoiler]

She calls the film "one of most enduringly popular films of all time," as she points out that when adjusted for inflation it has the largest box office ever. She calls it "a film of undeniable cultural significance."

But she also points out that the film fed racist stereotypes of the time, showing Black slaves and servants as either devoted to their white masters or as incompetent, while denying "the horrors of slavery, as well as its legacies of racial inequality."
In the introduction Stewart says that there were protests about the film going back the announcement of the original production, and that despite assurances from the film's producer that it would be sensitive to concerns of African Americans it presents "the Antebellum South as a world of grace and beauty without acknowledging the brutalities of the system of chattel slavery upon which this world is based."
Stewart, who is African American, points out that the film's Black cast members were barred from its Atlanta premiere because of Georgia's Jim Crow segregation laws at the time. And Hattie McDaniel, who won an Academy Award for playing the servant Mammy, the first Black American to win the award, was not allowed to sit with the other cast members at the Oscars ceremony in Los Angeles.

"Watching 'Gone With the Wind' can be uncomfortable, even painful," says Stewart. "Still, it is important that classic Hollywood films are available to us in their original form for viewing and discussion.”

"It is not only a document of Hollywood's racist practices of the past, but also an enduring work of popular culture that speaks directly to the racial inequalities that persist in media and society today."

HBO Max also included a second feature, an hour-long panel discussion filmed at the Turner Classic Movies film festival in April of 2019, entitled "The complicated legacy of Gone with the Wind."

[Vilya]

Originally Posted by JohnAV

Note HBO Max finally has Gone with Wind back on. From CNN

Could you please answer my question in this thread if you are able and willing?

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.p...postcount=1083

[gotmule]

Originally Posted by Vilya

If you are referring to my little war story, it was just a day in a former life.

Thanks for sharing. I understand why you pulled the parachute when you did. I will think of you anytime I watch the movie Unstoppable from now on.

[alchav21]

Originally Posted by Wendell R. Breland

Sights like you have experienced can be tough to live with. And as you grow older....

One that did not bother me for years but later got tough to handle, Taps. I served in several Army funerals and seeing family and loved ones deal with their loss, especially during the playing of taps can be haunting. If a movie has a scene where taps is played and I know it then I will leave the room during that scene.

I know what you mean Wendell, real life is not like the Movies. I lost a Brother in the Vietnam War, he was a Marine. It was late 1968, I was in Army Flight School, and had to fly back to California for the Military Funeral. 21- Gun Salute and Taps still brings back very sad memories.