A*P*E 3D Blu-ray (1976) [Region A Locked]

[the13thman]

Originally Posted by Damon1281

I don't think 13th man's post actually designates Kino to be the ones that are greedy. That said, I also think he has mentioned having a region A playstation, which makes his objection curious since he can obviously watch them all.

I just hate it when films are available in one region only, I have players from both regions so obviously I can watch everything, but I think everyone should be able to watch everything. I consider films to be art. Why should anyone be stopped from enjoying art because of where they live?

I don't want to go off on one regarding copyright and licensing arrangements though, I know it gets on people's nerves and this argument has been had before. I know that people have to work within the system, I hate the system, not the people.

Anyway, I'm just super glad that I can finally get to watch all this quality vintage 3D, even if it is only on one of my blu ray players. I've had A*P*E on pre-order since it was listed for pre-order. I couldn't care less about how bad a film it is, as long as the 3D is good, I'll be happy.

[Zivouhr]

It would be great if all films were available in all regions, though it has to do with the territory that is licensing the product for their area of distribution.

The Film's Rights Holder may put in the licensing contract that they only want their film distributed in the licensee's immediate area, so that other territories can be licensed out in different regions by different labels/distributors for more profit for the Rights Holder. It's a business decision but unfortunately it limits how many people can watch it without it being locked. If the Rights Holder made a deal with a global distributor, that would be a different story, maybe with All regions available on the same disc. At least that's one point of view.

[Damon1281]

Originally Posted by Paul H

Nothing curious about it. I know exactly where he's coming from just thinking about my own experiences with my non-region A titles. Can't play the discs in my bedroom on the components not adaptable to region change, and i can't loan the discs to my relatives. Region coding sucks! Nothing personal.

I haven't yet pulled the trigger on a region-free player. Ironically, 13th man's list of region B only titles doesn't help in swaying me to get one. But it does occur to me that the 2 players I have are very easily moved, even more-so if I set them in a way that predicts it. TV's not so much. I also don't know anyone in real life that watches 3d movies (just you, my imaginary 3d friends ), so loaning them isn't in the equation. Forgive me that I didn't think of them.

A*P*E seems to be fairly priced for a vintage restore so I'll add it to my stock even though it looks pretty bad. Isn't that the same year that Dino DeLaurentis' King Kong remake came out? Production quality varied wildly in those days it seems.

[Zivouhr]

If the audience doesn't mind low budget entertainment, the guy in the giant Ape suit reveals that the audience should have fun with it, and watch it without taking things too seriously as we might if it was a AAA production. The predicted strong 3D will help most of all.

If it wasn't in 3D, I would wait till it was on TV or wait for a sale. I do like low budget monster movies though as well as Godzilla, so hopefully this will have plenty of great 3D and action. The scene where he confronts the giant reptile looks amusing.

As the movie's trailer states, "See giant ape, defy jaw shark. See giant ape vanquish monster reptile! See Ape, in 3D!"

[Damon1281]

Originally Posted by the13thman

I just hate it when films are available in one region only, I have players from both regions so obviously I can watch everything, but I think everyone should be able to watch everything. I consider films to be art.

Aren't there 3 regions? I never hear about the 3rd one.

[Movieman66]

Originally Posted by Zivouhr

If the audience doesn't mind low budget entertainment, the guy in the giant Ape suit reveals that the audience should have fun with it, and watch it without taking things too seriously as we might if it was a AAA production. The predicted strong 3D will help most of all.

If it wasn't in 3D, I would wait till it was on TV or wait for a sale. I do like low budget monster movies though as well as Godzilla, so hopefully this will have plenty of great 3D and action. The scene where he confronts the giant reptile looks amusing.

As the movie's trailer states, "See giant ape, defy jaw shark. See giant ape vanquish monster reptile! See Ape, in 3D!"

Well, since I saw Jaw Shark 3-D, I have to get A*P*E 3-D!!!!!!

[punkskins]

Originally Posted by Damon1281

Aren't there 3 regions? I never hear about the 3rd one.

Region C Parts of Asia, Russia, China.

I have never come across a region C locked release. Maybe there is some but never seen one

[Zivouhr]

Originally Posted by Movieman66

Well, since I saw Jaw Shark 3-D, I have to get A*P*E 3-D!!!!!!

Yes, I think with the APE trailer, the filmmakers were trying to tap into the Jaws movie hit of the time, and described the shark as "Jaw Shark".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ape_(1976_film)
Ape made in 1976.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaws_(film)
Jaws made in 1975.

[Movieman66]

DVD Drive-In has a review for A*P*E 3D up now: http://www.dvddrive-in.com/reviews/a-d/ape76blu.htm

Be forewarned that they do not review the film on it's 3-D merits because they don't have a 3-D T.V. setup. We should start a "Get dvddrive-in.com a 3-D T.V. setup" KickStarter campaign.

Just saying......

[revgen]

I watched my copy last night and other than a slight hiccup (I'll explain later) I had a blast. This film is not for everybody. If you love watching bad movies on MST3K, then this one is right up your alley. The plot is basically a cheap King Kong knockoff about a giant ape that escapes from a ship and terrorizes Korea. Hilarious one liners, embarrassing editing mistakes, and cheesy special effects are littered throughout. It's not quite as cute as Robot Monster (1953), but still entertaining for those who love these kinds of films.

The 3-D was shot by cinematographer and 3-D legend Dan Symmes using the SpaceVision 3-D rig. The 3-D is strong without hurting my eyes like the 80's 3-D titles like Amityville, Jaws, Comin' At Ya, and Metalstorm do. There are plenty of fun popout moments and plenty of depth to keep a 3-D enthusiast interested.

However, there was a problem with my Oppo BDP-93 player at the 13 minute 15 second mark where the video would begin freezing and stuttering. I had to skip a chapter and rewind back to just after the 13 minute 15 second mark to start the film again. I never had a problem the rest of the way through. I tested the disc on a Samsung 3-D Player, an LG 3-D player, and a Playstation 4 and all of them played that section without any issues, so it appears to be a problem with my player rather than the disc itself.

Big thanks to Bob Furmanek, Greg Kintz, and the 3-D Film Archive for restoring this film.

Bottomline, if you love "so bad it's good" films and you love 3-D, don't hesitate to pick this up.

[Robert Furmanek]

Two big differences between A*P*E and the 1980's titles that you listed.

Dan Symmes knew what he was doing and Space-Vision was a superior lens.

Greg Kintz did the restoration. Had he done the other titles, he would have made them look MUCH better than the existing transfer. A shame that Shout tried to do the alignment work in-house instead of bringing in someone who knows what they're doing with 3-D.

[T. Warren Scollan]

Originally Posted by Robert Furmanek

Two big differences between A*P*E and the 1980's titles that you listed.

Dan Symmes knew what he was doing and Space-Vision was a superior lens.

Greg Kintz did the restoration. Had he done the other titles, he would have made them look MUCH better than the existing transfer. A shame that Shout tried to do the alignment work in-house instead of bringing in someone who knows what they're doing with 3-D.

I fear if Shout ever gets around to doing "Bwana Devil" in 3D, we'll get the same flawed results.

[Joe D.]

Got it for $16.99 no tax and free shipping as part of an order that included September Storm for 21.93. Pays to shop around.

[Zivouhr]

Looking forward to this hopefully this week. Glad to hear the 3D is strong. Thanks Revgen for the 3D review.
Just watched "Son of Godzilla" on the Svengoolie show on TV, so I'm ready for Giant Ape 3D.

[Jbug]

Originally Posted by T. Warren Scollan

I fear if Shout ever gets around to doing "Bwana Devil" in 3D, we'll get the same flawed results.

If Shout says they are going to do BD in 3D we should all warn them that if they mess this one up we aren't going to buy it.

[Jbug]

Originally Posted by Zivouhr

Looking forward to this hopefully this week. Glad to hear the 3D is strong. Thanks Interdimensional for the 3D review.
Just watched "Son of Godzilla" on the Svengoolie show on TV, so I'm ready for Giant Ape 3D.

I watched the Sven's opening about the movie and found it so odd that I called my wife to come see how silly this looks. She said she didn't know that Godzilla had a son and thought it was cute. I also noticed that Sven's neck area on both sides looked very puffy. I hope he's ok. I know he's had a couple of strokes in the past. I would surely miss him and his show if something happened to him.

[Joe D.]

Godzilla had a son?

With all the movies out simply from Toho studios, would think he was a great grandpa by this time.

[T. Warren Scollan]

Originally Posted by Jbug

If Shout says they are going to do BD in 3D we should all warn them that if they mess this one up we aren't going to buy it.

I would disagree. As much as I would hate doing it, I would buy anyway, knowing I must support all these restoration efforts. To me, a flawed version is better than no version. Of course I would then give Shout a big ration of Sh*t!!!!!

[Movieman66]

Originally Posted by Joe D.

Godzilla had a son?

Actually there was Minilla (Minya) who was in the 60's and 70's Godzilla films, like Son of Godzilla, and in Godzilla:Final Wars, who is considered by fans to be an adoption by Godzilla. Then there was Godzilla Junior, which is actually a Godzillasaurus (Toho's term), which, at the end of Godzilla vs. Destoroyah, when

[Show spoiler]Godzilla died, the massive radiation that Godzilla contained in his body, was emitted forth from his dissolving body, only to be absorbed by Godzilla Junior, causing him to grow in size and power to become the new Godzilla for the Millennium series of films from Godzilla 2000 to Godzilla: Final Wars.

[Interdimensional]

Originally Posted by T. Warren Scollan

As much as I would hate doing it, I would buy anyway, knowing I must support all these restoration efforts. To me, a flawed version is better than no version.

Agree. I'd like studios and labels to be encouraged as much as possible to release 3D restorations. I don't want them to feel they're damned if they do, damned if they don't, and just avoid 3D altogether. It'd be all to easy for them to take that position, especially in the current climate. I'd like to applaud the effort, while stressing certain fundamentals.

I've come to the conclusion that the worst sin in those other restorations has been vertical misalignment. Followed by colour and contrast mismatch between eyes. If they could just pay more attention to these two areas, I'd be a lot happier.

Actually the worst sin would be Tony Anthony's coloured-in black and white alterations to Comin At Ya, but I don't expect that issue to crop up ever again.

On the plus side, I don't recall noticing any L/R synchronization issues in the various 80s 3D-Blurays in question(although this is probably less likely with single strip films).

As imperfect as these releases have been, I found I could still enjoy most of them, as the issues were not present in every shot. I just couldn't recommend them to anyone else, particularly anyone who's ever complained of eye-strain. Of course Greg Kintz could have done a better job with these but there's a lot of work to be done and if other teams could get the basics right we'd be in a much better position.