Chopper (20th Anniversary) Blu-Ray

[Alister_M]

Originally Posted by From Beyond

What else have they botched recently? I was looking forward to this release but will prob hold off for now.

Guns Akimbo was cropped from 2.35 to 1.78. The new remastered Amelie is 1080i. Not a good look at all.

[rip63]

Originally Posted by Alister_M

Guns Akimbo was cropped from 2.35 to 1.78. The new remastered Amelie is 1080i. Not a good look at all.

Why does this seem to go on in this country and so frequently, I wonder?

And they wonder why people won't always buy Australian and import instead...

[Alister_M]

Originally Posted by rip63

Why does this seem to go on in this country and so frequently, I wonder?

And they wonder why people won't always buy Australian and import instead...

Scandinavia and the UK often have similar problems, especially with the 1080i issue. Then there's the Germans who have to put up with every other movie being cut to pieces by their insane censorship board (also happens in Australia and the UK, to a lesser extent). Idiotic distributors are unfortunately a worldwide issue.

[Rick Grimes]

Originally Posted by Laservampire

Remastered from 35mm... to look like HD videotape circa 2006

HD videotape would probably look a lot more grainy/noisy (eg. Battlestar Galactica).

Haven’t looked at it yet, but it sounds like a modern day DNR job akin to T2 (fine detail remains, but grain is missing), only not as waxy.

[StrayButler91]

Originally Posted by Vegasnights39

They didn't just scrub the grain off.. what's going on in the part where they play Release the Bats by The Birthday Party in the club? There's trailing, and ghosting, and all kinds of bad shit going on. I saw this in the theaters numerous times, and on DVD 80 times.. they botched this disc. There's no way this was an artistic decision by Dominik. lol I own a thousand Blu-rays, and this has to be the most unwatchable one. My favorite film.

I noticed banding and macroblocking in several low-light scenes, but I'd be very surprised if those artifacts are baked into the remaster. Those are all compression artifacts that have appeared as a result of the Blu-ray encode. Let's not forget that Via Vision/Imprint are an offshoot of Madman so they likely all use the same software and people to encode their discs, and we all know about their encoding as it has been discussed to death on here

So, yeah, Dominik certainly wasn't sent the Blu-ray encode to approve - he would've contributed to the remastering process itself.

[TrentW1982]

I'm seeing the DCP of this at Pentridge next week, so it will be interesting to see how it compares to the Blu ray, and if some of the flaws being discussed are common to both or only on the Blu.

[StrayButler91]

Originally Posted by TrentW1982

I'm seeing the DCP of this at Pentridge next week, so it will be interesting to see how it compares to the Blu ray, and if some of the flaws being discussed are common to both or only on the Blu.

I would love to hear your report

[alexpeden2000]

Just need to hope a foreign distributor gets their hands on it I guess..

[DawnShadow]

Now streaming on Stan if anyone wants to compare the stream to the Blu-ray.

[Andeh Pandeh]

Watched it on Stan the other day.... I hadn't seen it in years. Fantastic movie!

[LMFAObros]

Looks bad on Stan. Got TC wobble and too much DNR.

[Laservampire]

Originally Posted by LMFAObros

Looks bad on Stan. Got TC wobble and too much DNR.

Gotta love the state of tech in this country. So many films overseas getting pin sharp, stabilized 4K remasters and we get new transfers for blu-ray that look like repurposed DVD masters from 2008.

[fuzzymctiger]

Originally Posted by Laservampire

Gotta love the state of tech in this country. So many films overseas getting pin sharp, stabilized 4K remasters and we get new transfers for blu-ray that look like repurposed DVD masters from 2008.

Something that makes me even sadder, is the scan for the Criterion 4K of The Piano was done here in Australia in Canberra.

So it's not even like the equiptment and quality isn't available.

[StrayButler91]

Originally Posted by fuzzymctiger

Something that makes me even sadder, is the scan for the Criterion 4K of The Piano was done here in Australia in Canberra.

So it's not even like the equiptment and quality isn't available.

As ever, it comes down to whoever is at the wheel. It doesn’t help that there are still so many consumers who hate grain and want all of the nasty stuff to be wiped away, that’s why DNR is still used so liberally.

[DAT_JB]

I really hope this will get a release outside down under with a better outcome. Maybe BLONDE can push this in any way..

[Met]

What's the general consensus on the Chopper Blu Ray? Are there any other scans/releases coming out in the near-future?

[DawnShadow]

German Blu-ray coming:
https://bluray-disc.de/blu-ray-news/...ltra_hd_bluray

[TrentW1982]

Originally Posted by StrayButler91

I would love to hear your report

Almost a 1 year later response...

But from memory, the DCP didn't look too different to the Blu ray. A couple of parts I specifically looked out for, like the scene in Bojangles, looked a bit more stable on the DCP than the Blu ray but overall, the DCP had barely any sign of film grain either.

I enjoyed the night regardless. It was great seeing it in such a fitting location and they screened some extra features with it, some interviews and behind the scenes stuff from 1999/2000 shot with the cast in Pentridge's H division.

[Rick Grimes]

Since the DCP was devoid of film grain, I have a feeling that the German BD won’t be much better, since it would figure that the master made from the OCN has already been f*cked by excessive DNR.

Maybe the director or the DP is shares George Lucas and James Cameron’s hatred film, and they love the look of digital.

Maybe the OCN of Chopper was not in the best shape and fixing the dirt, scratches, spicks and specks made the job of keeping a consistent amount of film grain difficult, so they excessively scrubbed the picture.

Maybe whoever worked on it was a uni graduate from Griffith Art School circa mid 2000’s. My wife pointed out that while she did her fine art degree, most lecturers pushed the use of DNR, on both film and DV projects, saying “the masses want that clean digital look now”.

Either way, much like the Ultra-HD Blu-Ray transfers of the Holy Trilogy or T2, we are just going to have to accept that Chopper on Blu-Ray is scrubbed and waxy looking, and there’s nothing we can do about it. To quote a phrase from Goodfellas that’s apt in the situation: “And that’s that”.

[DawnShadow]

German release is out now - anybody checked it out?
https://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Chopper-Blu-ray/330737/