Specs for Lionsgate February Titles

[Josh]

Lionsgate Home Entertainment has announced their February Blu-ray slate and they include American Psycho (Uncut), First Blood, Reservoir Dogs and Young Guns. All four will include full 1080p anamorphic transfers along with DTS HD and Dolby Digital 5.1 EX Surround audio tracks.

Extras for American Psycho will include audio commentary with director Mary Harron and writer Guinevere Turner, deleted scenes with optional commentary and "The '80s Downtown" featurette. First Blood includes separate commentaries with Sylvester Stallone and writer David Morrell, an Advanced Trivia Track, deleted scenes, "Drawing First Blood" featurette and interactive menus powered by Metamenu technology. Young Guns features "The Real Billy the Kid" documentary, the Advanced Trivia Track and Metamenus.

And finally, Reservoir Dogs presents an audio commentary, Pulp Factoids Viewer, "Playing It Fast and Loose" and "Profiling the RESERVOIR DOGS" featurettes. Interestingly, the special features on this last disc are presented in high definition resolution. All are due on February 6th with retail $29.99 each.

And some bonus info on Saw III:

Lionsgate Home Entertainment will release Saw III on January 23rd, 2007. Available with a 1080p anamorphic transfer of the 113 min. unrated cut, the disc will include Dolby Digital 5.1 & DTS HD tracks. Bonus materials will include three commentary tracks (1. Director Darren Lynn Bousman, Writer Leigh Whannell and Executive Producers Peter Block and Jason Constantine; 2. Producers Oren Koules and Mark Burg; 3. Director Darren Lynn Bousman, Editor Kevin Greutert and Director of Photography David A. Armstrong), deleted scenes, "The Traps of Saw III," "The Details of Death: The Props of Saw III," "Darren's Diary: Anatomy of a Director" featurettes and trailers. Exclusive to the Blu-ray Disc are "Amanda: Evolution of a Killer" and "The Writing of Saw III" featurettes. Retail is $39.99.

http://www.davisdvd.com/news/bluray.html

[Blubaru]

Reservoir Dogs FTW!

[GoldenRedux]

This is great news for HD DVD!

[GoldenRedux]

I wonder what video codec they are using for Reservoir Dogs? Have they moved away from Mpeg2 and gone to AVC or VC-1?

[JTK]

I have to agree with some rumblings I've been getting in my PM box and abroad:

It's noticeably quiet (too quiet) on the software front for December, isn't it? Where's Master and Commander? Where's ID4? I'd like to see some kind of nice BD announcement for Christmas time, as far as movies are concerned.

[GoldenRedux]

Originally Posted by JTK

I have to agree with some rumblings I've been getting in my PM box and abroad:

It's noticeably quiet (too quiet) on the software front for December, isn't it? Where's Master and Commander? Where's ID4? I'd like to see some kind of nice BD announcement for Christmas time, as far as movies are concerned.

So would I. It seems all the announced titles are coming out after the holidays, which is ridiculous, IMO.

[JTK]

Originally Posted by GoldenRedux

So would I. It seems all the announced titles are coming out after the holidays, which is ridiculous, IMO.

Sure is.

[Maximus]

Originally Posted by JTK

I have to agree with some rumblings I've been getting in my PM box and abroad:

It's noticeably quiet (too quiet) on the software front for December, isn't it? Where's Master and Commander? Where's ID4? I'd like to see some kind of nice BD announcement for Christmas time, as far as movies are concerned.

I would love ID4 one of my favourite action films of all time.

[KenThompson]

Would be thrilled if they would throw in Aliens with ID4.

[Chris Beveridge]

Such is what happens with the late startup in getting the authoring tools ready. It's the price to pay for moving away from mpeg2 to avc. I'd rather people who are getting players for Christmas and start looking to see what's coming out get excited.

[JTK]

Originally Posted by Chris Beveridge

Such is what happens with the late startup in getting the authoring tools ready. It's the price to pay for moving away from mpeg2 to avc. I'd rather people who are getting players for Christmas and start looking to see what's coming out get excited.

True, but on that same token, they need a few big name titles to have them excited when they buy said hardware in the first place.

[dialog_gvf]

All four will include full 1080p anamorphic transfers

I trust that is confused speak for widescreen?

I sure wish they had anamorphic encoding, but unfortunately people weren't listening, or were hostile to the notion, when myself and others raised it several years ago.

Neither BD or HD DVD have anamorphic encodings. But, apparently, BD-J and HDi are potentially capable of handling it (downconverting).

Gary

[Zvi]

Dumb question, but what's ID4

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by Zvi

Dumb question, but what's ID4

Independence Day

The DTheater release was OK, but nothing great. It would need definite TLC to be anything special.

Gary

[GoldenRedux]

What's still very telling in all of this is that these title are actually coming out on Blu-ray and not HD DVD like all the crazy people on AVS Forums were trying to claim were the reason for the lack of announcements from Lion's Gate.

Will they ever learn? The news now from Virgin Mega Stores is that the PS3 has already had a hand in helping Blu-ray movie sales move to within a 3:1 ratio of HD DVD sales from a 4:1 ratio that was pretty constant from launch of the two formats. That doesn't even take into account what effect continuing sales of the PS3 and the stand-alone Panasonic, Samsung and Philips players, plus the forthcoming Sony and Pioneer stand-alone players will have on sales.

[WriteSimply]

Originally Posted by GoldenRedux

Will they ever learn? The news now from Virgin Mega Stores is that the PS3 has already had a hand in helping Blu-ray movie sales move to within a 3:1 ratio of HD DVD sales from a 4:1 ratio that was pretty constant from launch of the two formats. That doesn't even take into account what effect continuing sales of the PS3 and the stand-alone Panasonic, Samsung and Philips players, plus the forthcoming Sony and Pioneer stand-alone players will have on sales.

This is news to me. Link? Just to make it official.

I don't know if Sony is happy that some HT people are using their PS3s as a BD player exclusively. But at least this adoption will encourage BD and porn studios to release more titles on the format. And Universal to change its mind.


fuad

[Josh]

Originally Posted by GoldenRedux

I wonder what video codec they are using for Reservoir Dogs? Have they moved away from Mpeg2 and gone to AVC or VC-1?

Looks to me that they are using MPEG-2. Otherwise, they could afford more space for extras.

[JTK]

Originally Posted by WriteSimply

This is news to me. Link? Just to make it official.

I don't know if Sony is happy that some HT people are using their PS3s as a BD player exclusively. But at least this adoption will encourage BD and porn studios to release more titles on the format. And Universal to change its mind.


fuad

No reason Sony shouldn't be happy. Move product and make more sales by any means necessary and helps overall adoption.

Heck, all they need to do is implement 480i over HDMI and watch a lot of non gamer folks pick the PS3 as their new darling digital transport.

Universal already looks pretty foolish at this point in time ignoring BD utterly.

[GoldenRedux]

Originally Posted by WriteSimply

This is news to me. Link? Just to make it official.

http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6394173.html

I don't know if Sony is happy that some HT people are using their PS3s as a BD player exclusively. But at least this adoption will encourage BD and porn studios to release more titles on the format. And Universal to change its mind.


fuad

I don't know that an increase in Blu-ray movie sales is evidence that the PS3 is being used as a BD player exclusively, but just being put to one of its intended uses.

[JTK]

I'm all for whatever it takes for BD to seal this thing up and finally finish it.