I saw the HD screen captrures on DVD Beaver.
For a movie shot in 70mm in HD, the image suffers from excessive noise reduction.
WHY REMOVE ALL GRAIN AND BLUR SOME FINE DETAILS ???????????
Grain reduction+ anti aliasing filter + edge enhancement = a video-like look.
The color are great, the contrast looks like choosed to remamber a print look. But the texture...
Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
Keep thinking...
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Danny Burk
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
Here we go again......remember that you can't judge everything from screen caps. Robert Harris has posted a very complimentary review on Home Theatre Forum; I would put more faith into his review than into screen caps.
That said, I won't be buying it; I'm greatly disappointed that the silent version isn't also included on blu-ray, and my interest in the sound version isn't high enough to persuade me to upgrade my present DVD.
That said, I won't be buying it; I'm greatly disappointed that the silent version isn't also included on blu-ray, and my interest in the sound version isn't high enough to persuade me to upgrade my present DVD.
Visit www.dannyburk.com
Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
Look again, I did not said it wasn't worth buy !!!!
I said the film, for what someone expect from a HD tranfer from 70mm fine elements, have grain reduction creating some few texture loss, loss of some fine details. Not much detail loss compared to other edition that killed much more details.
Roberts Harris used to raise a flag against grain reduction for DVD and Blu Ray, or against excessive grain reduction, against the loss of detail from such filters. But today looks like he do not always care this flag all the time.
I believe a little bit of grain reduction it's needed in many cases, but not a complete reduction of grain.
Only one company in the world can really reduce grain without create fine detail loss, Lowry Digital. But they charge a lot for it.
I said the film, for what someone expect from a HD tranfer from 70mm fine elements, have grain reduction creating some few texture loss, loss of some fine details. Not much detail loss compared to other edition that killed much more details.
Roberts Harris used to raise a flag against grain reduction for DVD and Blu Ray, or against excessive grain reduction, against the loss of detail from such filters. But today looks like he do not always care this flag all the time.
I believe a little bit of grain reduction it's needed in many cases, but not a complete reduction of grain.
Only one company in the world can really reduce grain without create fine detail loss, Lowry Digital. But they charge a lot for it.
Keep thinking...
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silentfilm
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
http://www.baltimoresun.com/explore/how ... 2370.story
'Ben-Hur': Still going well beyond the material
By John Harding, [email protected]" target="_blank
September 26, 2011 | 3:20 p.m.
Pity the poor film lovers who blew their entire month's movie budget on the latest "Star Wars" box set. This week, for roughly the same price, they could have owned a cinema milestone superior to "Star Wars" in just about every way — William Wyler's "Ben-Hur" (Warner Home Video, Ultimate Collector's Edition three-disc Blu-ray box set, $64.99; five-DVD set, $49.92; two-DVD anniversary edition, $20.97).
Don't misunderstand. The original "Star Wars" trilogy is a lot of fun and George Lucas corralled future generations of movie fans with his films' youthful spirit of wonder and adventure. But "Ben-Hur" is profound and ageless — not to mention challenging and stirring in its full-blooded depiction of man's capacity for both cruelty and redemption.
Like the Lucas fantasies, Wyler's screen classic turns on the eternal opposition of good and evil. But the big difference in the two visions is that one is set in a comic book universe of masked fiends and light sabers and matinee heroics, and the other takes place in a universe of family bonds and societies populated by fallible individuals trying to keep their balance on a plane constantly pitching between the degradation of tyranny and the possibility of liberation.
It's sad that film schools today are full of students who know all there is to know about Lucas but dismiss films like "Ben-Hur." If they looked deeper, they might see that Wyler did not view cinema as an end in itself, but as just another powerful artist's tool for digging into ultimate relationships between the mortal and the everlasting.
Submit a Letter to the Editor for the Columbia Flier and Howard County Times
That is also the field in which General Lew Wallace once toiled with his original novel. It is subtitled "A Tale of the Christ," but you don't really have to be a Christian or a Bible student to find nourishment in its suggestion of values that extend well beyond our material world.
For the film's Blu-ray debut, technicians have returned to original negative elements to create a 1080p transfer that captures both the epic scope and the intimacy of Wyler's Oscar-winning masterwork.
"Ben-Hur" was one of only two films photographed in a process called MGM Camera 65, the widest aspect ratio (2.76:1) ever used theatrically. At nearly three times as wide as it is high, its picture has always posed challenges for video technicians.
But high-definition finally allows for the best resolution of picture details yet possible. There is none of the irising or shimmering of unresolved lines here, and both the brightness and color are pushed to their peaks with stunning vibrancy.
At last we can see into the dark recesses of the Roman slave galleons and note every bead of sweat on the muscles of the oarsmen as they speed into a sea battle with pirates. For the first time at home, Judah Ben-Hur's team of chariot horses is snowy white again, and not some cream- or wheat-colored offshoot as in past video versions.
Best of all is the new lossless DTS-HD Master Audio track, flawlessly reproducing the awesome Miklos Rosza musical score and dispersing it around the 5.1 stereo soundstage. (There's an option for listening to the isolated score on its own, though this is only in Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo and not quite as satisfying.)
Bonus extras are included on each of the box set's three Blu-ray discs. These include commentaries and "making of" documentaries from previous editions, along with various release trailers, rare screen tests, newsreel footage and the complete 1925 silent film version with Ramon Novarro — not presented in true high-def but commendably sharp and intact and good to have in the set.
New and exclusive supplements begin with a 78-minute "personal journey" through the film via Charlton Heston's 16mm home movies and reminiscences by the late actor's wife and grown children. Also included is a facsimile of a bound "diary" and scrapbook kept by Heston during the film's production, and a 64-page hardcover book of rare photos, movie stills and production art.
The five-disc DVD set contains all of the same extras plus the remastered feature in standard definition. The two-DVD "special edition" has just the remastered film and running commentary, plus a poster mail-in offer.
'Ben-Hur': Still going well beyond the material
By John Harding, [email protected]" target="_blank
September 26, 2011 | 3:20 p.m.
Pity the poor film lovers who blew their entire month's movie budget on the latest "Star Wars" box set. This week, for roughly the same price, they could have owned a cinema milestone superior to "Star Wars" in just about every way — William Wyler's "Ben-Hur" (Warner Home Video, Ultimate Collector's Edition three-disc Blu-ray box set, $64.99; five-DVD set, $49.92; two-DVD anniversary edition, $20.97).
Don't misunderstand. The original "Star Wars" trilogy is a lot of fun and George Lucas corralled future generations of movie fans with his films' youthful spirit of wonder and adventure. But "Ben-Hur" is profound and ageless — not to mention challenging and stirring in its full-blooded depiction of man's capacity for both cruelty and redemption.
Like the Lucas fantasies, Wyler's screen classic turns on the eternal opposition of good and evil. But the big difference in the two visions is that one is set in a comic book universe of masked fiends and light sabers and matinee heroics, and the other takes place in a universe of family bonds and societies populated by fallible individuals trying to keep their balance on a plane constantly pitching between the degradation of tyranny and the possibility of liberation.
It's sad that film schools today are full of students who know all there is to know about Lucas but dismiss films like "Ben-Hur." If they looked deeper, they might see that Wyler did not view cinema as an end in itself, but as just another powerful artist's tool for digging into ultimate relationships between the mortal and the everlasting.
Submit a Letter to the Editor for the Columbia Flier and Howard County Times
That is also the field in which General Lew Wallace once toiled with his original novel. It is subtitled "A Tale of the Christ," but you don't really have to be a Christian or a Bible student to find nourishment in its suggestion of values that extend well beyond our material world.
For the film's Blu-ray debut, technicians have returned to original negative elements to create a 1080p transfer that captures both the epic scope and the intimacy of Wyler's Oscar-winning masterwork.
"Ben-Hur" was one of only two films photographed in a process called MGM Camera 65, the widest aspect ratio (2.76:1) ever used theatrically. At nearly three times as wide as it is high, its picture has always posed challenges for video technicians.
But high-definition finally allows for the best resolution of picture details yet possible. There is none of the irising or shimmering of unresolved lines here, and both the brightness and color are pushed to their peaks with stunning vibrancy.
At last we can see into the dark recesses of the Roman slave galleons and note every bead of sweat on the muscles of the oarsmen as they speed into a sea battle with pirates. For the first time at home, Judah Ben-Hur's team of chariot horses is snowy white again, and not some cream- or wheat-colored offshoot as in past video versions.
Best of all is the new lossless DTS-HD Master Audio track, flawlessly reproducing the awesome Miklos Rosza musical score and dispersing it around the 5.1 stereo soundstage. (There's an option for listening to the isolated score on its own, though this is only in Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo and not quite as satisfying.)
Bonus extras are included on each of the box set's three Blu-ray discs. These include commentaries and "making of" documentaries from previous editions, along with various release trailers, rare screen tests, newsreel footage and the complete 1925 silent film version with Ramon Novarro — not presented in true high-def but commendably sharp and intact and good to have in the set.
New and exclusive supplements begin with a 78-minute "personal journey" through the film via Charlton Heston's 16mm home movies and reminiscences by the late actor's wife and grown children. Also included is a facsimile of a bound "diary" and scrapbook kept by Heston during the film's production, and a 64-page hardcover book of rare photos, movie stills and production art.
The five-disc DVD set contains all of the same extras plus the remastered feature in standard definition. The two-DVD "special edition" has just the remastered film and running commentary, plus a poster mail-in offer.
Bruce Calvert
http://www.silentfilmstillarchive.com
http://www.silentfilmstillarchive.com
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Christopher Jacobs
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
Well, as I expected, there did turn out to be a 1959 movie-only Blu-ray, which is currently a Walmart exclusive until next March. Rather than waiting for the inevitable $10 or $15 sale prices sure to occur by Christmas, I decided to go for it at Walmart's reasonable $20 price for the 222-minute film spread across two Blu-rays (breaking at the Intermission). I can't say I was disappointed. It still includes the audio commentary, an isolated music score, and five trailers from various releases (although those are unfortunately only in standard-definition). So far I've only spot-checked a few scenes on disc one, perhaps a half-hour total. The longest segment I watched was the sea battle and its aftermath.
There is a certain amount of digital noise reduction throughout, and I would think that a 65mm anamorphic negative should probably look slightly sharper than parts of this transfer, but it still looks extremely good, far better than any DVD including the very fine remastered one that was released with the silent BEN-HUR as a bonus. There is some grain apparent, more in certain scenes than others, but it definitely hasn't been obliterated like some other Blu-rays have done (such as ZULU, BECKET, THE LAST STARFIGHTER, MONSTER'S BALL, and many more). I'd say it looks about as good as Warners' Blu-ray of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, also from 65mm, and better than IT'S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD, also from 65mm. It could never look as sharp as a 70mm film print, by any means, but I'd say it looks roughly as good as the last 35mm print I saw theatrically about 10-15 years ago (and which I had to set up from all 14 reels onto a platter and take down again, for just a single showing!), and certainly looks better than the 16mm print I saw in college. Matte paintings are now more obvious than in previous video versions (but no more so than in film prints), as are matte lines around actors in the blue-screen shots (although I thought I remembered the lines previously being blue, and here they tend to be black and are not quite so noticeable). The soundtrack is superb (the original English track, at any rate), with exellent frequency range and multi-channel stereo separation. There are multiple language tracks as alternates, not just the few listed on the box, and even more subtitle options, including Greek, Hebrew, Korean, and numerous other languages less-commonly included on commercial releases.
In short, if you like the 1959 BEN-HUR and don't want to spend the extra bucks for the deluxe collectors' edition for duplicate copies of the same standard-definition bonus features on the last DVD release, the $20 movie-only Blu-ray from Walmart is a good option, and I expect it probably will be on sale by the end of the year if not by Thanksgiving or Christmas.
BEN-HUR movie-only edition on Blu-ray --
Movie: A
Video: A
Audio: A+
Extras: C+
There is a certain amount of digital noise reduction throughout, and I would think that a 65mm anamorphic negative should probably look slightly sharper than parts of this transfer, but it still looks extremely good, far better than any DVD including the very fine remastered one that was released with the silent BEN-HUR as a bonus. There is some grain apparent, more in certain scenes than others, but it definitely hasn't been obliterated like some other Blu-rays have done (such as ZULU, BECKET, THE LAST STARFIGHTER, MONSTER'S BALL, and many more). I'd say it looks about as good as Warners' Blu-ray of 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY, also from 65mm, and better than IT'S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD, also from 65mm. It could never look as sharp as a 70mm film print, by any means, but I'd say it looks roughly as good as the last 35mm print I saw theatrically about 10-15 years ago (and which I had to set up from all 14 reels onto a platter and take down again, for just a single showing!), and certainly looks better than the 16mm print I saw in college. Matte paintings are now more obvious than in previous video versions (but no more so than in film prints), as are matte lines around actors in the blue-screen shots (although I thought I remembered the lines previously being blue, and here they tend to be black and are not quite so noticeable). The soundtrack is superb (the original English track, at any rate), with exellent frequency range and multi-channel stereo separation. There are multiple language tracks as alternates, not just the few listed on the box, and even more subtitle options, including Greek, Hebrew, Korean, and numerous other languages less-commonly included on commercial releases.
In short, if you like the 1959 BEN-HUR and don't want to spend the extra bucks for the deluxe collectors' edition for duplicate copies of the same standard-definition bonus features on the last DVD release, the $20 movie-only Blu-ray from Walmart is a good option, and I expect it probably will be on sale by the end of the year if not by Thanksgiving or Christmas.
BEN-HUR movie-only edition on Blu-ray --
Movie: A
Video: A
Audio: A+
Extras: C+
Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
It's one thing to put talking heads documentaries on supplement DVDs, but if I buy a bluray, I want all the program material in bluray. I cancelled my preorders of both Citizen Kane and Ben Hur because of this. I don't need the bells and whistles package if it's SD.
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goalieboy82
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
is the silent ben hur on dvd just by itself (and not part of a dvd set).
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Christopher Jacobs
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
The DVD of the silent BEN-HUR is only available as a bonus with the deluxe multi-disc DVD set of the 1959 version. It's also a bonus with the new Collector's Edition Blu-ray of BEN-HUR, but I think it's actually just a standard-definition file on the bonus Blu-ray, so they could use one Blu-ray disc for all of the standard-definition bonus features, just like they did with THE WIZARD OF OZ, which includes five complete silent "Oz" features on one Blu-ray, but all in standard definition.goalieboy82 wrote:is the silent ben hur on dvd just by itself (and not part of a dvd set).
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goalieboy82
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
is there a place i can find a stand along dvd of the silent version?
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Mike Gebert
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
Not legally, no.
Cinema has no voice, but it speaks to us with eyes that mirror the soul. ―Ivan Mosjoukine
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Christopher Jacobs
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
You might do a google search to see if anybody who bought the box set is selling off their copy of the silent version (which is disc 3 out of 4 -- the sound version takes up discs 1 and 2 and disc 4 is a bunch of documentaries and other bonus items), but for most people the whole point of buying the box set was to get the silent version (and it does not have its own separate box). Someone who has the DVD box set and decided to get the new Blu-ray box set might be willing to get rid of the two bonus DVDs (or the entire 4-disc set), since they're both included on one Blu-ray in the deluxe Blu-ray BEN-HUR set.goalieboy82 wrote:is there a place i can find a stand along dvd of the silent version?
Re:
The blu-ray for Cleopatra is up for sale on Amazon.uk with release date January 30th.Frederica wrote:Has there been any announcement of a blu ray release of Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra? Rumors? Rumblings? Should I lay in a supply of martini toothpicks now?barafan wrote:I would have to double-check, but I believe that the "Big Hollywood" website set the BH release for Easter.
No word on region, but other 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment blu-rays have been region free.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B005QV2OV6/r ... amp=211189" target="_blank" target="_blank
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Christopher Jacobs
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The Fox U.K. Blu-ray of CLEOPATRA will most likely be All-Region A-B-C, like their release last year of TORA! TORA! TORA!, but CLEOPATRA's January 2012 U.K. release may or may not mean an imminent U.S. release. Fox is waiting until December 6th 2011 for the U.S. release of TORA! TORA! TORA! to tie in with the 70th anniversary of Pearl Harbor (about 18 months after the U.K. release), so it's conceivable that they could well wait until 2013 for a U.S. release of CLEOPATRA on its 50th anniversary. Amazon.co.uk pricing is reasonable and shipping is often faster than Amazon U.S., so if there's no announcement of a U.S. release by the time the U.K. edition is available, I'm sure most American CLEOPATRA fans will be ordering it from the U.K. unless the American edition will have additional features.Kevin2 wrote:The blu-ray for Cleopatra is up for sale on Amazon.uk with release date January 30th.Frederica wrote: Has there been any announcement of a blu ray release of Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra? Rumors? Rumblings? Should I lay in a supply of martini toothpicks now?
No word on region, but other 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment blu-rays have been region free.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B005QV2OV6/r ... amp=211189" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank
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Keatonesque
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Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
I just saw this on Silent Sunday and I hope I live to see the day this one gets a 2K/4K restoration and release on its own. It certainly deserves it –– the score might be my favorite of Carl Davis, and I understand it's highly regarded.
Re: Ben-Hur coming to blu-ray and standard DVD
I only bought the "talkie" when it cameoutbecause it included the silent version. I had seen the later version so many times on TV( wasn't it on ABC every Easter night for years?), but I wanted the silent version & that was the only way to get it.
Agnes McFadden
I know it's good - I wrote it myself!
I know it's good - I wrote it myself!