Stanley Kubrick Collection

[bluesea]

Has it been confirmed whether or not Barry Lyndon and Lolita are indeed remastered, or just repackaged?

[Jeff]

I know this is the wrong thread, but this might be the end of HD-DVD.

If you guys want to discuss this, do it over here.

Has it been confirmed whether or not Barry Lyndon and Lolita are indeed remastered, or just repackaged?

They are the exact same discs repackaged in keepcases.

[Romat]

Some stores in the Boston area, actually got more Kubrick boxsets in at the end of last week. I saw 2 sets in a Best Buy ($69.99) on Friday. And
Newbury Comics (they didn't know what boxset I was talking about last Tuesday) has had at least 2 sets on display since Sunday ($59.99).
All of them still have the mismatched Shining cover.

[denti alligator]

I received four out of the five HD DVDs from Warner. 2001 is still missing,and apparently is on back order (!), with an estimated ship date of 30 days!! I might just cancel and order from amazon.

I watched Full Metal Jacket tonight. HD transfer is very good. I'd give it a B/B+. Some scenes looked no better than an upconverted SD DVD, but that's still pretty good. Mostly it was strong: pronounced colors, excellent detail, and sharp.

As for the AR. I thought it looked fantastic at 1.78:1. There wasn't a single scene that seemed too tightly framed. There are close-ups in which the top of Joker's helmet is cropped, or the top of Gomer's head (to give two examples), and these felt just right. The clips in academy ratio that appeared in the documentary felt too open. I'm perfectly happy with this film in 16x9.

I'll report on the others as I view them.

[manicsounds]

My Boxset shipped last week from amazon. Still havent received it though. I'm hoping for a matching Shining cover but I will just have to wait and see.

[Person]

I caved in and ordered the SD box from CD-WOW. It arrived today and I have watched most of the video extras, save FMJ and am currently watching EWS, which looks stunning. The extras are better than I expected, overall. I have yet to listen to any of the commentaries.

What I want to ask is, at 01:30:16 to 01:30:19, when Bill comes home, as he turns towards the hall doorway, we see, on his back, a large eye, an Illuminati symbol, from what I have understood from the late, great Robert Anton Wilson. Seems a weird cinematic trick for the likes of Kubrick. Any thoughts?

[Belmondo]

I am confident that the "large eye" is Kubrick telling us to focus on what he is trying to say by way of theme and content, and that twenty odd pages on aspect ratios, cover art, and the condition of the box, is probably just about enough.

[yoshimori]

What I want to ask is, at 01:30:16 to 01:30:19, when Bill comes home, as he turns towards the hall doorway, we see, on his back, a large eye, an Illuminati symbol, from what I have understood from the late, great Robert Anton Wilson. Seems a weird cinematic trick for the likes of Kubrick. Any thoughts?

I am confident that the "large eye" is Kubrick telling us to focus on what he is trying to say by way of theme and content, and that twenty odd pages on aspect ratios, cover art, and the condition of the box, is probably just about enough.

Wow! You guys must've got the special secret theme-and-content insider printing of Eyes Wide Shut. Someone, probably one of the people who want us all to keep talking about nothing but cover art, has digitally erased that Illuminati symbol from my disc.

[Darth Lavender]

With DVDBeaver having made a mistake about the Clockwork Orange aspect ratio, is there any chance that Eyes Wide Shut (the HD) is also at the more acceptable 1.66:1?
I know I definitely saw it listed like that on Amazon for pre-order, but you know how inaccurate those details can be.

EDIT: Nevermind, I checked the pixels from one of the SD DVD screenshots, and it's definitely 1.777777777777777777777:1

I'll leave this post here, though, just in case anyone else has the same question.

[Svevan]

What I want to ask is, at 01:30:16 to 01:30:19, when Bill comes home, as he turns towards the hall doorway, we see, on his back, a large eye, an Illuminati symbol, from what I have understood from the late, great Robert Anton Wilson. Seems a weird cinematic trick for the likes of Kubrick. Any thoughts?

Popped in my old SK Collection disc to verify: um, weird. It looks like a technical error, where the camera is reflecting light onto the film from another source. In fact it may not even be an eye but a lamp (perhaps the lamp on the table in front of Cruise?).

Unless you're pulling my leg.

edit: it's the lamp, it's obscured by Cruise's torso at the same time the "eye" disappears. Hope you weren't joking about the whole thing and didn't just waste my time at 5:30 in the morning.

[denti alligator]

Watched the HD of The Shining last night. Picture is superior to Full Metal Jacket. Much more detail. Sharpness ideal. Colors looked great, but I still can't figure out why the tennis ball is pink (in the documentaries on the disc, clips of this scene show that it is indeed yellow). I'd give the PQ an A-/A.

As for the AR. Looked perfect to me. No helicopter shadow--that's a plus. Nothing looked too tightly framed. No issues with this one at all. 1.78:1 seems to work very well.

Next up Clockwork Orange and EWS.

I agree with David that Warner should have made FMJ, The Shining, and EWS 2 or 3-disc sets with both open matte and matted versions. As is, however, so far I'm not at all unhappy with FMJ and The Shining. Having never seen EWS open matte (since I never viewed the DVD version of the film--last time I saw it was in the theaters on opening night), I doubt I'll be disappointed by the 16x9 presentation.

[Person]

Someone, probably one of the people who want us all to keep talking about nothing but cover art, has digitally erased that Illuminati symbol from my disc.

Oh, it's definitely there. It is actually more visable in this new transfer. It seems to pan from left to right in a matter of two seconds as Bill walks towards the door. Try cracking up the brightness if you are having trouble seeing it.

Unless you're pulling my leg.

edit: it's the lamp, it's obscured by Cruise's torso at the same time the "eye" disappears. Hope you weren't joking about the whole thing and didn't just waste my time at 5:30 in the morning.

Geez, Svevan! All I did was point out an anomalous image that confused me in the past, that came back to me when watching again recently. It looks like an eye to me and it is plain to see that magickal symbols proliferate this film. I am not an Illuminati conspiracy theorist, but it is a subject that intrigues me and a lot of weird facts have entered the public domain in the Internet Age, ie. Bohemian Grove.

Also, if you were surfing the Net at 5am, that's your doing, not mine!

[Highway 61]

(Though even this doesn't quite come off artistically, although this scene may well have been directed by Pollack.)

The thought of Pollack having an influence behind the camera had never occurred to me. Are you speculating here, or do you have some inside info on the film?

[Darth Lavender]

Had a quick look at the Eyes Wide Shut HDDVD.

The new framing looks absolutely fine to my eyes. Even the opening shot with Kidman (which, at first glance on DVDBeaver, looked atrocious). We lose the (perhaps intentional) 'stage' quality mentioned earlier, but in the widescreen composition there's a real sense of voyeurism, looking at Kidmen through between those two pillar things.

Other than that; perhaps I would kind of prefer the unique 1.37:1 framing, just because I kind of like that frame. It gives a certain 'classic' quality to any film (although I'd say the same about many films; Schindler's List, Picnic at Hanging Rock (which looked great in 4:3 VHS,) etc.) But, in terms of individual shot-composition, I don't see much evidence to say the 1.37 is how it should be.

We see head-room from time to time, anyway, in the 1.78:1 (part of the shot of Cruise and the corpse (not the part shown in Beaver's caps) still shows a goodly amount of head-room in the 1.78:1, presumably, this is a scene were Kubrick wanted it.)

Incidentally, I remember similar complaints (on another forum) when The Godfather was released on DVD, cropped to 1.78:1 and as it turns out Gordon Willis has said that he actually composed the film to work equally well in 4:3 or 1.85:1, so it seems entirely possible that this is really what Kubrick meant about wanting his films 4:3 on VHS

As for the HDDVD itself; It is, indeed, one of the weaker HD DVDs I own. In the positives; some colors really do 'pop,' I'm amazed, for instance, by the total absence of bleeding in the scenes with an orange/yellow Kidman standing in front of those bright blue windows. And I noticed one scene, right away, that uses very obvious rear-projection (or front-projection,) which I had never noticed on the DVD. Also, being blown up to fill a 16:9 screen, this (and the anamorphic DVD) probably shows a lot more of the pictures weaknesses than the old 4:3 DVD did (of course, since those weaknesses are intentional, I don't complain.) There is plenty of grain, but it ends up looking a little like digital noise. That could just be a consequence of downconverting to 720p

Sadly, the "Unfinished Kubrick" doc is only 20 minutes long (although I haven't watched it yet.)

All in all, I'm happy with my purchase, because I know that Eyes Wide Shut is a movie I'll get a lot of viewing out of. (It ties with 2001 and The Shining for my favourite Kubrick. Not necessarily best, but favourite.)
However, for those with only a lukewarm interest in the movie, I strongly recommend staying with the old DVD.

[patrick]

Perhaps this belongs in the HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray thread, but it's really fascinating seeing people's take on various HD discs' transfers, it seems some people want that "pop" even if it's an inaccurate presentation of the film. I'm not saying that that's the case, but it's certainly fascinating/horrifying to see the debate storming around, say, the Blu-Ray edition of Bram Stoker's Dracula.

[manicsounds]

Seems most people that got the boxset have the wrong coverart for he Shining. Any word on Warner sending out the uniform coverart or not?

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

Seems most people that got the boxset have the wrong coverart for he Shining. Any word on Warner sending out the uniform coverart or not?

I noticed this too.

All the covers in the box set have a certain set scheme except this one. What's it suppose to look like?

The big giveaway of this is the fact the spines in the box don't match.

[devlinnn]

Anyone else have terrible audio/sync problems with the O Lucky Malcolm doco on the Clockwork Orange release? I'm still waiting for O Lucky Man to arrive, so can't compare the condition of the same doco on that release.

[mbalson]

What's it suppose to look like?

See the photos of my set on page 18.

[Mr Pixies]

Has this been discontinued? I was just told this from DeepDiscount. It had a defective copy of Full Metal Jacket, returned it, but after a while they just refunded me.

[Matt]

Barry Lyndon is now apparently out of print. This includes the recent keep-case reissue (UPC 085391200178) and the older edition (UPC 085392114825). Maybe we're in for a lavish 33rd Anniversary Edition or something.

[denti alligator]

This is weird. Why would they take out of print an item that was just reissued? I mean, I can only hope we'll get a new edition, but what are the signs of something like that really happening (or is this the only sign we need)?

[Antoine Doinel]

Maybe Warner is gearing up to release the complete Kubrick box on Blu-Ray.

[manicsounds]

maybe to do with the pink tennis ball on the new SE?

[exte]

First I hear of it, and it's really odd that this is the case. How did this happen? Does anyone know?