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swo17 wrote:

Jeff wrote:Warner will finally release a Blu-ray without all the useless crap in September.

Does anyone know what has happened with this? I still am not interested in all of the useless crap.

I got mine from Deep Discount several weeks ago (but DVD Planet has it cheaper now). Don't know why it's not listed on Amazon. It's exactly what you'd expect, the first disc of the box set in a standard Blu-ray case.

Ah, I see. I was going off of Amazon, which doesn't have this in stock for some reason, but a quick search shows that several other online vendors do have it. Thanks for the info!

swo17 wrote:Ah, I see. I was going off of Amazon, which doesn't have this in stock for some reason, but a quick search shows that several other online vendors do have it. Thanks for the info!

Is this not in stores down in the States? Everywhere I go up here has copies, HMV, Wal-Mart, FutueShop, Best Buy, etc. It's 20$ at HMV right now.

What is this thing you call a "store"?

hahaha...."store"

swo17 wrote:What is this thing you call a "store"?

It's the place where I can find Casablanca and you can't.

Touché.

swo17 wrote:Touché.

Amazon.ca has it in stock for $21.99. I don't know what their shipping rates are to the good ole USA, but they have to be better that the vice versa.

Warner is pulling Casablanca (and the first two Lethal Weapons) from the shelves.

They plan to remaster and release.

For those who know much more than me, and have seen the Casablanca BD, I have to ask how much more can be done here? I usually cite Casablanca (along with a lot of Criterion discs of films from this period) as being a premier example of a 1080p HD mastering of an old film.

This seems like a cash grab.

aox wrote:For those who know much more than me, and have seen the Casablanca BD, I have to ask how much more can be done here?

The short answer is not much. The current BD is single layered but the feature is just a tad over 15GB. I do recall some discussion somewhere that there may have been a bit too much DNR, so I suppose a new encode with a higher bitrate (if possible) and less DNR might have an edge in detail, but it's hard to see how it would differ enough for owners of the current BD to upgrade. The current disc is stunning on my 50" plasma.

Quite a lot can be done. While the DNR is not "up to eleven" on current Blu-rays, the filtering is obvious. Audio could also be upgraded to lossless. I hope it receives a brand new 4K master.

The 70th anniversary blu-ray set includes about 3-4 coasters and that's not even including the DVDs.

But they just did a big junk-filled special edition BD in 2009. Who's going to buy this one now?

Matt wrote:But they just did a big junk-filled special edition BD in 2009.

That edition was eventually released as a stand-alone BD. One can only hope that after profits from the new junk-filled edition have leveled out, a stand-alone release will follow.

They could follow the Citizen Kane release scenario again: wide release of the big set + retailer exclusive digibook version and wide release of the digibook about 4 months later.

Jesus, a second crap-filled edition? Who the hell's going to buy this junk? Anyone who would probably bought the first one, and I doubt many of them would double dip just to get some stupid paraphanelia. There's no way that's going to make any money.

Also, Robert Harris' take on the old Blu-Ray disc:

Casablanca is a bit of a problem title, as the original elements were over-printed, with replacement sections the norm.

The most recent Blu-ray does a very nice job of evening out the problems.

IMHO, what we do not need is another Blu of Casablanca, especially when there are superb films with Mr. Bogart that need to be released on Blu.

hearthesilence wrote:Jesus, a second crap-filled edition? Who the hell's going to buy this junk? Anyone who would probably bought the first one, and I doubt many of them would double dip just to get some stupid paraphanelia. There's no way that's going to make any money.

According to the press release, this is an all-new 4K resto. I wouldn't buy it for the tchotchkes, but a 4K restoration is another matter. Hopefully there will be an edition with the film plus on-disc extras and without the trinkets.

hearthesilence wrote:Jesus, a second crap-filled edition? Who the hell's going to buy this junk? Anyone who would probably bought the first one, and I doubt many of them would double dip just to get some stupid paraphanelia. There's no way that's going to make any money.

And if that is the case, I'm sure Warners will use it as evidence that "people just aren't interested in non-Archive editions of old films."

zedz wrote:And if that is the case, I'm sure Warners will use it as evidence that "people just aren't interested in non-Archive editions of old films."

You could be right, zedz, but this is Casablanca. Surely there's at least one person at Warners who will realize that poor sales of an iconic film might be due to the inflated price from all the tacky crap packaged with said film.

The new 4K restoration is for me the real deal, especially when the former BD had the movie taking only 15 Gb (and only a DD 1.0 at 192 kbps track).

I just hope the edition without the goodies won't be too long to be released. I'm already perfectly fine with my older French edition, which is about the same as the older US UCE, but with less junk.

tenia wrote:The new 4K restoration is for me the real deal, especially when the former BD had the movie taking only 15 Gb (and only a DD 1.0 at 192 kbps track).

I just hope the edition without the goodies won't be too long to be released. I'm already perfectly fine with my older French edition, which is about the same as the older US UCE, but with less junk.

1st paragraph=bottom line

2nd paragraph=yes (my hopes as well)

Beaver on the new edition.. It does look incredibly dark but I've no idea how it was originally.

Edit: Link fixed!

Here is the bluray.com review.

The lossless audio is huge here, but does anyone think the PQ difference between this and the 2008 disc is substantial?

The new caps do look less like a show-offy BD transfer and more like film to my eyes, though I think I'll still hold out for at least a 75th anniversary edition.