Over the past few nights we've watched......

Beowulf - we missed this at the cinema, and (ashamed to admit to not knowing the story) I found it enjoyable if a bit "strange" at the beginning..... Visually interesting with the whole CGI but real people kind of thing going on there....and yeah, we both agree'd Angelina's boobs had been CGI'd for sure......

300 - I fell asleep, I'd seen it before and was still coming off of night shift, but my gorgeous other half really enjoyed it, much to her surprise......think the six pack's had something to do with it though.....

Apocalypto - watched this last night, and am still thinking about it - totally blown away and gripped virtually from the start!! Mel did a great job, visually stunning with a great transfer to BD.....I see it "almost" won an oscar....

What you been watching lately.....???

Cheers,
Ali

We've just got Apocalypto on BD - watched it on SD & you're right Ali, a brilliant film, excitement from beginning to end; and what a good ending too!

We watched "30 Days of Night" the other night. A very superior horror film with some pretty scary moments, made even more so by the great picture quality.

Don't think I'll bother with 300 on BD. got it on SD & thought it was a load of old tosh!

just watched the new transfer to BD of 2001

absolutely breathtaking

cool - was interested how 2001 would look.......any extras on the disc??

Pan's Labyrinth and I Am Legend (for the second time for both, after seeing in the theater)

PL visually stunning. Most complain about the cheesy CGI on IAL, and I partly agree, but upon closer inspection at home, I could live with it. Being a fan of apocalyptic tales, I loved it overall. Omega Man in all it's cheesy glory was one of my faves as a kid.

We do not have Beowulf on BD here in the states yet, I think. I am not running out to see it anyway.

John

quote:

We do not have Beowulf on BD here in the states yet, I think. I am not running out to see it anyway.

Good plan....spend your money on something fun like sticking rusty nails into your eye sockets. This has to be the worst movie ever....

Cheers

Jim

Blood diamond, which came across well - good film.

And, er, 'Pirates'.....

Phil

quote:

Originally posted by Exiled Highlander:
John

quote:

We do not have Beowulf on BD here in the states yet, I think. I am not running out to see it anyway.

Good plan....spend your money on something fun like sticking rusty nails into your eye sockets. This has to be the worst movie ever....

Cheers

Jim

... The 3 'Pirates' on BD for £36 amazon 2 weeks ago - fine - I cannot envisage buying many on BD unless price is right/quality is significantly better than ordinary £3 DVD ...

Might however try '2001' ...

Problem with often overpriced limited BD catalogue at mo is that in this room there are about 10 DVDPs/about another 10 elsewhere in house, and so far only 1 (PS3) BDP ...

So far I have been completely underwhelmed by the whole Blu-Ray experience. Many of the discs I have seen have been extremely variable in quality, with some actually looking worse than their DVD counterparts - the new Fantastic Four film suffers from horrendous picture noise on BD, whilst the original film on DVD is stunning. Likewise, 300 on BD has a terribly noisy picture quality - I had the misfortune to see it on a £14 K projector hooked up to the latest Pioneer BD player and was severely disappointed. What's the point in buying a film on BD when there is actually no gain in picture quality? It's like those early CDs years ago which in truth actually sounded crap compared to the analogue discs that they were supposed to be replacing. I think Bd has great potential but so far there aren't many discs that I have seen that would convince me that their prices are yet justified.

I am Legend on Blu-ray. Excellent graphics but what the eck was it about?

No point in reading the book to find out PB, apparently the film's nothing like it!

I was really looking forward to seeing it but it ended up the most dissapointing film I have seen for a long time.

I quite enjoyed I am Legend. Well at least the first two-thirds anyway. I liked the sci-fi aspect of a grim desolation brought about by a civilisation destroying virus, the tension of roaming around a deserted city with the latent danger around every corner and the friendship between the only two survivors - Will Smith and his dog.

*** SPOILERS ***

I didn't particularly care for the slide into the zombie horror genre, 'God's little helper' or the nice optimistic ending.

For me, we should have had that slow, tense first two-thirds extended out to about twice the length, incorporating a few jump cuts forward by 10 years each time, to the point where Will Smith is simply too old and slow to survive. The last man on Earth eventually succumbing to the inevitable, through some simple but ultimately tragic mistake. Now that would be grim.

We watched "Master and Commander- the Far Side of the World" on BD last night.

For those who haven't seen it, a magnificent film, and it looks particularly fine on Blu-ray.

The standout feature of the SD DVD is the sound, and so it is with this disc - sensational surround sound, both during the sea battles which fair rattle the teeth and also with the subtle sounds of men moving around the ship.

Well worth acquiring!

Close Encounters of the Third Kind - Director's/Final/Superdooper cut.

Typically grainy 70's film stock in places, but quite gorgeous visuals in others. Unfortunately, the really interesting parts of the film happened at night and of course, they were pushing the film to its limits. Still it's an impressive and enjoyable experience if you like the movie (which I do).

The audio is touted as TrueHD and DTS-HD/MA. Well, I tried it on a Sharp BD player through an Onkyo TX-SR875 and could barely tell any difference between Uncompressed PCM, Dolby Digital and straight DTS (the Sharp can't stream DTS-HD/MA). Big deal. Very unhappy about that. Accepting it for what it is, the soundtrack is good.

quote:

Originally posted by Chumpy:
... The 3 'Pirates' on BD for £36 amazon 2 weeks ago - fine - I cannot envisage buying many on BD unless price is right/quality is significantly better than ordinary £3 DVD ...

Might however try '2001' ...

errr, not that Pirates....

2001 BD is stunning - looks amazing!

Phil

I haven't got it or seen it yet, but all reports state that Blade Runner is amazing on BD for both video and audio.

Hey Phil, what's the audio like with 2001? Specifially, what are the codecs used?