UHD Titles Worth/Not Worth Upgrading [Archive]

[MichaelB]

Was it shown with subtitles theatrically? If not, I'm not bothered.

[therewillbeblus]

No it wasn't, and it doesn't bother me either. Just saying that it's one title where the option might be more significant for some

[nicolas]

No it wasn't, and it doesn't bother me either. Just saying that it's one title where the option might be more significant for some

Are there any on-screen titles or texts that Eagle translated into Italian?

[nicolas]

Bad Lieutenant and Cry-Baby arrived and I’ve taken a look at them. I can confirm that Bad Lieutenant looks very good throughout with the main reason likely being that so much of the film plays at night and the relatively subdued HDR grade compared to other KL titles, hence less problematic highlights and barely any detail loss. For unknown reasons, KL don’t state any more whether their maters are director-approved but from the looks of it, either Abel Ferrara or the late Ken Kelsch supervised or approved this. Sound is a mixed bag but I can’t truly confirm. The 5.1 sounds awful to my ears with what I think is unnatural separation of elements compared to the 2.0, which is more "boxy". Take that with a grain of salt though. I think this is a blue tier disc.

Cry-Baby is almost a disaster. They placed this 85-minute film on a barebones BD-100 and it looks as if 5 hours of footage was on that one disc together with an Atmos track. Horrifyingly bad in brighter shots and pretty much any time white things are on screen (shirts, curtains, table cloths,…). No grain is visible there but pulsating pixel blocks every second. If one’s aware of this, you can’t unsee it. Darker shots and those with primarily other colors (even within shots that feature white) look better. The restoration itself looks spectacular and the colors are gorgeous. I never had the old BD but it was apparently one of the worst catalogue titles from Universal with their infamous filtering and edge-enhancement. The DC on BD looks like every other KL title on BD. Heavily low-pass filtered but consistent throughout. Also disappointing that it wasn’t made available in 4K via seamless breaching but I guess their authoring house has no idea how this works when looking at the Fear and Desire disaster.

Hopefully another label picks this up together with the huge set of new extras. This is a disappointing release solely due to the encode. (I really hoped Bad Lieutenant marked a turnaround for them after the many disappointments).

[Finch]

Figures they'd fuck up the one title I was interested in getting from them in a long time. Hopefully Arrow/Radiance (or maybe even Eureka) to the rescue.

[nicolas]

Figures they'd fuck up the one title I was interested in getting from them in a long time. Hopefully Arrow/Radiance (or maybe even Eureka) to the rescue.

You mean Cry-Baby, right? If you’d like I can do some screenshots once I’m back at my computer to give you a few examples and whether the UHD is worth it for you. I remember you mentioning that you haven’t upgraded to 4K. Maybe the artifacts are less prominent in HD but they will be once you see the film in all its glory.

[Finch]

Appreciate the offer, nicholas, but I'm happy to wait and see if a UK label picks Cry Baby up. I've bought so many Kino titles only to see them bettered over time that I don't see the point in buying from them anymore unless they really hit it out of the park (Five Graves To Cairo is better than the MoC and they did well with The Good The Bad and The Ugly).

[Finch]

Sony's customer service told a BR member that the new Taxi Driver 4K will be the corrected disc without the duplicate shot and released on July 7.

[therewillbeblus]

No it wasn't, and it doesn't bother me either. Just saying that it's one title where the option might be more significant for some

Are there any on-screen titles or texts that Eagle translated into Italian?

Yes, there are two Italian sub options - the second is just for on-screen titles. It's the default setting (so is Italian for language, but you can change that in the "setup" menu - which is in English) so you need to manually use your subtitle button on your remote to remove them.

[mfunk9786]

Seems as though some users on Blu-ray.com's forums are having something of a meltdown over Cry-Baby having poor/blocky compression, but LQ and I watched it last night and it's a stellar 4K disc that looks great throughout, so I don't know whether to believe my own eyes or not.

[nicolas]

Seems as though some users on Blu-ray.com's forums are having something of a meltdown over Cry-Baby having poor/blocky compression, but LQ and I watched it last night and it's a stellar 4K disc that looks great throughout, so I don't know whether to believe my own eyes or not.

I’ve started what turned into a meltdown by posting screenshots of the UHD, which triggered one user who feverishly claimed that everything’s alright with the disc and the handful of us “videophiles” are yelling into an echo chamber etc. The counterpoints to that guy’s talk are well-founded though, so it’s worth reading the two or three pages with none of the usual rabbit hole BS that bloats some of the threads over there.

To bring it back to your point. I’m of an entirely different opinion but I do respect your POV and am happy that you’re able to enjoy this disc, which I’m not because I can’t unsee the issues. Feel free to check out your disc once again and try to spot the problems in the white areas. My screenshots on the other forum confirm what you should see on your screen in both Dolby Vision and HDR10.

I’ll only post this one example in order not to blow-up the thread too much with all the caps that are on BR.com anyway. This is an excerpt from one of my screenshots to give you a glaring example about what’s wrong with Cry-Baby beyond the issues in every area where something white is visible:

[mfunk9786]

Didn't realize you posted about this upthread here, too - sorry for missing.

As for the screenshots over there and the one here, at risk of sounding like a fool, I genuinely don't see the problem with any of them, nor did any of this catch my eye last night as being off. Would like to think I'm not blind to these things, but perhaps I am. I also think it looks better in motion than in stills - there's a really charming look to building exteriors in this film, especially.

[mhofmann]

I’ll only post this one example in order not to blow-up the thread too much with all the caps that are on BR.com anyway. This is an excerpt from one of my screenshots to give you a glaring example about what’s wrong with Cry-Baby beyond the issues in every area where something white is visible:

(screenshot with loads of weird artifacts)

Ouch, this looks bad… I’m not sure how one can not see these issues.

[tenia]

As for the screenshots over there and the one here, at risk of sounding like a fool, I genuinely don't see the problem with any of them, nor did any of this catch my eye last night as being off.

Grain is splotchy and blocky, and there's also big plaques of chroma issues.

[hearthesilence]

Yeah, I'm looking at it right now on an old MacBook Air and that splotchy and blocky quality of that image is glaringly obvious. At the right angle (like when I tilt the screen up a few degrees), it looks like she's got vitiligo. Maybe some displays can be more forgiving, but not the one I'm looking at.

[nicolas]

Yeah, I'm looking at it right now on an old MacBook Air and that splotchy and blocky quality of that image is glaringly obvious. At the right angle (like when I tilt the screen up a few degrees), it looks like she's got vitiligo. Maybe some displays can be more forgiving, but not the one I'm looking at.

Here are all my full-size caps:

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[tenia]

This looks like prime rubbish encode. There are frames like looks perfectly fine like this one, but also this one that's encoded by LEGO, this one that is OK grain wise but has chroma issues, this one that has both chroma issues AND a texture readied for Youtube at 480p, and this one with good ol' plain blocky sky (but no chroma issue) fondly reminding me of those god-awful Pixelogic Criterion encodes like My Own Private Idaho.

This is insane to display such a variety of issues on a single title that's encoded at 75 Mbps AVB, and it's hard not to think that's exactly what you get when encoding in a set-and-forget way : the encode will run the full gamut from perfectly fine to all the possible different issues you can get, and everything in between.

[nicolas]

This looks like prime rubbish encode. There are frames like looks perfectly fine like this one, but also this one that's encoded by LEGO, this one that is OK grain wise but has chroma issues, this one that has both chroma issues AND a texture readied for Youtube at 480p, and this one with good ol' plain blocky sky (but no chroma issue) fondly reminding me of those god-awful Pixelogic Criterion encodes like My Own Private Idaho.

This is insane to display such a variety of issues on a single title that's encoded at 75 Mbps AVB, and it's hard not to think that's exactly what you get when encoding in a set-and-forget way : the encode will run the full gamut from perfectly fine to all the possible different issues you can get, and everything in between.

And especially for a film that's just 85 minutes long on a barebones UHD-100 with only two audio tracks, a commentary and not a single extra on that disc.
Fear and Desire was a disaster already with their encoder being too stupid to figure out how seamless breaching works but Cry-Baby is another level of bad.

Even Criterion whom I've criticised a lot last year in particular have significantly improved their encoding of this year's editions, which tells me it is possible to do solid, unspectacular encodes even when authoring houses are average at best. It's all a matter of effort and Criterion / NexSpec appear to have figured out a consistency in encoding even among their increasing UHD output. Shout and Duplitech learned the lesson as well, thankfully.

[mfunk9786]

I appreciate the added context, because I suppose I can indeed see the issues in some of the white clothing (particularly the screenshot tenia says was "encoded by LEGO"). But in motion, none of this leapt out at me as anything beyond film grain/in-camera quirkiness. Again - I am playing the part of the fool in this conversation, but nicolas, I appreciate you going another round through explaining your repulsion from this disc, because I definitely do see now what you're trying to point out.

[tenia]

Compression issues can be tricky to perceive, both in motion and static, for multiple reasons. To be fair, if some don't perceive them while spinning a disc, they're the lucky ones !

[nicolas]

I appreciate the added context, because I suppose I can indeed see the issues in some of the white clothing (particularly the screenshot tenia says was "encoded by LEGO"). But in motion, none of this leapt out at me as anything beyond film grain/in-camera quirkiness. Again - I am playing the part of the fool in this conversation, but nicolas, I appreciate you going another round through explaining your repulsion from this disc, because I definitely do see now what you're trying to point out.

My pleasure! I’m glad the added context was helpful and maybe it’ll catch your eye in motion, too. If not or not as intensely, no worries. Hopefully you’ll enjoy your copy for a long time.

[Finch]

Geoff gives the Chinatown 4K a thumbs up on the other forum: Now, the really important question is if they've done right by South Park Bigger Longer Uncut? [-o<

[nicolas]

Addition to the non-English friendly master list under the blue category.

Nagisa Oshima's In the Realm of the Senses and Empire of Passion were released by Carlotta in a set. The films are on 2x BD-100 discs in SDR and not English friendly.
The resolution upgrade is strong and encoding excellent by LSP but these are Éclair restorations with their signature color tint.
Caps for the two UHDs + the bonus film A Woman Called Abe Sada on BD at the bottom of this page: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.ph ... st22209390)

[Finch]

Withnail and I Arrow 4K

Bound Criterion 4K

[nicolas]

Arrow’s American Gigolo looks like one of the best releases of the year: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.php? ... tcount=160

Encoding is confirmed to be by David M.