Home Video Can Now Have
Movie Theatre Quality
“Digital
Cinema,” HDTV and BluRay technology
level the difference between going out and staying home
(This page and those linked are revised
and updated from articles originally published in the High Plains Reader
in 2008-2011)
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PAGES STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION --
CONTENTS:
Home Theatre Options -- Photos of a Home Theatre Setup
Video Projector
Considerations
Movies to Show Off
an HD System
MOVIES, TV,
and HOME VIDEO
For the first half of the 20th century, in order to see
a movie, you usually had to go out to a movie theatre. Television changed all
that. While still experimental in the 1920s and 30s, it has been available
commercially since about 1939 now, and became widespread enough by the early
1950s that many viewers chose the convenience of home entertainment over going
out to movie theatres. (Hollywood responded by switching exclusively to various
widescreen formats in the mid-50s and periodically playing with 3-D ever
since.) Then the rise of home video in the late 1970s and 1980s made it even
more convenient to watch what you wanted whenever you wanted.
However, besides the fact that standard TVs cut off the edges of
the movie’s picture, the quality of the image and sound from a television set
could never even approach the quality of film at even the smallest local
cinema. High-end home audio systems helped force more theatres to install
stereo sound, but even the smallest multiplex theatres always had the advantage
of wall-sized screens and the superior picture resolution of 35mm film. That
is, they did until the “digital revolution” leveled the playing field. Now
high-end home video can rival or surpass more than a few commercial cinemas in
picture quality as well as sound.
Television broadcast specifications standardized in the late 1940s
and modified for color in the 1950s, were made obsolete by late 20th
century technological advances and a higher definition standard was devised in
the 1990s was expensive and not immediately embraced by the general population.
The introduction of DVDs in the mid 1990s showed the
public that larger and higher quality TV sets using the already existing
standard could display a picture much sharper than they’d been accustomed to,
even if the 4x3 shape did not match most films. The so-called “High Definition
Television” standard that has slowly (very slowly) been gaining popularity over
the past decade changed the shape of the picture to approximate what is seen in
theatres for many movies. The HDTV format, besides including much more detail,
used a wider 16x9 picture ratio of width to height (1.78:1) that was a
compromise midway between the original 4x3 (1.33:1) format and the 2.35:1
“CinemaScope” theatrical widescreen format. It was also very close the two
other major theatrical formats of 1.85:1 and 1.66:1, so minimal “letterbox” or
“sidebar” (“pillarbox”) margins would need to be
visible on most films.
By mid-2009, HDTV was theoretically supposed to be everywhere by
government decree. Its two megapixel picture is substantially
higher definition than what viewers have become used to watching at home -- six
times sharper than “standard-definition” broadcast television (and the best DVD
quality). However, this is still only a quarter to a sixth the resolution of a
good 35mm movie, which can contain the equivalent of 4000 to 6000 pixels across
the width of its image, although HDTV’s 1920 pixels wide by 1080 pixels tall is
close to the sharpness of a typical mass-produced film print shown in a modern
multiplex.
In 2005-06, the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers
established standards for digital cinema technology. Movies were to be played
from a computer hard drive in either a preferred 4K format (i.e., approximately
4000 pixels wide) with an eight megapixel image, or a
secondary and cheaper 2K format (about 2000 pixels wide) with a two megapixel image that is barely distinguishable from the new
HDTV broadcast standard everyone will eventually be getting at home. For
highest quality, the top-level Hollywood films are sometimes scanned to digital
video at an 8K resolution and downconverted for
theatrical and HDTV/BluRay/DVD use.
Almost immediately after the digital cinema standards were
established, a major film equipment manufacturer named Christie invested in digital
projectors and made a deal with the large Carmike
Cinemas chain and some independent theatres to switch technologies, installing
2K video projectors in place of the 35mm film equipment. Although only 100
screens worldwide were equipped for digital projection in early 2005, there
were over 1000 a year later and over 3000 by early 2007. It was in April of
2007 that the Grand Forks theatres all converted to 2K digital projectors
(although the Columbia 4 switched back to film when it became a dollar theatre
until it closed for good some months later). It’s estimated that most U.S.
movie theatres will be running some form of digital cinema rather than real
film by the mid-2010s. Photochemical film will likely become used primarily for
original production, special exhibition venues, and archival purposes, rather
than for mass distribution as has been the case since
the 1890s.
During this same period (2007-2011), both HDTV sets and home/office
video projectors dropped drastically in price, local TV channels started
broadcasting some HD programs, and cable companies added many more
high-definition channels to their premium packages. Then came BluRay DVDs, which in early 2008
won the marketplace battle with the rival HD-DVD format, and whose players now
cost a fraction of what they did three years ago (under $100 by summer 2009,
about the same as high-end standard DVD players).
What does all this technology and price shifting mean? It means
that the simultaneous lowering of theatrical standards and raising of home
video standards makes it economically practical for the average person to
invest in a home theatre that will equal (and perhaps surpass) many commercial
theatres. And with a typical window of only three to eight months between a
movies theatrical release and home video release, it becomes that much easier
to pass up theatrical screenings that wont look or sound any better than you
can see and hear at home.
And what that means, is that commercial theatres must stress the
service, environment, and overall experience that simply cannot be duplicated
at home, or they will evolve into places reserved for special events rather
than mass entertainment. There will always be certain movies that require a
group experience and the theatre-going ritual for their maximum impact (like
the big-budget summer blockbusters), but the average movie may soon need to
forego expensive theatrical releases to join all the other direct to video or
cable TV titles.
Of course all this is speculative, and
depends on a large number of consumers not only investing in decent home HD
equipment, but viewing it under optimum conditions. Even though the full HDTV
picture is six times sharper than standard television, the typical person with
a screen between 20 and 40 inches, viewed from across the room, may notice
little or no difference. Even on a standard definition set, from five or six
feet away the myriads of glowing dots that make up the TV picture all blend
together, looking virtually indistinguishable from a theatrical movie screen
viewed from the last few rows of the auditorium.
You can simulate a theatrical experience even with standard
television, by getting a bigger TV set or simply by sitting closer to the
screen -- say one to three feet away, instead of five to ten feet or more --
but that creates a problem: you will then be able to make out the individual
colored dots of the image. What the HDTV format really does is make it possible
to have a screen six times larger than you’re used to before you start to
notice those little glowing dots. This much larger picture, viewed from your
previous standard viewing distance, is what increases the dramatic impact to
something closer to a theatrical experience.
Prices on high-definition television sets and BluRay DVD players have been steadily dropping and
electronics store advertisements promise “we’ll help you build the HD theater of your dreams.” But how many movie theatres have
you been to, let alone dreamt about, where the screen is a glowing LCD, LED, or
plasma display hung on the wall? And do those “giant” 52-inch diagonal screens
they so lovingly describe (which are barely four feet wide and a little over
two feet tall) come even close to the theatre experience where the screens are
nearly wall to wall and stretch from two or three feet above the floor almost
to the ceiling? Watching a movie on a large flat-panel video display is more or
less equivalent to looking at a movie poster turned sideways.
The term “home theatre” has been very loosely
applied to any living room or recreation room used for watching TV. A 52-inch
widescreen LCD, LED, or plasma TV is a definite step up from a standard 20-inch
to 32-inch TV and can look pretty impressive in a small room (just as it is
more impressive to have full-size 27-inch by 40-inch movie posters on display
than 11x14 lobby cards or 8x10 photos). A large flat-panel television may be a
good choice for an apartment, or if you have a relatively small room, or need
to get a viewable picture in a multipurpose room with windows that cannot be
completely darkened. But how many movie theatres have you ever seen with
windows in the auditorium? And how many movie theatres use TV monitors as their
screens? Even digital theatres project the image from the projection booth. A
true home theatre needs a separate projector and screen, and at least two or
more rows of seating, or it can really only be called a TV room, rather than a
“theatre.”
So if you want a home theatre, forget about
getting a big-screen TV set to watch movies on. Save
that for watching TV shows and sporting events in an all-purpose rec room, where it doesn’t matter if the lights are on,
light is streaming through the window, and people are scattered around at random.
A dedicated home theatre needs a standalone video projector and as big a screen as the size picture it can show from the
opposite side of the room (from a shelf, table, ceiling mount, or through a
projection port from the adjoining room).
Using a projector rather than a big-screen
flat-panel TV provides both a larger image for the price and more film-like
look, but one of the biggest advantages is that you can keep the same screen
height for everything. A good zoom lens actually lets you make the picture
wider for widescreen movies (hence the term “wide” screen), instead of being
forced to watch it either shrunk to the “letterboxed” image or with the sides
cut off, as required on a fixed-size TV set. Note that if you use a projector
with anything less than “full 1080p” resolution, you will probably be
disappointed in the sharpness of its larger image. Projectors don’t have
built-in tuners, but they cost less than the large TV sets and can deliver a
much larger picture, larger than a wall in a house. If you need a tuner, just
use the one in your DVD recorder or VCR, and connect it to your antenna, cable,
or satellite box. Optimal viewing distance is roughly one to two screen widths
away from the picture, whatever the size of your screen.
Besides a good projector, to approximate a
theatrical experience it is necessary to have a decent-sized room that can be
made totally dark, a space maybe ten to twelve feet square, but preferably
larger. A basement or garage is often ideal for converting into a home theatre,
and a typical garages twenty-foot square space is roughly the size of the a
small auditorium in some commercial multiplexes!
The next step to make a room into a theatre is
providing seating for more than just a few people. Seating style is up to you
and your budget. Some prefer sofas and easy chairs (possibly with built-in cup
holders), while others insist on traditional theatre seats. Some people like
the flexibility of folding chairs (especially movie-style directors chairs) so
the room can be used for other things. Still others do a combination of all of
these, perhaps with areas having small tables for drinks and snacks.
If desired, for a few
hundred dollars worth of lumber and a few days of labor, you can build
platforms to give you stadium seating. Get some three-quarter-inch plywood
sheets and two-by-fours to frame and brace it. Use carriage bolts to attach
legs if you want risers on more than one level. Depending upon the size of your
seats and your room, the distance from one seat back to the one in the next row
(and thus the depth of each platform) might range from thirty inches to four
feet, and might be anywhere from eight to sixteen feet wide. Depending on the
height of your ceiling (a converted garage will
usually have more space), each row might rise in increments of four to nine
inches from the one in front of it.
It may seem too obvious to mention, but in a theatre the seats should all be facing the screen, rather
than each other as in a living room. The center of the screen should be near the
average eye height. A very large, almost wall-size home screen (perhaps three
to four feet tall by eight to ten feet wide), should be placed a few inches to
a foot below the ceiling, and two and a half to three and a half feet above the
floor. You’ll need to consider sightlines and projector location to avoid heads
getting in the way of other viewers or casting shadows on the screen.
To achieve the theatre look rather than the home
TV room look, the amplifier, BluRay player, and other
A/V equipment should be out of sight. They might be covered by black fabric
under the screen, located at the side or rear of the room, or in an adjoining
room with your projector. You’ll obviously want a 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound
system with a good subwoofer, and may want an amplifier that can handle BluRay’s various uncompressed audio options (through its
HDMI inputs), besides the compressed Dolby and DTS encoding that standard DVDs have.
In home theatres, video projectors are often
mounted to the ceiling (making it easier to avoid people standing up in front
of the lens), but you may prefer the flexibility of setting it on a table or
shelf so it can be portable. If your situation permits, you can cut a hole in
your back wall near the ceiling and use the next room as a projection booth,
just like a real theatre. You’ll need to take into consideration your lens zoom
range and projector size, as well as seating arrangement, before settling on
your installation spot. The projector should ideally be positioned flat, aimed
straight ahead at the dead-center of the screen, but most video projectors have
digital keystoning compensation adjustments if it
must be slightly off-center or angled up or down. If it’s not dead-center, then
changing aspect ratios with a constant height may require both a zoom and a
lens-offset adjustment instead of merely a zoom in or out.
Commercial movie theatres have perforated screens
so they can mount the speakers behind the screen, but their screens are
typically ten to twenty feet tall and fifteen to fifty feet wide, with the
front row about fifteen feet back from the screen. At your home viewing
distance of only five to twenty feet you would be able
to see the holes in the screen, so you’ll need a non-perforated screen with the
speakers set up on the sides and/or below it. Some people like the speakers
exposed to show off to their audiences. Others prefer to hide them behind the
screen masking (you may need a lighter-weight black fabric for your masking if
you choose this option, to avoid muffling the sound). Surround speakers may be
mounted on the walls near the ceiling, or inside the walls, or inside the
ceiling, depending on your room and the type of speakers you get. They might
even be placed on shelves or pillars that are ear-level or higher, rather than permanently
mounted.
Turning a room into a home theatre does not have
to be as expensive as many people (and home theatre supply companies) believe.
With a dark room and the increased brightness in today’s video projectors,
there is no need to invest hundreds of dollars for a premium screen unless for
some reason you need one that automatically rolls up and down. A smooth wall
painted matte white makes an ideal low-cost screen for any sized picture. A
good substitute is a four-by-eight or four-by-ten sheet of matte white wall
paneling, nailed or glued to a wooden frame to hold if flat. That can be
mounted directly to the wall or suspended from the ceiling by a couple of hooks
and chains. Just buy the lumber and hardware and do it yourself.
For a more professional look, buy some black
flannel or velveteen fabric to put up around all sides of the screen and mask
off its mounting framework, as well as your front speakers. Be sure that at
least your side masking is moveable, so you can adjust it to fit whatever size
image you are projecting (see below). If you have the inclination and money to
make it more fancy, add some motorized drapes, and/or
motorize the top, bottom, and side masking. Dimmers are a good idea for the
lights, and youll create a more theatrical feeling
with wall sconces and by painting the ceiling a matte black or navy blue (which
also makes a black ceiling-mounted projector less distracting). If your ceiling
is not already acoustic tile, youll find a rough
textured surface better for your audio than a smooth shiny surface.
If you have the luxury of designing a home
theatre space into a new construction or unfinished space, its
much easier to hide wiring in the walls or above the ceiling. This includes
speaker wiring, audio-video cables, and any special power cable requirements.
However, before finishing the walls, be sure to look into soundproofing costs,
or at least ways to minimize sound leaking into or out of your theatre room.
Soundproofing an existing room is likely to be prohibitively expensive, but
even minimal acoustic treatment can improve your audio experience to some
degree.
For the side and rear
walls you can either spend huge amounts for expensive acoustic paneling
designed for home theatres, or you could simply hang some drapes to help absorb
sound. Partial or complete wall carpeting is another option. If your room is
large enough to include a walkway behind your back row of seats, you might
decide to install floor-to-ceiling shelves on the rear wall designed to hold
your projector, amplifier, surround speakers, and/or DVD/BluRay
collection. Drapes covering side and rear walls will give your theatre the
modern multiplex look, but incorporating decorative wall patterns and
architectural ornaments you like will give some distinctive style to your
theatre. Some like the clean and sleek art deco style of the
1930s and 40s, while others prefer the classical Graeco-Roman
look, a more elaborate Baroque design, or some theme like American West,
Medieval Gothic, Egyptian, Persian, Chinese, Mayan, etc. Many often also
put up framed posters, movie stills, a few old film reels, or other memorabilia
around the room. Don’t forget the popcorn!
PHOTOS OF
A MODEST-COST HOMEMADE DO-IT-YOURSELF HOME THEATRE SETUP
VIDEO PROJECTOR CONSIDERATIONS
HDTVs can provide a
substantially sharper picture than the old NTSC (North American) and PAL
(European) video formats. However, as noted above, their new 16 by 9 (or
1.78:1) TV format was a compromise to get the most efficient pixel use for both
the old standard 1.33:1 (4 by 3) images and the theatrical CinemaScope wide
format of 2.4:1, while almost fitting the normal theatrical format of 1.85:1.
There has never been theatrical standard of 1.78:1 (although the rarely used
standard of 1.75:1 is very close). To display as originally intended on a 16 by
9 video screen, every theatrical film format must still either be pillarboxed on the sides or letterboxed on the top and
bottom to some degree, leaving some of the screen blank. Movies that fit a 16
by 9 screen exactly will either be cutting off image area originally seen above
and below (in 1.33, 1.66, or 1.75 ratios) or showing extra image not displayed
in theatres (in the 1.85 ratio or the Super 35 2.4 ratio). A CinemaScope 2.4:1 (or
sometimes 2.35, 2.39, or 2.55:1) or a 70mm films 2.2:1 image displayed on a
16x9 screen will have the sides of the picture cut off unless it is
letterboxed. A classic Academy Ratio 1.33:1 or a widescreen film in the 1.66:1
ratio will have the tops and bottoms cut off unless it is pillarboxed,
with very slight black sidebars for a 1.66 film and much wider black sidebars
for the old standard 1.33 (4 by 3) or the rarer and almost square 1.2 film
ratio.
With a video projector, all you need to do for
any ratio is zoom a letterboxed picture out (and pull out your side masking) so
the height stays filled. If your zoom lens doesn’t have enough range (a two to
one zoom range should be adequate), you may need to move the projector back a
few feet as well (thus ruling out a fixed projector mount). If your screen
surface is four by eight feet, you should permanently mask off the bottom so
that you wind up with a picture three feet four inches tall by eight feet wide
for your full scope picture. Then simply zoom your picture to fit the height
and pull in the black fabric you’ve hung on both sides to fit its width.
This will be anywhere from about four feet wide
for early sound films to almost four and a half feet for standard films, to
various widths between five and a half to six feet or so for typical widescreen
movies and about seven feet four for most 70mm productions. A few extra-wide
format films will still look letterboxed even at an eight-foot width with that
three-foot-four height, so a white wall will be more flexible than an
eight-foot wide screen, but that’s still better than being stuck with a pricey
80-inch 16x9 flat-panel screen (which would have the equivalent height and a
six-foot maximum width). Note that with picture ratios narrower than the
projectors native 16x9 (1.78:1), setting the side masking to match a films
1.66, 1.33, or 1.20 ratio will cover up the sides of the discs menus if those
are 16x9. Likewise, zooming out the picture to fit a 2.4:1 screen will cut off
the top and bottom of the menus. Also note that there
is a good chance you will need to readjust the focus after zooming from one
size to another.
Of course when you make the picture larger
instead of watching it letterboxed, it has a bigger visual impact but you can
also see the much lower image quality inherent in video, compared to actual
film. This is where a projector with a high-definition image really shows its
superiority over standard 480i television pictures. For regular DVDs, you’ll want a projector capable of at least 1024 by
768 pixels of resolution (which is a 4x3 image). Getting a native widescreen
projector that is either 1280 or 1344 by 768, and one with progressive scan,
will show noticeable improvement on widescreen pictures or with BluRay DVDs. Those sizes are
typically referred to as 720p high definition.
The best, naturally, is the full HD 1920 by
1080-pixel resolution, and you should look for a projector capable of
displaying 24p, which will show BluRay movies to
their best advantage, at the same frame-per-second rate
the films were photographed. (Otherwise, movies must be converted to videos 30
progressive frames or 60 interlaced half-resolution fields per second, like
standard-definition video and cheaper HDTV sets.) Then you can see HD movies at
home essentially the way they look in digital cinemas, at least in frame rate
and image resolution. BluRay discs and especially
HDTV broadcasts are heavily compressed to save on computer memory and
processing power, whereas commercial digital cinema installations use
uncompressed video, but most of the time the difference is barely noticeable,
if at all.
Video and movies shot at 30 or 25 frames per
second will look best projected that way, and actually have smoother motion
than movies and video shot at 24 frames per second, but all footage will look
its best when shown at its original speed rather than converted to any other
speed, which can result in noticeable jerkiness and ghosting. Also, the higher
the image refresh rate (typically 60 Hz, 120 Hz, or 240 Hz, or cycles per second),
the crisper the image is likely to appear and the more future advanced features
can be displayed.
Some consumers may be reluctant to invest in
high-definition and BluRay equipment because they
already have a large number of DVDs and resented
having to buy new copies of favorite movies on DVD after they’d already bought
them on VHS or keeping separate players for each technology. A high-definition
projector can display standard DVDs at their highest
possible quality, and the advantage to getting a BluRay
player, is that all BluRay players will also play BluRay discs as well as standard DVDs
and CDs (though possibly not VCDs).
There’s really no need to replace all your old DVDs once you get an HD projector. On a high-definition
projector, an upconverting DVD player (which includes
all BluRay players) can show well-encoded DVDs, especially those made from recent high-definition
masters, with a picture that can look nearly as sharp as a genuine 1080p BluRay image. However, all DVDs are not created equal. A poor or mediocre DVD
that looks acceptable or even pretty good on a standard TV set or a
medium-definition 1024 by 768 projector, may look
pretty ragged on an HD projector. Some projectors and players with excellent
high-definition pictures may handle standard-def better or worse than others. Another advantage of a video projector over a large
flat-screen monitor, is that virtually all projectors are designed to accept
the North American NTSC video signals as well as European PAL video, HTDV, and
computer inputs, whereas most monitors tend to be for either North America or
Europe only. This lets you see foreign DVDs (with a
multi-region player) the way they were encoded instead of converted to the
American standard.
Currently (in 2009) a full 1080p video projector
costs in the $2500 to $6000 range, with some very good ones available near the
low end of that range. This is a price comparable to the large LCD, LED, and
plasma TVs but with a vastly greater image potential and portability. Decent
1344, 1280, or 1024-pixel wide by 768-pixel tall (720p) projectors are near $1000. Don’t get an 800 by 600 projector unless you
like small pictures or big dots or prefer to watch everything in a 4 by 3
ratio.
Projectors may be either LCD (liquid crystal
display) or DLP (digital light processor) units. The DLP projectors often have
brighter pictures with wider contrast and more intense color for the price, but
unlike the three-chip theatrical versions, the single-chip home DLP projectors
produce a color rainbow strobe effect that many people find annoying. Some
people do not notice this effect, which is produced by projecting three
black-and-white images consecutively through red, green, and blue filters to
produce the illusion of full color. Others see it constantly, and still others
only when shifting their eye position to look across a wide picture. An LCD
projector eliminates this and the newer ones produce a picture just as good as
a DLP image.
Your projector may need some adjustment to
produce a more film-like image, since like flat-panel TVs many are preset with
artificial enhancements for daylight viewing that simply re-enforce their video
look. You can adjust the image by eye, or get hold of a DVD or BluRay disc with test patterns for optimum calibration. The
brightest picture will probably not be the best. You’ll want dark blacks
without shadows going murky and bright whites that don’t burn out highlights or
cause black levels to go gray and lower contrast excessively. Nevertheless,
contrast must be low enough to reveal shadow details without flattening the
overall image. Any sharpness setting should be turned off, as it is really nothing more than an electronic or digital edge
enhancer, putting artificially-generated haloes around objects to make them
stand out from the background.
BluRay DVD players, sold for
$1000 and up when introduced in June 2006, dropped to the $350-$500 range a
year later and down to under $300 in 2008, and briefly stabilized in 2009 in
the $130 to $250 range, with some models under $100. Player and disc sales
increased drastically after the competing HD-DVD format was discontinued in
early 2008.
Still, many people are questioning whether they
should make the switch to BluRay from standard DVD only
a decade after DVDs started to replace VHS tapes. New
movies are being released in both formats. As in the early DVD days, so far only selected older titles have come out on the new
format, but this is changing monthly.
More and more classic films are gradually hitting
the BluRay market and astounding many viewers that a
properly done high-definition transfer from original 35mm film negative
elements can make a 50-year-old picture look as good as a brand-new movie. The
people surprised by this fact simply don’t understand that today’s modern HDTV
video technology is finally catching up to sharpness standards that have
already been possible on correctly exposed and processed movie film for over a
hundred years!
A few key classics
already out on BluRay include Stanley Kubrick’s groundbreaking 2001: a space odyssey (1968), John Wayne’s The Searchers (1956) and Rio
Bravo (1959), the original Adventures
of Robin Hood (1938), several of the 1960s James Bond movies, the Godfather collection, the original Planet of the Apes collection, a couple
of Elvis pictures, and a set of 1950s Ray Harryhausen
sci-fi/fantasy films including The 7th Voyage of Sinbad
(1958). In 2008, Warner Home Video’s Casablanca
(1942) and How the West Was Won
(1962), and Fox’s The Day the Earth Stood
Still (1951) came to BluRay, as well as the
Criterion Collections now out-of-print BluRay version
of The Third Man (1949). Early in
2009 came Pinocchio (1940) from
Disney, The Robe (1953) and South Pacific (1958) from Fox, and Quo Vadis (1951),
An American in Paris (1951), and Gigi (1958) from Warners.
Some classics released
later in 2009 include The General
(1926), Its a Wonderful Life (1946), Snow White (1937), The Wizard of Oz (1939), and Gone
With the Wind (1939), and a few promised upcoming titles include Sherlock, Jr. (1924), Metropolis (1926), King Kong (1933), Stagecoach (1939),
The Maltese Falcon (1941), Dr. Zhivago (1965),
The Seven Year Itch (1955) Lawrence of Arabia (1962), Bridge on the River Kwai
(1957), and many more.
Prices on BluRay titles
are typically $5 to $15 higher than their standard DVD
counterparts, usually running from $25 to $40 each, but that too is
changing. Virtually every retailer sells BluRay discs
with at least a 10 to 30 percent discount off the suggested list price, some
more often at 40 to 50 percent discounts. After Thanksgiving 2008, stores
slashed prices on a substantial selection of titles to $15 each, and after
Thanksgiving 2009, some BluRay titles were under $8,
most going back up to $10-$20 after Christmas. However, those same movies can
often be found on line in the $7 to $12 range. Many mass market standard DVDs have plunged to the $5 to $10 range or less, yet the
normal DVD price is still in the $12 to $20 range.
Unlike the VHS to DVD technology revolution,
there is no need to replace old DVD copies with BluRay
copies. Not only do standard DVDs play in all BluRay players, but they usually (thought not always) look
better than they do in standard DVD players. Comparing the situation to the
audio recording industry, it is more comparable to the switchover from 78 rpm
records to LP records (old players couldn’t play the new format, but new
players could play both formats) than to the more drastic technology switches
from LP records to tape cassettes and then from tape cassettes to CDs.
The question of compatibility
and what is available to watch is no longer a deciding factor. Prices
have dropped substantially since the BluRay format
was introduced, but they are still dropping as the format becomes more
widespread. The only reason to spend the extra money on a BluRay
player right now instead of waiting, is if you already have a full 1080p
high-definition TV or video projector, or plan to get one soon (especially one
that is capable of displaying films 24 frames per second as well as videos
normal 30 frames/60 fields per second). A BluRay disc
cannot possibly look any sharper than a standard DVD if it is played on a
standard-definition TV monitor.
On any TV set, whether SD or HD, if it is smaller
than 40 inches, the average person will probably see no significant difference
in picture quality from a typical viewing position several feet across the room
on a sofa. The picture must be very large and/or the viewer must sit within
approximately one screen-widths distance away in order to notice much
difference.
On a 720p HDTV, especially one smaller than 40
inches, many people still will not notice a substantial improvement between a BluRay disc and a standard DVD that is played through the
component inputs with progressive scan. Even on a 1080p HDTV
it may be hard to see enough difference to justify going blu
on many movies that are transferred to standard DVD in the 1.33:1 aspect ratio
or in a 1.66 to 1.85:1 anamorphic 16x9 format. This is thanks to the upconverting capability of BluRay
players and many standard DVD players, which electronically soften the jagged
edges between scan lines and interpolate picture information to make a
well-authored DVD look nearly as sharp as if it were actually high definition.
(Ironically, they often look sharper than the standard-definition content
included on many BluRay discs!) Some people
apparently mistakenly believe they have HD-DVD players, when what they actually
have is an upconverting standard DVD player. These
will not play the discontinued (and
thus often very cheap) HD-DVD format discs, nor will they play BluRay discs. But they will make most standard DVDs appear sharper by doubling the existing scan lines and
sending out a 1080-line signal through an HDMI cable to an HDTV monitor. People
with 720p HDTV sets may be perfectly satisfied with their image quality,
especially if they mainly watch older movies in the 4x3 ratio. Those who have
1080p HDTV sets, and who see what BluRay discs are
capable of, on the other hand, can quickly become spoiled by the much shaper BluRay image.
MOVIES TO SHOW OFF AN HD SYSTEM
As people gradually upgrade their TV sets to high
definition models, those who get big-screen displays (40 inches or larger) at
the full HDTV 1080p standard, and especially 1080p projectors with wall-size
screens, will naturally want to show off their equipment at its best.
High-definition cable or satellite reception can provide a certain amount of
programming, but the convenience of DVDs means HDTV
owners will ultimately need to switch to a BluRay
player and start collecting and/or renting BluRay
discs. And if movies are what you prefer out of all the HD channels now
available, a BluRay player is a cheaper option than
subscribing to any of the HDTV services.
While the larger HDTVs
are still moderately expensive, there have been enough drops in prices on
players and discs to move BluRay products from
high-end technophile luxuries into the standard consumer realm. Many prices
tend to drop even further just in time for Christmas, so BluRay
versions of favorite movies might make perfect Christmas gifts for anyone with
a 1080p HDTV set.
Several BluRay releases
are especially good for demonstrating an HD home theatre systems picture and
sound capabilities, with a variety of suitable titles for different tastes or
moods. Some are notable for the unbeatable combination of entertainment value,
image and audio quality, and high-definition supplementary materials, all on
top of a recently reduced price to $20 or less. These would make great
additions to any growing Blu Ray library.
Arguably the best single BluRay
disc released in the first three years after the format’s debut is Lionsgate’s 2007 remake of the taut psychological western 3:10 to Yuma (although its sometimes
intense R-rated violence may turn off sensitive viewers). Russell Crowe and
Christian Bale head a strong cast in a powerful story well told. The picture
and sound quality are superb, and there is a directors
commentary, a few outtakes, and a wide range of featurettes and documentaries
(all in high-definition) about the making of the film as well as the historical
context of various story elements and Elmore Leonard’s original story itself.
There’s also an extensive interactive timeline covering historical events from
the 19th century. But this disc uses the BluRay
format to do even more with its interactive feature Inside Yuma. This allows
the viewer to watch the movie with a superimposed side menu that lets you see
your choice of the appropriate screenplay page, storyboard page, multi-screen
display of alternate angles for some scenes, or behind-the-scenes footage
(taken from the featurettes) for some scenes, all while the movie plays in the
background. About the only things missing are the classic 1957 film version
(although that’s been released on a separate DVD worth tracking down) and a
copy of the original short story.
Some may consider it ironic that some of the
best-looking and sounding films to be released on BluRay
are over a half-century old -- notably Paramount Home Video’s release of the
recently restored Cecil B. DeMille 1956 version of The Ten Commandments and Fox Home
Video’s release of the classic 1958 musical South
Pacific. Universal Home Video also did a superlative job in its
high-definition transfer of Alfred Hitchcock’s classic thriller Psycho (1960). Another excellent BluRay release to show off picture and audio quality (and a
more recent film) is Columbia’s offbeat 2007 musical, Across the Universe, which created a story inspired by the songs of
The Beatles. Sort of an alternately realistic and heavily stylized rock opera, its a must-have for any fan of the Beatles music or for
anyone interested in the decade of the 1960s, whose atmosphere it lovingly
recreates. The disc includes a directors commentary
and a nice selection of behind-the-scenes featurettes, plus some of the artwork
created for the film, again all in high-definition.
More family-friendly is Disney-Pixar’s 2007 Oscar-winning animated romantic comedy hit, Ratatouille. This has one of the
sharpest pictures currently out on BluRay, with
excellent sound quality. While unfortunately there is no audio commentary, it
brings over all of the standard DVDs bonus features
but in high definition, including two funny animated shorts, and adds some
interactive BluRay-only features plus some deleted
scenes (in storyboard form). Disney-Pixar’s 2009 Up is also an outstanding example of
digital animation on BluRay for picture, sound,
entertainment value, and interesting bonus features (all in HD), and not too
difficult to find at $20 or less. A bargain when you can find it for under $20
is Paramount’s Iron Man double-disc BluRay release of the 2008 hit superhero adventure with a
strong sociopolitical message designed to appeal to both left and right-leaning
viewers. Again with superlative picture and sound, its
packed with mainly HD special features, but alas no audio commentary. Warner
Brothers’ Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street is one of its
relatively few BluRay discs to have most of its ample
bonus features in HD, although again has no audio commentary. Still, Tim Burton’s eerily appropriate
vision for Stephen Sondheim’s gory musical melodrama
is a bargain at $15 and will provide a good test of a home theatres ability to
handle dark scenes effectively.
To show off fine picture details and audio
dynamics, any of the recent historical epics are perfect additions to a new BluRay collection, and the following titles can be found
for $15 or less. Zack Snyder’s 300 from
Warner Brothers is less realistic and more graphically stylized, but has a
director commentary and several worthwhile bonus features in HD. Wolfgang
Peterson’s Troy is better for both
plot and image variety but almost all its bonus features are standard
definition. Peter Weir’s fine sailing epic Master
and Commander has outstanding picture detail and delivers an incredibly immersive audio experience, but has very few bonus
features, all in standard definition except the trailer. Oliver Stone’s
double-disc final directors cut of Alexander
(Revisited) likewise is an ideal demonstration of high-definition image and
sound, but its bonus documentaries are all standard definition (although it
does have two different audio commentaries).
Universal’s fun 1999 and 2001 Mummy movies have
also come down in price substantially, but also have only SD bonus features. Warners has
an attractively priced four-disc set of Christmas movies on BluRay,
The Essential Holiday Collection. This includes such seasonal favorites as A Christmas Story (1983), National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
(1989), Elf (2003), and The Polar Express (2004 in 2-D only), each
with a few SD bonus items. Several of Lionsgate’s
flashier genre films from the 1990s and early 2000s typically sell for $10 or
less each, including Reservoir Dogs, Stargate, Terminator 2, Total Recall, and the first two Saw
movies. Most of these have few, if any bonus features, and not always in HD.
Many other recent theatrical releases and some
earlier catalog titles have recently dropped to half or less from their
original list prices on Amazon.com and other on-line retailers. These can
sometimes be found locally for the same or even cheaper rates by checking your
local BluRay dealers weekly (they often rotate titles
on sale). Quite a few of the heavily discounted BluRay
titles include only the feature in high definition, with few if any bonus
features, and those they do have are often only in standard definition. Theyre still a bargain if you like the movie and want to
see it with the same quality seen in digital cinemas although any given film
may or may not demonstrate the full capability of your picture and sound
system.
BluRay home video technology
has been on the market since June 2006, but sales were unimpressive until the
competing HD-DVD format was discontinued last year. Now, as high-definition TV
sales gradually increase, not only are dropping prices helping BluRay to cut into standard DVD sales of recent titles, but
more and more older films are finally showing up in BluRay
versions. Many can now be found in the $10 to $20 range comparable to standard
DVD prices a few years ago, and causing DVD prices from major studios to plunge
into the $5 and $10 range. Even though new releases on BluRay
are still usually marketed at substantially higher prices than standard DVDs, within a few months of their release
a surprising number of major titles drop to the $10 to $20 price range on BluRay, sometimes as part of box sets but often
individually. A website called Blu-ray.com keeps track of new releases and
daily price changes with a separate page for the latest top bargains. For
example, the same Hallmark made-for-TV movies that were once selling at the
bargain pricing of $15, are now as low as $4.99 on BluRay.
The Criterion Collection has long been noted as
the gold standard of home video distributors. One reason is for their
consistently high technical standards, from laserdisc to DVD, and now to BluRay. Even more important is their focus on titles that
represent significant works of major directors, styles, and movements from
around the world, covering the silent era through the present day. Anyone who
might decide to watch every film released by Criterion on DVD would wind up
with a broad understanding of international world cinema, and would recognize
the major influence of numerous specific films of the past upon later
generations of filmmakers (especially today’s film-school graduates). In
addition, the generally excellent picture and audio quality on Criterion
releases (which is usually higher than most other companies’ releases, often including
major studio releases of the very same titles) will demonstrate the
capabilities of a good home theatre setup, as well as how good older films can
look and sound.
Since December 2008,
Criterion has gradually been releasing new titles and re-releasing some of
their previous movies in the BluRay format, starting
with Carol Reed’s brilliant noir thriller The
Third Man (1949, British), Wong Kar-Wei’s
touching Chung King Express (1994,
Chinese), Wes Anderson’s offbeat Bottle
Rocket (1996, American), and Nicolas Roeg’s
peculiar sci-fi artfilm The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976, British). Since then fine BluRay versions from Criterion have included such major
international titles including The
Seventh Seal (1957), The Wages of
Fear (1953), The 400 Blows
(1959), Last Year at Marienbad
(1960), 8½ (1963), Yojimbo (1961), Sanjuro (1962), Lola Montes (1955), Repulsion (1965), Playtime
(1967), Pierrot Le Fou
(1965), Days of Heaven (1978), and
more.
Criterion’s select and growing group of arthouse classics were once staples of film societies and
revival theatres, and must be considered required viewing for any serious
devotee of cinema. Seeing these now in high definition from carefully restored
original film elements, after having only seen previous video editions or
beat-up 16mm film society prints, is like seeing them for the first time. The remastered BluRay discs often
look and sound better than they did in their original U.S. theatrical versions.
Typically higher-priced than popular mass-market studio releases, Criterions BluRay titles are usually in the $20-$30 range yet can
sometimes be found on sale (especially through Amazon) for under $20, cheaper
even than the DVD versions of the same titles! Starting in 2010, Lionsgate has started BluRay
releases of a number of international classics once handled by Criterion,
including Contempt (1963), The Ladykillers
(1955), and others.
Unfortunately, except for the James Bond
pictures, Disney cartoons, and a few westerns and war films, it is rare for any
pre-1970 titles to be carried by retailers in a market this size, so local BluRay player owners must order most of them on line (often
at substantially lower prices than local retailers have, anyway). For example,
in Grand Forks at least two stores carried the new BluRay edition of Woodstock
(1970) on its release date, yet the new BluRays of
Stanley Kubrick’s Dr.
Strangelove (1964), Ingmar Bergman’s The Seventh Seal (1957), or George
Stevens multi Oscar-winning The Diary of
Anne Frank (1959) were nowhere to be found. Strangelove turned up a month
or so later at one retailer.
Also, other than a few token major classics
(barely a dozen available by the end of 2009, including Casablanca, The Wizard of Oz,
It’s a Wonderful Life, etc.), all of
the older titles to hit BluRay are from the
widescreen era of 1953 and later. One reason for this, besides a somewhat lower
demand, is that many people with widescreen TV sets do not understand why there
must be black bars on the sides of the picture for non-widescreen movies (the
same people who dont grasp the concept of
letterboxing on standard TVs). More important, however, is that the widescreen
films display the most obvious image improvement from BluRay’s
hi-def capability.
As noted above, a 4x3
image on a properly encoded standard DVD can look nearly as sharp as the BluRay version when played with a DVD player that upscales the resolution to simulate HD (which every BluRay player can do); but widescreen films squeezed into
the standard DVD format show obvious degradation when blown up on a hi-def TV
set, compared with their HD versions. Hence, studios are choosing to put out fewer of
the old film rarities that DVD collectors have been enjoying the past several
years, and are sticking more to pop hits from the past 55 years for BluRay. There are a few 1.33:1 classics on BluRay, however, that have a breathtakingly sharp image
only hinted at in their already-impressive standard DVD versions. The
beautifully transferred BluRay versions of An American in Paris (1951), Quo Vadis
(1951), The Third Man (1949), Gone With the Wind
(1939), and The General (1926), among
others, prove that even 4x3-format films can benefit from the full-HD
treatment. So far, most of the older titles coming out on BluRay
are from the 1970s and 80s, and only occasionally the 1960s or 50s.
Still, its nice to get the chance to revisit
movies one saw while growing up (or never saw in theatres because one was too
young or not yet born) with a visual clarity and audio quality equal to, and
possibly better than they had in their original theatrical presentations. Its also great to catch up with films missed due to short
runs or that never made it to local theatres. Of course
this has been possible to do for some 30 years on tape, laserdisc, and then
DVD, but never with the potential to rival a commercial theatres presentation
until BluRay and hi-def home projectors became
affordable.
Anyone who still has only a standard-definition
television or a hi-def TV that is only 720p resolution and/or is smaller than
40 inches really has no reason to upgrade to a BluRay
player or to bother replacing DVDs with BluRay versions. An upconverting
DVD player with component or HDMI connections will do just as well. Many of the
older classics and special-interest DVD releases may take years to receive BluRay version and may never get any BluRay
release at all, so those with large collections of DVDs
will need to be satisfied with upconverted
standard-definition on many titles. The best DVDs,
properly encoded from high-definition masters, can still look amazingly sharp
through an upscaling player and a high-definition TV
or projector. However, the same movie on a properly mastered BluRay will look and sound noticeably better. People who
have a 1080p (so-called full HD) TV that is larger than 40 inches, especially
those with a 1080p projector, a wall-size screen, and a 5.1 or 7.1 surround
sound system, will quickly become addicted to the theatre-quality experience
they can get at home with well-encoded BluRay copies
of movies. They’re also more likely to devote a room to a dedicated home
theatre, rather than watch movies on TV.
Below are links to reviews of selected BluRay releases, plus few notable BluRay
releases of older catalog titles that have appeared throughout the short
history of the format, including The
Terminator, Robocop, Baraka, Saturday Night Fever,
some Criterion releases, and more.
OLDER MOVIES AVAILABLE ON BLU-RAY (an ongoing
listing)
A MODEST-PRICED DEDICATED HOME THEATRE SETUP