Star Wars on Blu-Ray

Zubeneschamali

uprooted tradition wrote: »

The original in themselves are not what people want to see, they want Lucas to digitally remaster them convert the sound to Dolby give us a better picture quality but stop the tinkering there.

The originals are precisely what I want to see, as near to the original cinema quality as possible.

Lucas just isn't interested in giving that to the fans.

Kinski

uprooted tradition wrote: »

That is just a totally different situation. The difference is that the painting of which you speak no longer belongs to Picasso. There is one copy of it out there and someone bought and paid (presumably) for it. No matter how many copies of Star Wars in any form we buy, the films will always belong to Lucas to do with what he pleases. We can debate all day long whether or not he should make these changes but there is no argument that he can do it.

There is an even more direct comparrison here as well, how many times does a film get released and then get a "Directors cut", possibly the most famous being Blade runner. Most agree that the "tinkered" version was way better than the original cinematical release. By your argument that version would never have seen the light of day.

No, because Lucas said that no one has a problem with an artist continuing to alter a painting, which just isn't true. My point is that if an artist attempted to change a famous painting decades after releasing it into the public sphere, people would have a problem, and not just from a legal perspective.

I'm not disputing that Lucas owns the copyright to Star Wars, and is thus legally free to do as he wishes (but he won't own it forever); I'm saying that he's a jerk for not allowing fans to have high quality copies of the unadulterated original trilogy.

And I wouldn't say that films can't ever be changed after release. The Director's Cut of Blade Runner is better than the original theatrical release, but that's because Scott fixed issues that came about thanks to stupid studio interference, thus bringing the film closer to his intended artistic vision.

But in the case of Star Wars, calling Lucas the artistic force behind the original movies is questionable. He only directed the first, and his original rough cut was reportedly a mess, so the film was taken away from him and saved in editing. And he neither directed nor wrote The Empire Strikes Back, which everyone regards as easily the best entry in the series. On the other hand, he did write and direct all three of the prequels, and they are dire movies.

So while he may have the right to change the films, it's another question altogether if he is using that right for valid artistic reasons. And he's not.

NunianVonFuch

Kinski wrote: »

And I wouldn't say that films can't ever be changed after release. The Director's Cut of Blade Runner is better than the original theatrical release, but that's because Scott fixed issues that came about thanks to stupid studio interference, thus bringing the film closer to his intended artistic vision.

The problem I have with it is that he's made the original cinema versions extremely hard to get a hold of. Unlike Blade Runner which can still be obtained and is also a decent example of doing it right. I still prefer the original voice over version without the dream sequence but the thing is you can choose which you want, unlike Lucas who gives you only one option. Unless you hunt down one of the fanmade HD Theatrical versions on the web, which I highly recommend doing as the ruined scene in Return of the Jedi is enough for me to never watch any of the updated Star Wars versions.

uprooted tradition

Zubeneschamali wrote: »

The originals are precisely what I want to see, as near to the original cinema quality as possible.

Lucas just isn't interested in giving that to the fans.

As I said earlier, he gave us that a couple of years ago, the complete trilogy on DVD in its untouched form.

Morlar

uprooted tradition wrote: »

As I said earlier, he gave us that a couple of years ago, the complete trilogy on DVD in its untouched form.

Werent the DVD Triology the updated/tweaked versions ? FAIK the untouched ones were on vhs/laserdisc years previous to that.

Giruilla

The worst thing about Lucas putting the superb scene stealing dialouge of 'Noooooo' into the climax of a 6 hour loved epic is that we were barely even suprised when it happened...

He really has consitently proved that he has no idea why people actually loved star wars.

Voodu Child

uprooted tradition wrote: »

As I said earlier, he gave us that a couple of years ago, the complete trilogy on DVD in its untouched form.

It was very half-assed, non-anamorphic transfer (ie low resolution) and used a Laserdisc master that was already 13 years old at that stage.

Zubeneschamali

uprooted tradition wrote: »

As I said earlier, he gave us that a couple of years ago, the complete trilogy on DVD in its untouched form.

As was pointed out earlier, those were a long way from "as near cinema quality as possible".

branie

I'm getting my copy for christmas

jaykhunter

Zubeneschamali wrote: »

As was pointed out earlier, those were a long way from "as near cinema quality as possible".

i imagine films looked pretty awful in the cinema in the late 70s/early 80s though? full of blips and cigarette burns etc

Zubeneschamali

jaykhunter wrote: »

i imagine films looked pretty awful in the cinema in the late 70s/early 80s though? full of blips and cigarette burns etc

No, even the Ray Harryhausen-style monster in Jabba's basement looked pretty feckin good on the massive screen of the Ambassador back in the 80s. I was shocked at how woefully bluescreeny that effect looked on VHS years later.

Mind you, I went to see 2001: A Space Odyssey around 1980 in the Plaza Cinerama, and it must have been an original 60s print, with plenty of skips and splices. The film actually stopped and the lamp melted it at one point, to loud groans from the audience looking at a white screen.

jaykhunter

Fair enough. My memories of watching films in the cinema in the 80s in the Carlton, Ambassador, Savoy etc were that it looked like crap but the big screen is nice. In general i still think the picture quality is quite poor!

Voodu Child

jaykhunter wrote: »

i imagine films looked pretty awful in the cinema in the late 70s/early 80s though? full of blips and cigarette burns etc

Correct, release prints are expensive so in Ireland we wouldn't have been getting fresh ones. We'd have gotten ones that had already been in use for a few months in other regions. So full of scratches and dust.

Also, for digital restoration of older films, they sometimes go all the way back and scan the original negative. The original negative has significantly more detail and less grain than a release print would have had, so in many cases the BluRay that we get of an older film can look much better than it would have looked theatrically.

Unfortunately that's not the case with Star Wars on Bluray, very little effort was put into it.

That_Guy

A tweet from Xtravision just said that they're selling the collection for €59.99

Jimdagym

That_Guy wrote: »

A tweet from Xtravision just said that they're selling the collection for €59.99

This was mentioned in Bargain alerts. I think you get some half price rental vouchers with that too.

branie

Edits or not, they're still the same films

Zubeneschamali

branie wrote: »

Edits or not, they're still the same films

If Lucas just remade them, I wouldn't have a problem. Remakes happen all the time, and some are good. Going back and editing the originals 30 years later is something different.

It's like finding an album of family photos, opening it up and there's Jar-Jar photoshopped into your childhood.

kiwi_40

G-Money wrote: »

Yeah I haven't watched the original's yet. I watched all of the prequels yesterday. Episode 3 definitely looks better than Episode 2 and has less motion blurring IMHO.

Looking forward to seeing what they've done with the original 3.

Well GMoney have you watched the originals and what is your humble oppinion