here are my comments from my viewing this weekend, from my young frankenstein appreciation thread
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ok, Blu-ray review time. I was really concerned that the age of the film would prevent the movie from really looking much different than the previous prints we've had, not to mention the anamorphic disc from the boxed set which actually looked quite good. Fortunately that is not the case here. The print is INCREDIBLY clean with very little dust, scratches, etc. What there is a ton of on screen, and even more noticeable in HD, is film grain. We know Mel Brooks shot it intentionally this way, and it is heavily prevalent on the screen.. It is almost distracting, but it is very obviously true film grain, not digital artifacting, compression, or a filter. Just that before hi-def it was never this apparent.
The movie is great obviously. They offer an isolated score on one of the soundtracks and you can really see the emphasis that the soundtrack had on this movie. Most people agree that this is Brooks' most cinematic movie, and a lot of that can be attributed to him working to emulate the classic monster movies which were themselves very cinematic. The soundtrack is the same case, with a very obvious homage to classic horror scores while never working against the comedy.
I popped up some of the picture in picture commentaries and I don't know if anything in here will be new for most die hard fans of the movie.. it seems much is recycled either from the previous DVDs or just from the information we've already had. But for people who are just finding out about the movie or maybe aren't quite as nuts about it, the commentaries and PiP tracks are a great way to see how awesome the production was on this film.
So the disc is a major score.. both for die hard fans and newbies. About the only complaint is that it carries the typical Fox tax and online still goes for about $27.
Still, we all know there are movies from Fox (sigh...) that are still worth it even for that extra couple of dollars more, and I would say without hesitation that Young Frankenstein is one of those movies. Not only that, but this edition is loaded and looks amazing. I find it very hard to believe that there will ever be another version of Young Frankenstein worth replacing this one over.
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ok, Blu-ray review time. I was really concerned that the age of the film would prevent the movie from really looking much different than the previous prints we've had, not to mention the anamorphic disc from the boxed set which actually looked quite good. Fortunately that is not the case here. The print is INCREDIBLY clean with very little dust, scratches, etc. What there is a ton of on screen, and even more noticeable in HD, is film grain. We know Mel Brooks shot it intentionally this way, and it is heavily prevalent on the screen.. It is almost distracting, but it is very obviously true film grain, not digital artifacting, compression, or a filter. Just that before hi-def it was never this apparent.
The movie is great obviously. They offer an isolated score on one of the soundtracks and you can really see the emphasis that the soundtrack had on this movie. Most people agree that this is Brooks' most cinematic movie, and a lot of that can be attributed to him working to emulate the classic monster movies which were themselves very cinematic. The soundtrack is the same case, with a very obvious homage to classic horror scores while never working against the comedy.
I popped up some of the picture in picture commentaries and I don't know if anything in here will be new for most die hard fans of the movie.. it seems much is recycled either from the previous DVDs or just from the information we've already had. But for people who are just finding out about the movie or maybe aren't quite as nuts about it, the commentaries and PiP tracks are a great way to see how awesome the production was on this film.
So the disc is a major score.. both for die hard fans and newbies. About the only complaint is that it carries the typical Fox tax and online still goes for about $27.
Still, we all know there are movies from Fox (sigh...) that are still worth it even for that extra couple of dollars more, and I would say without hesitation that Young Frankenstein is one of those movies. Not only that, but this edition is loaded and looks amazing. I find it very hard to believe that there will ever be another version of Young Frankenstein worth replacing this one over.
I watched it on dvd the other day and I think it will look stupendos on bluray. Can't wait for BAHZ LUHRMAN'S Australia
