Deep Red - The Reviews

[DeHumph]

Watched this for the first time the other night and loved it. Definitely up there with my current favourite Suspiria. That said, the only other Argento's I’ve seen so far are Inferno, Opera & Two Evil Eyes. With the exception of Opera, I found them a little disapointing.

Looking forward to the upcoming Argento Blu-ray's, particularly Tenebre.

[Gojirosan]

extras, no matter how informative and numerous they are, are just that - extras. For me, it's all about the presentation of the film itself, and personally, given the choice between a feature-packed disc with a decent transfer and a bare-bones one with a superb transfer, I'd pick the later without a moment's hesitation.

Oooh! A man after my own heart! Phew! I thought I was alone!

[Sargento]

Yahoo! My Deep Red BD arrived today from HMV (at last! ... they aren't usually this slow)

Well I feel really really bad for this, but I am a little underwhelmed! Sorry guys! I have been comparing it to my AB US DVD and I don't really see much of an improvement image wise. There is a lot of dirt present which I hoped would have been cleaned up a little. Now, I must say that I never seen a film as old as Deep Red transferred to BD so I cannot really comment as to how well older films should look. But comparing this to the BD of Suspiria - Suspiria trounces this release image wise. I suppose it all depends on the source material of course, and I know this is the best Deep Red is EVER going to look in it's complete form - but it still does leave me feeling a little underwhelmed. Audio wise I was expecting both English and Italian 5.1 audio for the Director's Cut, but we only have 2.0 for the English track! Quite disappointing really as the Italian mix on the disc sounds terrific .. but I would like to have had the same for the English audio. Now these are my first impressions ... and I am tired after a stressful day at work, so I will of course re-visit and watch in full when I am better suited guys.

Sorry guys, but that's how I feel about the release at the moment

[Nemesis]

I'd have to go with the former - with the prices one has to pay for blus nowadays, particularly in-store, I need more bang for my buck and for me, a bare-bones release, even if it does have the best transfer in the world, does not justify paying £15-£20. Provided the transfer is not seriously flawed, a la Predator Ultimate edition, I'd rather have a decent picture and some extras which celebrate and give insights into the film.

[Stephen@Cult Labs]

Hey sargento, no need to apologise for expressing your opinion. The release seems to be dividing a lot of people out there, so don't feel like you have to say sorry for saying something negative (and that goes for everyone).


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[Sargento]

All the reviews I have seen have been glowing, so I may have been a little over-expectant maybe ... but I am tired like a say .. and maybe grumpy!! So I will give it another spin. I just don't feel it is the same quality of say Arrow's COTLD.

Shame.

[bdc]

I'll be giving it a spin later tonight...I am well rested and quite jolly.

[doolahrock]

Originally Posted by Sargento

All the reviews I have seen have been glowing, so I may have been a little over-expectant maybe ... but I am tired like a say .. and maybe grumpy!! So I will give it another spin. I just don't feel it is the same quality of say Arrow's COTLD.

Shame.

I agree with your initial post on the DR Blu. I felt pretty underwhelmed as well to be honest and totally share you thoughts regarding Suspiria as a comparison. I watch my discs on a 720p projector and, yes, I know it's a 1080p transfer but as Sargento says there really isn't a huge difference between this disc and the up res Anchor Bay DVD....which isn't even PAL.

Now, to be fair I haven't watched the whole film. Just the opening 10 minutes or so on both discs as I was curious to see the difference. So, my main focus was on the scene in the theatre when we are introduced to Helga. At moments that should 'pop' like the close up of the lips it almost gets there but not quite.

There are moments of softness in both the DVD and Blu so they are most likely down to the film itself.

In comparison, Suspiria really 'pops' in the close ups and genuinely looks like it could have been shot pretty recently even though it does have some obvious flaws.

There's also a tremendous amount of grain/noise in the image. I don't know if Arrow have been pressured by some of the crazy 'grain is film' chat on the forum but it's quite distracting at times (Hemmings in daylight before he enters the house of secrets for example).

For instance, with softer transfers I quite like to pump up the sharpness on the projector which usually helps without being too intrusive. I tried this on DR and the grain just went through the roof. First time I have ever seen it anywhere near this bad.

I'm no expert, although producing video is my profession I'll never claim to be an expert on transferring film to disc. I guess I was just expecting more from the early reviews.

The packaging is fantastic and I'll say for sure that this is the best this film looks to date. I just feel someone, somewhere can get more from this classic.

[Phantom]

Oh, and it's also worth noting that there is a fairly noticeable glitch at the 00:45:27 mark, during which the image briefly disintegrates into severe blocking. I've checked this with multiple BD players and playback software and, in case anyone's wondering, it's present to the same degree on all of them, pretty much ruling out any likelihood of this being a player issue. It's minor, but it does take you out of the film momentarily. The same moment is also affected in the 105-minute cut. The problem does NOT appear in the WMV-HD version.

I'm interested in how this 'glitch' will fare on my Oppo player. My copy should be in early next week.

[springjack]

Originally Posted by The Limey

Here is the Land Of Whimsy's take on the Deep Red BD:

"Overall

All told, I'm of two minds about this release. The extras are plentiful, the sound is good (despite the lack of a lossless English option), and I'm sure many will welcome the ability to watch both cuts of the film in high definition (though for me the full-length 127-minute cut is the only one that matters). The image quality is rather iffy, but it's unclear how much better it could reasonably have been expected to look.

I know quite a few people intending to pick up the upcoming Blue Underground release have been waiting to find out whether the extras alone justify the purchase of the Arrow version. That's a question I can't really answer: this is one of my favourite films and I was always planning on picking up both editions anyway. For those only intending to buy one or the other, we'll have to wait for the BU release to see how it compares to Arrow's version on the audio-visual front. Different people will have different views on this matter, but this is mine: extras, no matter how informative and numerous they are, are just that - extras. For me, it's all about the presentation of the film itself, and personally, given the choice between a feature-packed disc with a decent transfer and a bare-bones one with a superb transfer, I'd pick the later without a moment's hesitation.

Of course, this is all rather academic at the moment, given that BU's release is a good three months off. So, should you buy the Arrow version now or wait and see what the competition looks like? That's not a question I'd feel particularly comfortable answering. The only advice I can give is to read my review (as well as the various others floating about the 'net) and decide how you want to play it."

Land of Whimsy

I started to dislike that guy some months ago...

For a so called "Argento Expert" he is a real dick.

Could you believe it said this about Arrow´s Inferno:

"The first ever BD release of INFERNO could have been something really special in the looks department. Instead, it's basically a case of "It'll do until something better comes along."