8/30/2017 0 Comments Download Cinefex MagazineThe Star Wars Trilogy. This release was a milestone in it's time. Released in the summer of '9. CAV format across 9 laserdiscs. All the movies had been remastered to THX standards, with the video cleaned up by state of the art techniques (more on those later), and the soundtracks remixed from original elements. The box also housed a special printing of the full Charles Champlin George Lucas biography. Here is one from Rolling Stone Magazine: THE ? It's The Star Wars Trilogy: The Definitive Edition (Fox). Here at last, in wide- screen with peerless picture and sound, are Star Wars (1. The Empire Strikes Back (1. Return of the Jedi (1. Put on the first of the 1. George Lucas' saga of Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill), set in . The effects got bigger in the second and third movies, and the relationship between Luke and the masked Darth Vader (dark father) grew deeper and more twisted. But it's the way the trilogy captures the kick of a rainy- day adventure at the movies that makes it indispensable. Faults? Turning over nine CAV discs means a lot of getting up and down; several of the side- breaks are jarring; the audio commentary is sparse and, when Lucas speaks, disappointingly vague. But nobody skimped on the movies themselves. The Force was with them.~~~~~~~~By PETER TRAVERS . What to ask for . Here's a Best- of- the- Year List for everyone. As the holiday season approaches, and friends and relatives are stymied over what to buy you for Christmas, but they know a laser disc would be greatly appreciated, perhaps a Best of the Year list would come in handy? Let's assume you have ten gift- giving friends and/or relatives. Let's assume further that one disc in most cases would be the extent of their generosity. IMAGO EDIZIONI ON LINE Via Lago dei Tartari, 73 - 00012 Guidonia Montecelio (RM) P.I. 0 8 7 3 0 5 0 1 0 0 7 Tel./Fax 0774-1920506 - E-mail: [email protected]. Publication with a focus on independent film, offering articles, links, and resources. One stop for all theatre and movie information. Show times, trailers, news, movie details, and online ticketing. Cineplex.com has entertainment covered. A few may be big spenders- -so you would make theirs a Criterion super- disc, or a boxed set. From the rest you can expect a modest $3. The Star Wars boxed set is the item of the season. There have been other auspicious laser debuts this year, but none to equal it. If you have lower back problems, you should proceed with caution, for the black containment box weighs in at nearly fifteen pounds. It is the second most cumbersome American disc container of all time. What is found inside, however, is a veritable treasure trove. All three films are presented in the CAV frame- by- frame- perusal- function, which accounts for most of the eighteen sides. I feel this way: about the series there is one great film (Empire), one important film (the original), and one silly sellout (Jedi). But they belong together, and I can't imagine anyone not wanting them all. Anyway you don't have a choice here, so there's no use thinking about it. Fox did release them separately a few years back, and they are still available, but they've been digitally remastered here and the 'fanatic consensus opinion' (FCO) is that they've all been considerably improved. The sound has been transferred, as well, by Skywalker Sound North, and little details have been added. The FCO is not unhappy about this (and since many well respected laser collectors and reviewers are also members of FCO, I've polled them as thoroughly as possible about this release) since the THX monitoring program that tweaked this set into shape was fathered by George Lucas himself . More pictures than text, it nonetheless impresses with its reminder of just how many major pies he's had his fingers in. I'd forgotten about Coppola's Tucker: The Man And His Dream, Schrader's Mishima, and Henson's Labyrinth, not vastly successful, but worthwhile undertakings. ![]()
And when will Captain EO, his rare collaboration with Michael Jackson, see the light of laser? There are extra audio track interviews with Lucas, production illustrator Ralph Mc. Quarrie, special effects directors Dennis Muren and Ken Ralston, Sound Designer Ben Burtt, and puppeteer/voice actor Frank (Yoda) Oz. Each of these is clearly indicated in a booklet of chapter- stops enclosed next to the Lucas tribute book. FCOs feel the interviews are less substantial than they could have been, but I don't anticipate any disc returns because of it. There have also been pressing defects reported, but in this case you should return the collection, and replace it with an immaculate copy. There are also behind- the- set stills, drawn storyboards and video storyboards, production sketches, rare footage, a music video for Jedi . As you can tell, the $2. I wonder if the THX Laser Disc Program, which so diligently supervised the production of this package, also designed the box itself? Sturdy, which so many aren't, it also has a fold over flap with a velcro swatch to hold the entire collection snug and secure. A cute and efficient design. Issue 1. 1/1. 2, p. To be fair, even today many of them are only really visible when moving through the movies frame by frame, or if you were unlucky enough to pause the movie on a frame like this one: For anyone scratching their heads, take a good look at the guy walking between the camera and the land speeder and you'll see that his legs are transparent. This was caused by a temporal noise filter which was comparing the current frame to the next and previous frames and copying pixels from those other frames where they were different only on the current frame. This can be a good way to clean up dirt, or . This is why automated cleanup processes should be used sparingly. There are many other examples, but this is one of the more egregious. However, as I said, when you see it in motion this sort of problem is hard to spot even if you are looking for it and on the whole the cleanup process greatly enhanced the viewing experience. I was 1. 9 when these were released and I don't remember me or any of my friends complaining about . To us on our 1. 9. By today's standards, not so much.. Here is a good comparision video: Before the THX cleanup and after (The top video is from the 1. Japanese Special Collection Laserdisc, while the bottom is from the Definitive Collection): Download this file (Right click the link and choose 'Save Target As..')As you can see, the color timing has been altered (don't ask me which is closer to the original theatrical colors - as far as I can tell nobody can agree on exactly what the colors were when projected in theaters!), there is less dirt and fewer scratches on the definitive edition and for most viewers - especially those now used to seeing movies on higher resolution DVD and Blu- ray discs - the reduction in film grain in the THX picture makes it look cleaner. Let's slow down the video on just the speeder pass: Download this file (Right click the link and choose 'Save Target As..')Now you should be able to see more clearly just how much of the dirt and scratches was successfully removed, and that if the technology had existed to manually clean the film up frame by frame on a computer rather than applying a single filter to the whole scene, it might have turned out much better. The Star Wars Trilogy Definitive Collection Laserdisc set can still be found (even new and sealed) on Ebay, but even with the additional dirt and scratches I think I would look for the Japanese Special Collection myself, since like the Definitive Collection they also came formatted in CAV. Japanese laserdiscs command a higher price if they come with their original OBI, a price/information strip that is common on Japanese media but often discarded by the original buyer, so if that is not important to you, you may be able to find what you are looking for a little cheaper. Unless you really want the laserdiscs (and to keep getting up and down to flip or change the disc) you would be wise to seek out the 2. DVDs. Here is how these DVDs compare to the Definitive Edition laserdiscs (laserdisc on top, dvd on the bottom): Download this file (Right click the link and choose 'Save Target As..')As you can see, they are very similar, but the small details (look at the stars) are much sharper on the DVDs, plus you don't have to keep getting up to change the disc.
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