Sony's Blu-Ray player the BDP-S1
© Sony
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen on Blu-ray
By: John SinnottDate: Sunday, December 03, 2006
Well, there’s not a lot of exciting news this time around. With the holiday buying season in full gear, most of the exciting announcements have already been made by the studios. Here’s what I’ve been able to dig up:
Saw III to be released on Blu-ray: Lionsgate will release the third installment in the popular Saw movie franchise on Blu-ray on January 23, 2007, the same date that the movie will come out on SD DVD. The standard definition disc will be available in both R-rated and uncut versions, and there is no word yet on which one will be on the Blu-ray disc. We’ll keep you informed.
Sony’s Blu-ray player finally shipping: One of the biggest snafus in a launch that has been filled with screw-ups has been the fact that Sony, the company behind the Blu-ray technology, has not released a Blu-ray player. Originally intended to be available at the same time as the very first BR discs, Sony’s machine has been postponed time and time again. Now they’ve apparently gotten their act together and the BDP-S1 is ready for release. Of course Sony can’t release the deck without some further complications. First of all, according to the Sony web sight, they are going to bundle Fifth Element with the player. This was one of the first BD’s released and was universally panned for having a mediocre picture quality. Note to Sony: If you want people to be happy about spending $1000.00 on a piece of your electronic equipment, give them a movie that shows the player in its best light. The Japanese conglomerate has also announced that they plan to have a firmware upgrade in early 2007 that will allow the deck to read “most” BD-R discs. Not an impressive beginning.
This week’s Spotlight: League of Extraordinary Gentlemen on Blu-ray
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen on Blu-ray © Fox
Set at the very end of the 19th Century, a master criminal, the Fantom, is trying to start a war between the various crowned heads of Europe. A war that he feels will engulf the entire world. This mad mastermind has kidnapped teams of scientists and forced them to build new, powerful weapons: tanks, machine guns, and flame throwers. If war does break out, he's positioned himself to sell these armaments to all sides of the conflict, creating an immense fortune in the process.
The leaders in Great Britain suspect that there is more to the random attacks against various countries than meets the eye, so they call together a team of people with special abilities: Allan Quatermain (Sean Connery), Captain Nemo (Naseeruddin Shah), Mina Harker who has been bitten by Dracula and is a vampire (Peta Wilson), Rodney Skinner aka the Invisible Man (Tony Curran), Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend), and Tom Sawyer (Shane West). Their first assignment is to travel to Paris where they secure their final member, Dr. Henry Jekyll (Jason Flemyng). With the good doctor in their group they are the League of Extraordinary Gentleman.
Traveling in Captain Nemo's impressive craft, the Nautilus, the group heads to Venice where they believe that the Fantom is going to strike next. It turns out that they were right, he's planted explosives on the pillars supporting the city and they arrive just in time to see them explode. The Fantom has something much more sinister than merely destroying a city though. He's planning on stealing the League's powers, and selling them to the highest bidder.
When this film was theatrically released, many critics panned it. That just goes to show you can never trust a film reviewer completely. This is just a fun movie. Yes, there are some plot holes (how did Tom Sawyer learn to drive a car?), stupid concepts (Venice's building toppling like dominoes), and dropped subplots (what ever happened to Tom hitting on Mina?), but how can you not enjoy the greatest 19th century literary characters all teaming up for a wild adventure? The characters are all enjoyable, and though they each only get a brief moment in the spotlight, that keeps the movie from becoming stale.
One of the aspects that is the most entertaining is seeing how many literary references you can spot. The numerous allusions to literary characters, places, and events are a lot of fun to notice. From Nemo's first mate proclaiming "Call me Ishmael." to Quartermain claiming that the ape-like Mr. Hyde has been terrorizing the Rue Morgue for months, there are several clever references.
The acting is good, though not terribly outstanding. Sean Connery does a great job, bringing a certain regal bearing to the role that makes it believable, and Shane West seems to have fun with his role as Tom Sawyer. Stuart Townsend is the most interesting actor though, making Dorian Gray seem both bored with life and potent at the same time. The movie was always interesting when he was on the screen.
This movie comes on a 25GB disc encoded with the AVC codec (also know as H.264 or MPEG-4 Part 10) at 16 mbps and it looks very good. There are a lot of dark scenes in this movie and the level of detail in shadows and low light situations in excellent. In bright light things look even better. The reflection of the water on the hull of the Nautilus is easy to make out and the pores and fine lines on Sean Connery's face are clear and well defined. The black levels are solid and look very good, and the colors are generally fine. They do appear a bit flat in parts of the movie, but this is undoubtedly the way it was intended to look.
This isn't a perfect looking disc however. There is some posterization which is mainly visible in close-ups of faces. The skin tones change a bit too abruptly and aren't as smooth as they could be. This isn't really noticeable unless you're looking for it however. Some of the skin tones look like they've been tweaked a bit in postproduction too. Shane West's face has a plastic appearance to it when he's on the deck of the Nautilus and about to make a play for Peta Wilson's character.
While this HD disc does improve the look of the film, some of it suffers from the higher resolution. The CGI snow isn't nearly as convincing in HD as it is in SD, and the ice floating in the water as the Fantom's case sinks look like pieces of plastic, which they are. Mr. Hyde looks pretty weak too, but then again he did on the SD disc too.
Upcoming High Definition Discs:
December 5, 2006
Blu-ray
Bulletproof Monk
Flight of the Phoenix
From Hell
Rising Sun
Rocky
HD DVD
Miami Vice (2006)
Poseidon
Scary Movie 4
Wolf Creek
December 12, 2006
Blu-ray
The Devil Wears Prada
Kung Fu Hustle
Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
World Trade Center
HD DVD
Field of Dreams
Hulk
World Trade Center
December 19, 2006
Blu-ray
All the King's Men
Invincible
Lady in the Water
Pearl Harbor
The Sopranos: Season Six, Part One
HD DVD
Casino
Derailed
Jet Li's Fearless
Lady in the Water
The Matador
Scary Movie 4
The Scorpion King
The Sopranos: Season Six, Part One
Wolf Creek
December 26, 2006
Blu-ray
The Descent
Transporter 2
HD DVD
Casino
Jet Li's Fearless
Lady in the Water
The Matador
Scary Movie 4
The Scorpion King
The Sopranos: Season Six, Part One
Wolf Creek
January 02, 2007
Blu-ray
The Covenant
HD DVD
(none)
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