Puggo - Jar Jar's Yoda said:
bilditup1 said:
Trooperman said:
Cold, digital clarity does not help you focus on the content- it draws attention to its perfectness.
- they represent an alternative and in some way much more authentic experience of viewing the films, at least if you're trying to approximate how it was experienced originally, which straight pristine video of course doesn't really allow you to do.
I actually disagree with both of you. The original theater experience was with pristine sharp clean prints, often in 70mm, and often with stereo or surround sound. That's how I remember seeing SW in the theater in 1977. The dirty look came months or years later, when the prints had gotten so worn out they looked like PG and PSB.
For me, Harmy's is the closest to the theater experience I remember, and the filmic look doesn't have anything to do with being dirty and scratchy. The PG and PSB are valuable as research material, since they are actual films from the year the movies were released, respectively. I'm still a bit surprised that people actually enjoy watching them, but that's a cool bonus.
So the 16mm prints were only for home or something? That's not what I understood earlier; I thought that a good amount of people saw SW in 16mm in smaller theaters that couldn't afford 35 or something like that.
I didn't mean to imply that there was something inherent in the film format such that even if you had a pristine print it would look cruddy. Even on relatively new prints, you'll notice some minor flaws that simply won't show up on digital, and I think that's part of what Trooperman was referring to.
But anyway, I thought the prints of popular films got worn out, reprinted, and worn out again, and often enough that's what people saw. That is an experience that is today disappearing. Of course large format 70mm stuff is spectacular in a way the 16mm and a transfer of a 16mm print can never be. I personally don't know if I've ever seen a 70mm film, truthfully. 15-70 IMAX, yes (TDKR just recently), but 70mm - dunno. That's part of why I'm so keen on seeing 'The Master'.