Trooperman said:
This is why I believe the true version of a film SHOULD be the 4th generation theatrical print, because that is the version everybody saw and THAT is the format that everything, from the cinematography to the special effects work, was intended for.
Plus, 4th generation negative although it may have the same resolution as a DVD or similar, looks nothing like a DVD blowup (looks much better, more contrasty, different grain structure).
It is a disservice to old movies to display them from the O-neg where you can see wires on the ships, matte boxes, etc. It's not just because they were "old" that you see these things- if the o-neg was the final viewing format, those directors back in the day would have found the effects just as off-putting as we do!
I would be inclined to agree with you.
One of my prized possesions is a recording I made in 2007 of Superman The Movie straight from TV(ITV---UK channel) to standard def DVD.
The telecine that ITV(the rights have passed onto Channel 5 in the UK now) use is a 30 year old telecine.
Superman debuted on ITV way back in January 1983----it was a telecine of an already beat up 35mm theatrical print. I taped this January 1983 broadcast at the time to my V2000 video machine(since taped over).
The problem was that VHS/Betamax/V2000 recordings of these broadcasts involved the usual loss of quality (relative to the quality of the original TV broadcast).
Amazingly ITV continued to use this same Superman telecine throughout the 80's,90's and into early 2000's----as soon as I got my 1st DVD recorder in 2005 I made a promise that I would record that Superman telecine the next time that ITV showed it(which turned out to be in 2007).
When I play this DVD recording on my projector it immedietely reminds me of seeing the film in the cinema back in 1981---more so than the obviously superior(but digitally manipulated) 2011 blu ray.
The main drawback is that the telecine is 4:3 as opposed to widescreen.
Some where in their vault ITV have the telecine of Star Wars(which debuted in 1982 on UK TV)----it may even be a telecine of one of the rare technicolor 35mm prints(like the one that surfaced in Baltimore 2 years back)----the colours of the ITV telecine are richer than the contemporary 1982 VHS/laserdiscs.
I would love to record that telecine to DVD/blu ray too!
Too bad ol George wont let that happen.