Info: The Criterion Laserdisc Preservation Thread — Page 3

I'd love BR and Lawrence. I've got the basic Criterion North by Northwest which looks remarkably good.

Most of all I'd love to see Magnificent Ambersons and Taxi Driver.

The Criterion Taxi Driver is also the only release with the original mono.

A few Criterion Laserdiscs I have added to my collection in the last few months.

Yojimbo (single disk)

The Hidden Fortress (5 side / 3 disk)

Lawrence of Arabia (8 side / 4 disc)

Casablanca  (2 disks)

Citizen Kane (6 side / 3 disk)

The Aluminum Falcon said:

FanFiltration said:

I have my own plans to do a few Criterion preservations of disks I have.

 

"The James Bond Films" (Dr. No, From Russia With Love, Goldfinger) Upgrade

"Lawrence of Arabia" (Preservation of the 4 disc set with all extras) 

"Akira" (With the original English audio)

"A Hard Day's Night" (This will also include the very rare complete unaltered original mono mix from the first MPI release)

Sorry to bump but how are these preservations going? I'm especially interested in the "A Hard Day's Night" Criterion Preservation.

EDIT: Oh and has a preservation of the Blade Runner Criterion Laserdisc ever been made and released? If someone can help me get a copy of a Blade Runner preservation, can you pls. PM me?

Yes, These are going to be done.

The "A Hard Day's Night" preservation is all done, and only needs menus and a few of the extras to be finished off.  I've also included the extra rare original theatrical mono mix (only ever available on the first issue of the MPI VHS back in the 1980's) in PCM format. The mono/stereo upgrade mix used on all other MPI and Criterion releases is also included in PCM sourced from the Criterion 2 disk laser set.  

I am looking for the preservation of jason and the argonauts criterion.

The laserdisc is prohibitively expensive.

The Aluminum Falcon said:

FanFiltration said:

I have my own plans to do a few Criterion preservations of disks I have.

 

"The James Bond Films" (Dr. No, From Russia With Love, Goldfinger) Upgrade

"Lawrence of Arabia" (Preservation of the 4 disc set with all extras) 

"Akira" (With the original English audio)

"A Hard Day's Night" (This will also include the very rare complete unaltered original mono mix from the first MPI release)

Sorry to bump but how are these preservations going? I'm especially interested in the "A Hard Day's Night" Criterion Preservation.

EDIT: Oh and has a preservation of the Blade Runner Criterion Laserdisc ever been made and released? If someone can help me get a copy of a Blade Runner preservation, can you pls. PM me?

That is the euro theatrical cut released on DVD in the blade runner boxset.

I think someone on these boards did a letterbox transfer of blade runner criterion without the bonus materials.  Not sure but i think it was Rikter, but i am not sure if he authored the disc or someone else.  I know he also had a copy of the then rare workprint from a vhs tape ported over to DVD.

The Euro cut preservation had very poor video quality, even the audio was just mpeg 2 or ac3 not PCM.

I had it but the DVDR is probably now toast as being a rotter, otherwise i could have posted screen grabs.

The Aluminum Falcon said:

The "A Hard Day's Night" preservation is all done, and only needs menus and a few of the extras to be finished off.  I've also included the extra rare original theatrical mono mix (only ever available on the first issue of the MPI VHS back in the 1980's) in PCM format. The mono/stereo upgrade mix used on all other MPI and Criterion releases is also included in PCM sourced from the Criterion 2 disk laser set.  

I've found another "Lawrence of Arabia" disk set with AC-3 audio. I was going to add that to my Criterion preservation.

Wow! Tell me when A Hard Day's Night is completely done, FanFiltration. I'm a big Beatles fan and would be very interested in getting a copy of the final project. I'm so eager to listen to the mono mix.

I will post when it's all done.  The original (film only) mono mix is not that great I'm afraid. The sound is kind of flat with little fidelity. This is how it is presented on the first issue VHS tape. The only other way I would assume that you could obtain this mix would be from a 16 or 35 mm print, and I'm not sure the sound elements would be any better. I'm sure MPI did the best they could with what source they had at the time their first VHS version was produced. The great thing about VHS back in the early and mid 80's was that the tapes had a high quality and stood up much better then later tapes. This was because video tape were only used for rentals back then. Tapes of movies could cost close to $100, so not many people owned films. So anyway, my source was of excellent quality, and I used a very good 4 head VHS player. I can understand why they felt they had to replace the songs with the British LP stereo mix when the restoration was done circa 1982. But there is a fan interest out there for historical reasons that this lost original mono mix should (and must) be preserved.  The mono mix of the songs used for the current official home video release are taken from the British mono LP and single mixes, and differ from the exclusive original (film only) mixes. I'm sure the tapes given to United Artists of these tunes for insertion into the film are long destroyed, or hiding in someones basement.

I work in audio remastering, if anyone needs help with project to improve sound in any way (phase correction, declicking, all that) lemme know.

Just wanted to pint out that the best source for the original english streamline pictures dub of Akira is the CAV criterion laserdisc PCM track.

It was not even included on the DVD in the states in a poor mix down to dolby 2.0, much less the full bitrate PCM master could have achieved on a blu ray release.

The Video on the laserdisc is not identical to the first DVD release or the new blu ray, so would take a person who could sync the picture to the new blu ray restoration. Of course this would fall under the custom DVD and not a restoration.  Which would mean it could not be shared because of copyright.

If you were going to do a DVD you would probably use the blu ray as your base source for the video downrez it to DVD resolution , and add the full PCM track.  Or you could strictly just capture the non restored video off the laserdisc and audio and make an anamorphic conversion for DVD.

Is there something of interest on the Blade Runner laserdisc vs. the dvd? I may have 1 or 2 different ld rips on dvd somewhere.

The Criterion of Monty Python and the Holy Grail has one cool thing that didn't make it to DVD, a complete Japanese dub track. If you're a fan of the film, you've probably seen the French Knight taunting scene with subtitles translating the odd Japanese translation of Python humor on the DVD. This also first appeared on the Laserdisc.

If this hasn't already been done, I'd like to see the entire Japanese track translated and subtitled into English. I've been dying to know for years what the angry voices over the organ music at the end are yelling about. ;)

Of course, such a project is desperately going to need someone fluent in Japanese for this to even work!

What do you think, sirs?

Hi,

I just got my hands on "This is Spinal Tap" for only $7.

Seems like a few things on this  laser are not on the DVD release. And, it comes with a Spinal Tap guitar pick attached to the inner gate-fold sleeve.

Was there a preservation ever done for this Criterion Laserdisc by anyone here?

Also, I got yet another Criterion Laserdisc version (2 disk set) of "Lawrence of Arabia". This version has some extras not found on the 4-disc Criterion edition.

That will make 3 versions of this film I now own on laserdisc.

FanFiltration said:

Was there a preservation ever done for this Criterion Laserdisc by anyone here?

A disc containing the special features from the criterion LD was made by ThatArtGuy - details here.

Moth3r said:

FanFiltration said:

Was there a preservation ever done for this Criterion Laserdisc by anyone here?

A disc containing the special features from the criterion LD was made by ThatArtGuy - details here.

Thanks!