ChainsawAsh

Probably Blade Runner.  I've seen it countless times, and I've seen all five versions at least once.  (I think the only one I've actually seen only once is the US theatrical cut, the one with the censored violence.)

The Usual Suspects is my other go-to.  I make it a point to watch it at least twice a year.  It's the film that got me to want to be an editor.

The Evil Dead series.  Specifically, Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness.

I'd choose a different name if I joined today, though.  Likely Futurama-related.

I thought the DVD-5 has the flipper, and the DVD-9 (final version) has the hand?

Asaki:

DJ's GOUT V1 and V2 are almost the same - the only difference is the V2 moves the (yellow) subtitles from inside the letterboxing (as it is in the V1) to inside the frame itself (V2).  Also, the slow-motion scene in Empire (magic tree) required different settings for stabilization, which weren't applied to the V1, but were applied to the V2.

However, the V1/V2 used the same settings for everything else - which tended to scrub out too much grain and resulted in a loss of some fine detail.  As a result, it appears to be cleaner, but when you compare it to the GOUT, you can really see how much detail has been lost.  Edge enhancement is also an issue.

The V3 is an attempt to rectify these issues - stabilizing the image and cleaning it up without losing a lot of detail.  All the samples I've seen from the V3 script look substantially better than the V1/V2.

It will also feature recreated theatrical (white!) subtitles, and all the available audio mixes for all three films.

ikjacc:

I doubt that DJ will be making an h.264 MKV version available.  That's what I'll be doing for my own personal collection, but I doubt DJ will be doing it himself.

Also, even if he did, I'd prefer the alien subs to be burned-in the same way they will be on the DVD, as even SSA subs won't look right when viewed on my Seagate FreeAgent Theater+, and I'm really looking forward to having the proper, theatrical-accurate subtitles for the first time.

Kenobius Prime:

In the first few pages, AVCHD was indeed discussed.  But the idea was dropped very quickly, for the same reason Frink said.

Time to bust out the X0 again...

doubleofive said:

It took you guys mentioning it for me to even remember that I had no idea what was going on because they hadn't mentioned it in the movies. How are they going to explain it now that they're done using it? It's not like they hadn't read the 7th book when they made 6....

Well, the mirror shard was introduced in Order of the Phoenix, the fifth book, and not mentioned in Half-Blood Prince, the sixth book.

When they were making the Order of the Phoenix movie, the seventh book was being written, so the producers of the film hadn't read the seventh book at that time.  They thought the mirror was extraneous, so they cut it.

Here's what gets me - they were going to cut Kreacher from OotP, as well, but Rowling told them not to as he would be important in the seventh book.  Why didn't she say the same thing about the mirror?!

85 is still 4 minutes longer than the 1971 theatrical cut.  Would this mean that the "original" cut was aired unaltered in the UK in 1971?

Yeah, I'm assuming the mirror shard will be explained later.  My mom didn't believe me when I reminded her that it wasn't mentioned at all in the film series prior to this movie.

msycamore said:

Ah, now I see it. ;) apparently it was rated X in UK originally, so it's probably a lobby card made for UK cinemas, yeah it's weird but we're talking about the country who put Sam Raimi in court for The Evil Dead in the eighties so it's not that hard to believe, 15 is the UK video rating, erri_wan.

ChainsawAsh-- the lobby card we're talking about is linked in his post.

This is interesting.

According to the BBFC, a 95-minute cut was rated X in 1971.

In 1988, an 82-minute cut (home video, so about 86 minutes without PAL speedup) was rated 15.  Another 82-minute home video cut was rated 15 in 1992.  This is the "original" (laserdisc) cut.

In 2004, an 84-minute cut (also home video, so about 88 minutes minus PAL speedup) was rated 12.  This is the 2004 Director's Cut.

But the 1971 theatrical cut was 81 minutes.  What the hell is this 95-minute, X-rated version released in the UK in 1971?  Could that have included trailers or something?

bkev said:

Also, 7.1 was okay. Not fantastic or bad by any means, just kind of there. Although the one major thing they cut was VERY minor, being the whole "Voldemort-is-a-trigger-word" thing which explains why Harry uses you know who in this movie instead.

Just saw the movie (DH1) last night, and I was very pleased with it.  I'm reserving overall judgment until the last one comes out, and I can view Deathly Hallows as one long movie, but I really, really liked what I saw so far.

But you just reminded me about the Voldemort trigger, and now I'm irritated that it wasn't in the movie.  Damn it.  I was so happy with it, too.  :-(

Actually, GP wasn't dropped - GP was changed into PG.

*Unnecessary, off-topic ramblings about the MPAA ratings' history below*

The original ratings, from 1968 to 1970, were:

G (same as today; General Audiences, all ages admitted)
M (Equivalent to the PG rating before PG-13 was introduced; Mature Audiences, all ages admitted)
R (same as today; Restricted Audiences, children under 16 required adult accompaniment)
X (not trademarked like the others; no one under 16 admitted, period)

In 1970, since people kept getting M (Mature Audiences) and R (Restricted Audiences) confused, they changed the M rating to GP.  They also raised the admitted ages of R and X films to 17.

So, the second set of ratings, from 1970 to 1972, were:

G (General Audiences; all ages admitted)
GP (Parental Guidance Suggested; all ages admited)
R (Restricted Audiences; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian)
X (No one under 17 admitted)

By 1971, people were complaining about the GP rating, claiming that it wasn't indicative of the content of the film (it was perceived as too close to a "G" rating, since the G came before the P).  During this time, special indicators ("This film may not be suitable for pre-teenagers") were used.

In 1972, the MPAA changed the GP rating to PG in order to address this issue - now, with the P coming first instead of the G, it was different enough from G that people could tell the difference.

1972 to 1984:

G (General Audiences, all ages admitted)
PG (Parental Guidance Suggested - Some Material May Not Be Suitable for Pre-Teenagers; all ages admitted)
R (Restricted Audiences; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian)
X (No one under 17 admitted)

Then, in 1984, complaints that too many PG-rated films were too violent for such a "soft" rating became overwhelming with the releases of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Gremlins (both rated PG).  Steven Spielberg suggested to then-MPAA president Jack Valenti that they should create an intermediate rating (he suggested PG-14).  After conferring with theater owners, PG-13 was unveiled in 1984.

1984 to 1990:

G (General Audiences, all ages admitted)
PG (Parental Guidance Suggested - Some Material May Not Be Suitable for Children; all ages admitted)
PG-13 (Parents are Strongly Cautioned to Give Special Guidance for Attendance of Children Under 13 - Some Material May Be Inappropriate for Young Children; all ages admitted)
R (Restricted; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian)
X (No one under 17 admitted)

In 1986, the wording of PG-13 was changed to the more succinct "Parents Strongly Cautioned - Some Material May Be Inappropriate for Children Under 13."

Now, all this time, the MPAA hadn't trademarked the X rating.  Therefore, it could be used by anybody - and it was, particularly by the porn industry.  Because of this, the X rating had a strong "porn stigma" attached to it, and it was damned near impossible to get a film released with an X rating in the United States.

So, in 1990, the MPAA changed the rating to NC-17 and trademarked it.

1990 to present:

G (General Audiences; all ages admitted)
PG (Parental Guidance Suggested; all ages admitted)
PG-13 (Parents Strongly Cautioned; all ages admitted)
R (Restricted; under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian)
NC-17 (No children under 17 admitted)

Before the turn of the millennium, the NC-17 age limit was raised by changing the wording.  It currently reads "No children 17 and under admitted," effectively making it "NC-18," without having to change and re-trademark the logo.

And there you have it - the history of the MPAA rating symbols, all in one off-topic post!

*Back on topic*

So anyway, my point is, THX 1138 was always rated PG until the Director's Cut was released - it was just rated PG before the rating was called PG.

SilverWook, could you provide a scan of the lobby card?  I've never seen an X rating attached to THX 1138 in any way.  Not that I doubt you, I'm just curious.

I tried that.  It just gives me a white screen when I try to import the Lagarith video.

Wife Soup - Umphrey's McGee

Pretty much exactly what the title says.  I can't figure out how to convert it.  I'd like to convert the Lagarith .avi to a DNxHD QuickTime .mov so I can work with it in OS X, but I can't seem to get the AVI into any program that I know of in order to get the conversion started.  I can view it in Windows Media Player, but that's about it.

Anyone know how to do this?

You're no fun.  ;-)

Can we get one of all the spines sitting next to each other, as if it were on a shelf?  That'd be awesome.

CompMovieGuy said:

none said:

When will this reasonable thread return to reasonability?

When Fink and his alter egos get b& and then we can watch him create a facebook page about it like JT

Frink has more than one alter ego?

I watched the first 2/3 of the 3-hour Super Extended Cut (or whatever they're calling it) last night.  So far, I greatly prefer it to the theatrical cut - every scene that's been added so far has actually added something to the film instead of feeling like it was tacked on to make it longer.

I would love to see the uncut version of this.  One of my childhood favorites.

RE isolated scores and this project:

There are already so many audio mixes included that adding more would begin to seriously compromise the video quality.

Since ESB and ROTJ will include fewer mixes than Star Wars, though, it may be feasible for them.  But I'd rather all three remain consistent - either they all have isolated scores, or none of them, and I wouldn't add any more mixes to Star Wars for fear of hurting the video.

Just my two cents.

Ralph McQuarrie art is actually an awesome idea.  Dunno why it didn't occur to me...

Yeah, I'm not sure how you can get a disc label to look like it belongs in 1977-1983...

I think a big part of the problem is that the film series began when the fifth book hadn't even been written.

It would have been far better for the series overall if they had waited until all seven books had been released - then they wouldn't have had to deal with the whole "If we cut X, will it affect Y later on?" thing.  They'd know.

Of course, WB wanted to cash in on the series ASAP, so they did.

New deleted scenes, probably for all six movies, in HD.

Having heard the "clean" version of "Fuck You," nothing was bleeped - it was all dubbed over.  If it was bleeped, then it might have been funny, but the dubbing (is that the right word for music?) just makes it sad, IMO.