Dracula | Horror of Dracula (1958) pre-order March 17

[Richard--W a straight arrow Find all posts View Profile Close Richard--W]

Jack Theakston of the 3-D Film Archive posted a screen grab from an original 35mm dye-transfer print next to a grab of the blu-ray and guess what?

Post 1569:

http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum....h#.UV-ImzfJIm0

More to come.

[Paul L Scholar of Sleaze Find all posts View Profile Close Paul L]

Jack Theakston of the 3-D Film Archive posted a screen grab from an original 35mm dye-transfer print next to a grab of the blu-ray and guess what?

Post 1569:

http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum....h#.UV-ImzfJIm0

More to come.

That post quoted:

But the day-for-night exteriors are decidedly blue on the print, so it's not 100% incorrect. Other scenes are timed differently. Most surprisingly, though, the transfer is too saturated. Those who remember the film through candy-colored glasses will be in for a surprise. One of the greatest things about Asher's photography of this versus other Hammer titles is that it is surprisingly subtle.
[....]
That being said, if you're NOT finicky about how astray the timings might be, and love monster movies, the transfer is otherwise good—it's sharp, and doesn't clip the shadows or highlights. The framing is good, and the audio is serviceable. The censored scenes are cool. You'll like it.

... and, later, what Bob Furmanek says:

Jack's comment "Most surprisingly, though, the transfer is too saturated." is saying that the Blu-ray has more color than the original release print. In other words, the chroma levels have been boosted.

As I've said since viewing the 1958 print, the film has a very subtle color palette. Anybody that is remembering this film as being overly-saturated and dripping with color is mistaken.

Which is all fair enough :) There's something a little 'modern' about some of those nighttime sequences, which I'd put down to the digital rather than photochemical restoration and a couple of errors in judgement during the restoration, but I'm glad Theakston says 'it's not 100% incorrect' (it isn't, but it's not 100% correct either - and is just as 'off' as the WB home video versions have been, just in a slightly different way), adding that comment about 'remember[ing] the film through candy-colored glasses' and noting how 'subtle' Asher's photography in this film is, compared with some of the other Hammer films; that chimes with my memory of watching a 35mm print of this back in the 1990s.

EDIT. That specific grab is an unfortunate choice to illustrate the post, however, as it's from a sequence that is problematic but not really representative of the rest of the film.

[Lalala76 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Lalala76]

From a non technical and laymans pov, and being a die hard hammer fan ( no that doesn't mean Bruce willis :)) looking at that screengrab is still very much misleading. Every time I see a screengrab of the "new" version I always think how much worse it looks, but when I watch the film then I hardly notice at all. If I was setting out to buy this film for the first time, and I saw the grabs I think I would be put off.In fact the only reason I'm aware of this is through reading posts on forums. But Imo, even though the bfi version is far from perfect, this is the best version around.

[Richard--W a straight arrow Find all posts View Profile Close Richard--W]

dvdbeaver comparison:

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film4/blu-r...la_blu-ray.htm

[Ian Jane Administrator Find all posts View Profile Close Ian Jane]

From a non technical and laymans pov, and being a die hard hammer fan ( no that doesn't mean Bruce willis :)) looking at that screengrab is still very much misleading. Every time I see a screengrab of the "new" version I always think how much worse it looks, but when I watch the film then I hardly notice at all. If I was setting out to buy this film for the first time, and I saw the grabs I think I would be put off.In fact the only reason I'm aware of this is through reading posts on forums. But Imo, even though the bfi version is far from perfect, this is the best version around.

I would more or less agree with this. The screen caps make the blue tint look much more intense than it seemed to be to me in motion. There's no doubt that it's there and it's certainly more noticeable in some scenes than in others but when I watched it last night it (first time out with the new Blu-ray) it didn't jump out at me the way that I expected it to. With that said, those who know the movie better than myself may not have the same reaction, but I do think that it was blown out of proportion in certain circles. But to each their own. Having finally had time to watch the movie and check out some of the extras on the disc I'm happy to have this set. It should have been perfect and it's not, but it's still damn good.

[Richard--W a straight arrow Find all posts View Profile Close Richard--W]

Who hasn't read the evaluation of the new blu-ray in the current issue (#174) of VIDEO WATCHDOG:

http://www.videowatchdog.com/home/im...les/174/3b.jpg

http://www.videowatchdog.com/home/home.html

It expresses my own observations better than I can and I agree with it, mainly, so it must be right.

This issue also contains a review of SKYFALL which is the first review of the film I've seen, anywhere, to acknowledge the underlying subtext that James Bond is a loser, a failure, completely ineffectual, and who is bested by the villains and the women alike.