The Undiscovered Country - Theatrical Cut Blu-ray vs Director's Cut iTunes

I recently bought THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY on iTunes, which includes an HD copy of the Director's Cut. One difference in the transfer for the DC is that it used Nick Meyer's preferred taller aspect ratio 2:00 instead of the 2:35. Not surprising. The other difference is quite a freaking relief...




Theatrical Cut Blu-ray



Director's Cut iTunes




I haven't watched the Director's Cut all the way through yet. I've only been looking at bits and pieces such as above to see how different it looks from the blu-ray. It's not an amazing transfer, but compared to the waxwork/DNR'd-to-hell blu-ray the iTunes bonus looks like a godsend. I just hope Paramount one day gives this along with other Trek films a proper 4K remaster down the line.

 

I still don't understand how someone okayed all that hideous smoothing and edge-enhacement that they puked all over the Blu-ray. And then TWOK gets a nice new remaster and none of the others. Boo.

 

Blu-ray restores (most of) the aspect ratio that was wrong on the DVD release's director's cut (which also replaced distinct blues with frigging teal, like in the Klingon courtroom scenes).

Blu-ray also showed way too much edge enhancement after DNR, as if a first year college grad was left to do this, as well as what appears to be a warm color cast (I don't recall the uniform collar being cream-white and not white-white, but both screencaps above showed identical hues for the background image, which seems odd too.

...that aside, iTunes' version has neutral whites and has what looks like the original aspect ratio (finally?), does the neutral whites correctly, but still looks duller, darker (Spock's irises are barely distinguishable), and is actually too soft - despite Spock's wig dandruff still being quite visible.

More on the previous time the film was chopped up in edits, this movie's been used like a football:


(Good grief... light blooming issues all over the place and is softer than the Charmin I got before March...)

Hmmm, the blu-ray screencap you put up may be a studio lighting issue or one-off or something as that review shows white-whites in other scenes (and still blows the DVD out of the stars). For now I'll stick with the blu-ray, warts and all, until when or if 4K discs from 4K film scans come out. (Though to this day, there are 4K movie releases that are merely upscaled 2K - especially those whose CGI are in 2k, as those won't be re-rendered... mapping methods are good but telltale signs can't be glossed over via "AI", a term used because the actual processes used take up too many words that customers are told they don't want to know anything about... okay, to be fair, they're more subtle compared to upcsaling to 4K from 480i, which looked like something Frankenstein's monster ate then puked up afterward...)

 

Interestingly, though the LaserDisc is largely similar to the Special Edition DVD (except without flashbacks during mind meld) it also has different framing.

I wish that version was available in HD, as it's the version I grew up with and it doesn't have those awful inserts during the mind meld.

I'll eventually post more 9 more screencap comparisons when I get around to it.

 

We need a release cleaned up with all 3 versions.

 

I'd be all for yet another option. There'll be a video version from back in the days 4:3 tube TVs were dominant, that probably shows the majority of the unmasked frame. Unlike the way widescreen would be panned and scanned, The Undiscovered Country in Super 35mm would've been a different case. That ratio isn't very cinematic or the Director's choice, sure. But of interest to fans who like to pick every last pixel of detail out of the set.

 

To my knowledge the 2.35 is the authentic aspect ratio, determined by the movie's release in anamorphic 35mm. Why Nick Meyer insists on opening it up I've never understood.

 

I would be interested in hearing any rationale Meyer had for his 2:00 AR preference. TOP GUN had a similar home video release where the image was opened to 2:00 per Tony Scott's preference. Would have liked to have that option for the blu-ray. There's some releases out there that give out multiple aspect ratios like the Criterion release for ON THE WATERFRONT that has both 1:85 and 1:33.

I think it does allow the images in TUC to breathe a little more. I remember the IMAX presentation for SKYFALL was 1:90 and in a lot of ways I actually preferred that version over the 2:35 widescreen.

 

Every time I see the 2.35 version which is fairly rare I can't stand the framing. The Federation president has an interesting bit of facial hair and in the 2.35 version It's just cut off right at his chin in most of the close-ups where I'm pretty sure they wanted you to see his beard and in the 2.00 version it ends right at the tip of his beard so something tells me they framed it that way. I'm never going to watch the 2.35 Blu-ray first because it's not the Extended Cut second because I don't like the framing and third because it's a waxy mess. But all three versions should be preserved for the fans the two versions that are in 2.00 aspect could be on the same disc with branching. The 2.35 version would have to be a separate disk. I don't know if Paramount is generous enough to give us to separate discs if they ever do bothered to clean up the movie for 4K presentation

 

Rumor is that the 4K set release of the TOS films is taking as long as it is because it's hinging on the completion of the DE cut of TMP, which is taking awhile to get done. Could be BS, but it is peculiar that Trek has largely been ignored while a ton of other Paramount titles have been getting the 4K treatment.



EDIT: Anyway. Here's nine more samples.

 

I'm curious to know as well. I never realized Top Gun was Super 35; I'd seen it in theaters twice over the last decade and just assumed it was anamorphic (though admittedly my memory of it on VHS is more consistent with open matte).

Star Trek VI, I actually liked the Blu-Ray framing better. A number of shots I always thought looked too opened up on both the DVD releases. Now that said there's only one shot above I think I can definitely say looks better tightened up. But there's also at least one of them I could go either/or.

 

You're right! At one point there was a fullscreen version that was entirely open matte for VHS/DVD (I don't know if the same was for TUC, the VHS I had growing up was widescreen). I don't think Tony Scott's preferred AR was ever released beyond the first DVD release, as blu-ray and 4K stuck to the theatrical 2.40.

 

I bought all the ST movie VHS tapes (25th anniversary repackage) just before they re-released them with the laserdisc letterbox transfers and had to buy them all again. TUC's pan-and-scan was open matte, which I believe they zoomed out to full (1.66 or whatever Super 35's 'parent' ratio is) for the sign off and end credits.

It trips me out though that Jim Cameron rejected Super 35 for Aliens apparently the same year that Tony Scott was already using it for Top Gun.

 

Those screencaps look gorgeous.

 

Did the visual effects in space have to be pan-and-scanned for 1.33? My understanding is that ILM used to shoot their miniatures with VistaVision, which could easily open up for 2.00:1 framing.

It must have won over Cameron quickly because he jumped immediately onto that with THE ABYSS.

 

Cameron talks about widescreen on the Aliens commentary (I want to say about when the drop ship is setting down after reconnoiter). Perfectionist that he is, traditional (anamorphic) widescreen apparently demanded too much perfectionism for its narrower depth of field and it drove him crazy - he refused to touch it! Someone suggested Super 35, but he felt at the time that it was still too grainy (which... we've all seen Aliens. Especially how blown-up the grain looked on VHS because of the hard matting).

I actually don't recall any panning in TUC. If you told me they just kept the scan centered (except for shoulder shots) I would believe it. The fact they zoomed out to 1.66 for sign off (ie, they didn't have to go wider) inclines me to believe they kept their interpositive fully opened and didn't bother going back to whatever sources they used.

There was a lot of panning on all the earlier ST movies (including exterior shots). And it also looked a LOT better on the 'older' tapes I used to rent. The repackaged tapes I later bought, the panning seemed rather half-@$$ed, not unlike the ABC broadcasts. TUC came out later anyway, it's probably just as well they didn't do too much to it.

 

All this discussion about aspect ratio and framing...can anyone tell me what’s up with the weird framing at the beginning (prologue through credits) if TSFS?

I’ve never seen it as weird as it looks on the blue ray disk. It “normalizes” as the Enterprise comes into frame.

Just looks really weird....I I never saw it on DVD or VHS widescreen like that.

 

Windowboxing to protect credits from overscan. Annoying, as it's not something really needed nowadays. I still remember one of my previous copies (either UK VHS or US LaserDisc) where all you could see was AME JUDITH ANDERSO on my old TV.

Lame.

 

Some of the James Bond blu-rays did the same thing, but are now gotten rid of in 4K.

 

The top images all look better and sharper to me.