HD-DVD/Blu-ray - What do you have, and how do you like?

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Jedi2016

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This is NOT an argument thread about which is better, which is winning, or which just "sucks" according to you. If you want to talk about that, CLICK HERE.

Here, let's post a list of the movies you own, in either format, and your opinion of them in terms of audio and picture quality, how much better they look than standard DVD, etc.

Ironically enough... I don't have a player for either! :) I do plan on getting my PS3 here in the next couple weeks, so I'll have a Blu-ray player. By the time it gets here, I'll have the following three films to "break it in":

Corpse Bride
Unforgiven
Kingdom of Heaven

Another odd thing is that Kingdom of Heaven is a blind-buy.. I haven't seen the film yet, but I've heard so many good things about it, including the fact that it's one of the best-looking Blu-ray transfers out there (despite it's using the "antiquated" MPEG-2), that I figured "what the hell".

So, what movies do you folks have, and what do you think? Again, this is open to BOTH formats, as a general discussion about movie buffs enjoying high-def video, regardless of what kind of disc it's on. :)
 
I don't have a player for either, either. (:D) I will probably end up buying the HD-DVD add-on for the 360 since that is the cheapest option right now. I have not seen an HD DVD in action yet, but I did see a Blu-Ray movie in action at Best Buy and I was impressed. 👍
 
I dont have either player yet although I am hoping to get a PS3 in the near future. I do have a friend that came over with his Xbox360 and HD-DVD drive to hook up to my HDTV. We watched Batman Begins and King Kong and both movies looked absolutely stunning. You truly notice an incredible amount of detail in the picture that you have never seen before (and I have watched Batman Begins on standard DVD many, many, many times.)

I usualy watch standard DVD on a Samsung player that upconverts the signal to 1080i but even that is nothing like as clear as the HD-DVD picture was.

I'm really hoping that Blu-ray is just as good since that is the option I'm going to be going with. Just a pity that so far most of the movies I would watch are exclusive to HD-DVD. Luckily thats changing and hopefully I'll have the PS3 by the time Casino Royal hits stores.
 
From what I've heard, Blu-ray is every bit as good as HD-DVD when it comes to picture quality.

It'll be interesting to see how much of an improvement it is, because I happen to own Unforgiven in both DVD and Blu-ray now. It'll be at least a week before I can make the comparison, though. :(
 
I won't be getting a Blu-ray player/PS3 for a while, but when I do, I already know 2 movies I have to have right away.

Commando and The Fifth Element. Commando, I've been waiting for a anamorphic widescreen version on DVD forever. Fifth Element, I'm on my third version of that DVD. Regular -> Superbit -> Superbit w/extra features. Blu-ray one will be the fourth. :guilty:
 
I have Talladega Nights that was packed in with my PS3. The picture quality is... meh, but then again I've heard the actual retail version kicks the snot out of it.
 
Yeah, the Talladega Nights Blu-ray was definitely not the best. Very poor PQ ratings just about everywhere.

a6m5, I think you'll want to hold off a bit before you buy The Fifth Element on Blu-ray. It's actually one of the worst-looking Blu-ray titles out there right now, due to a very lackluster transfer. By all accounts, they simply used the HD master from the older DVDs, without remastering it or cleaning it up in any way. However, due to the extreme negative press that particular film has gotten, there are rumors that they're planning to create a new Blu-ray version with a fully remastered version of the film, along with the later advancements in BD technology (like making it dual-layer and/or using one of the new MPEG-4 codecs), for vastly improved quality. I'm holding out for that one, since I've heard so much negative stuff about the version that's out there.

It will actually be only my third total version of that film, one for each format. VHS>DVD>Blu-ray.

One thing I like about the reviews (especially at sites like HighDefDigest) is that they list out all of the technical aspects of the disc and transfer. For example, for the discs I own, I know that Unforgiven and Corpse Bride both use the VC1 codec. Unforgiven is on a dual-layer 50GB disc, while Corpse Bride is single-layer 25GB (doesn't suffer much because the film is barely half as long as Unforgiven). Kingdom of Heaven actually has the specs right on the box, apparently something Fox does with all of their releases, so I know that one's dual-layer 50GB using MPEG2. Fox for some reason prefers MPEG2 over the newer codecs, but they seem to go dual-layer only when necessary (like Kingdom of Heaven, because of it's length at over three hours). That film also nixes the idea that MPEG2 is "outdated" because, despite the film's length, it's hailed as one of the best-looking HD transfers on either format. One of the reasons I bought it. :)
 
Thanks for the info, Jedi. 👍 I'm glad I said something.
 
I don't have either player, and until I see a demonstration of how much better it is than DVD, I probably won't get one. When I eventually do get a player, I will probably only buy a few key movies again in the new format, sch as the LOTR trilogy, the Alien series, and of course, The Matrix movies.
 
Duck Tracy
I have Talladega Nights that was packed in with my PS3. The picture quality is... meh, but then again I've heard the actual retail version kicks the snot out of it.
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Yeah I going to have to agree with you on this on. I haven't got a chance to go out and rent a few other BR movies. But I heard crack was the bet on out so far.

I do have a PS3 btw, encase you didn't know
 
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