Comments on: Blu-ray Review: Young Frankenstein http://www.ropeofsilicon.com/article/blu_ray_review_young_frankenstein The best and latest movie news, reviews, features and editorials - updated daily Fri, 27 Nov 2009 04:36:33 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 hourly 1 By: alric12121952 http://www.ropeofsilicon.com/article/blu_ray_review_young_frankenstein#comment-3733 alric12121952 Sat, 18 Oct 2008 12:18:32 +0000 http://www.ropeofsilicon.com/news/?p=10502#comment-3733 While I love <i>Young Frankenstein</i> and anticipated with childlike glee the prospect of a Blu Ray edition, the picture quality was <i>not</i> typical of Blu Ray. Instead of the smooth gradations normally found in fresh black-&-white films, an overzealous application of an image-sharpening tool resulted in the film grain becoming too pronounced. You can not even imagine my disappointment when I began watching it and saw the telltale signs that the image would be mottled with all of that grain. Yes, yes, I know film has grain. But this grain was exaggerated as the result of the artificial sharpening. Anyone who's used PhotoShop can spot the application of the tool. So I can only conclude that your own enthusiasm for the film has influenced your perspective, so that your review, in your zeal to share your enthusiasm, was tainted with hyperbole. Your description of the result is simply not accurate. The film would have profited more from a simpler approach, with a straightforward 26-frames-per-second transfer for Blu Ray, and our HDTVs and Blu-Ray players would have taken care of the rest, giving us a sharper image and making it closer to the original cinematic experience. As it is now, the trickery has been inserted between us and the direct experience. I was so crushed, I immediately set out into cyberspace to see what others were saying. Yours was the only review I could find, and your opinion seemed to express your hopes above your actual experience. It's okay to see it for what it is. It's no reflection on Brooks or Wilder that this product is of an inferior quality. I hope you answer this. I'd like to discuss it with you. If we all pretend that it's not an inferior product, the manufacturer will think they succeeded in fooling us. Let's not let them get away with it. While I love Young Frankenstein and anticipated with childlike glee the prospect of a Blu Ray edition, the picture quality was not typical of Blu Ray. Instead of the smooth gradations normally found in fresh black-&-white films, an overzealous application of an image-sharpening tool resulted in the film grain becoming too pronounced. You can not even imagine my disappointment when I began watching it and saw the telltale signs that the image would be mottled with all of that grain.

Yes, yes, I know film has grain. But this grain was exaggerated as the result of the artificial sharpening. Anyone who's used PhotoShop can spot the application of the tool. So I can only conclude that your own enthusiasm for the film has influenced your perspective, so that your review, in your zeal to share your enthusiasm, was tainted with hyperbole. Your description of the result is simply not accurate. The film would have profited more from a simpler approach, with a straightforward 26-frames-per-second transfer for Blu Ray, and our HDTVs and Blu-Ray players would have taken care of the rest, giving us a sharper image and making it closer to the original cinematic experience. As it is now, the trickery has been inserted between us and the direct experience. I was so crushed, I immediately set out into cyberspace to see what others were saying. Yours was the only review I could find, and your opinion seemed to express your hopes above your actual experience. It's okay to see it for what it is. It's no reflection on Brooks or Wilder that this product is of an inferior quality.

I hope you answer this. I'd like to discuss it with you. If we all pretend that it's not an inferior product, the manufacturer will think they succeeded in fooling us. Let's not let them get away with it.

]]> By: matthew715 http://www.ropeofsilicon.com/article/blu_ray_review_young_frankenstein#comment-3620 matthew715 Thu, 09 Oct 2008 12:58:34 +0000 http://www.ropeofsilicon.com/news/?p=10502#comment-3620 I totally agree with your assessment of YF as one of the greatest comedies of all-time. I also agree that making this film right after Blazing Saddles somehow allowed Mel Brooks to keep making "comedies" for the next 20 years, no matter how strained, unfunny, even how unsuccesful at the box office they were. History of the World is only amusing here and there (it's good to be the king), and Spaceballs was nearly a decade too late for a Star Wars parody to be funny (to me). Finally after the trifecta of Life Stinks, Robin Hood Men In Tights, and Dracula Dead & Loving It, he seems to have given up on film-making to concentrate on Broadway musicals of his early, funnier films. I totally agree with your assessment of YF as one of the greatest comedies of all-time. I also agree that making this film right after Blazing Saddles somehow allowed Mel Brooks to keep making "comedies" for the next 20 years, no matter how strained, unfunny, even how unsuccesful at the box office they were. History of the World is only amusing here and there (it's good to be the king), and Spaceballs was nearly a decade too late for a Star Wars parody to be funny (to me).

Finally after the trifecta of Life Stinks, Robin Hood Men In Tights, and Dracula Dead & Loving It, he seems to have given up on film-making to concentrate on Broadway musicals of his early, funnier films.

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