It may well be the Blu-ray disc event of the year, and you’ll need a multi-region Blu-ray player in order to watch it. Shohei Imamura’s frankly amazing 1968 Profound Desires of the Gods gets a frankly amazing high-definition rendering from the incredibly enterprising folks at Eureka!/Masters of Cinema. This is a visionary release in several ways. One of the things I’ve found most impressive about the label is its unstinting commitment to bringing consumers the best materials in the most advanced format. As it happens, there won’t be a standard-definition release of this from the label. In a certain respect, this goes against all market logic, but it also speaks to a certain unwillingness to compromise that really only makes sense when you actually see how beautiful this disc is. I think the company’s gamble, which goes against the long-held conventional wisdom that Blu-ray is mostly for the more-bang-for-your-buck big-box blockbuster-loving type, is going to pay off in a long tail way. I’m certainly hoping so. In any event, I discuss the film and its truly spectacular Blu-ray version at The Daily Notebook, where it’s the Foreign Region Blu-ray disc of the week.
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Er…hm. I still don’t have Blu-Ray, and recent horror stories (SPARTACUS, etc.) have made me consider the option of never getting one, because maybe this thing doesn’t have the legs everyone claimed. And it still may not, but I’m very concerned that this may set a Blu-Ray only release precedent. In which case, I guess at some point I’ll have to get a Blu-Ray player.
And, AND, I like Imamura, so this is twice as annoying. Where’s frickin’ BALLAD OF NARAYAMA, anyways!?
PS – I almost wrote “BATTLE OF NARAYAMA”, before I had to stop and think “Wait, there’s no battle in that movie. Why is it called ‘BATTLE OF NARAYAMA’?” That’s how long it’s been since I’ve seen it!
I wasn’t going to get any of these newfangled Blu-Rays, but once I got a PS3– which has a built-in Blu-Ray player, I was all like, well, why the hell not, and I’ve picked up a few– which, surprisingly, have been cheaper than buying DVDs of the same titles!
It’s unfortunately not a multi-region player, but it’s still a very good one, I think; I don’t know if you have any interest in gaming at all, but if you do, that’s a whole lot of bang for your buck.
@bill, AnimEigo released a good, R1 DVD edition of [i]Ballad of Narayama[/i] a couple of years ago. The same company also released an equally good DVD of Imamura’s [i]Black Rain[/i] just last year.
This new PDotG Blu deserves all the superlatives you can throw at it and then some.
Look at those useless italics tags in that post of mine. Lovely!
Sigh. For every Blu-ray horror story there’s a BIGGER THAN LIFE or a DAYS OF HEAVEN or an EASY RIDER that transcends the format. If we held the rotten apples against DVD it never would have taken off.
Yes but what about the 3‑D Blu-ray double-dip? 😉
@Tom – I’m not into gaming, really, but I did think about going that route. The region-free-lessness of it bothers me, but since my wife and I do play some games, it would be a “two birds” kind of situation.
@Matt – Thanks very much, I didn’t know about that release. I’ll look for it.
@Bill C – Well hey, if you want to pony up the dough for it, I’ll get a Blu-Ray player this weekend! Until then, I shall remain cautious, no matter how much sighing you do.
I think he’s more pointing out the red herring logic of saying things like “Spartacus was a disappointment, so the whole format isn’t worth a spit”.…that’s not a very valid or logical argument. I understand the cost factor completely, but don’t pretend it hasn’t be a revelation for the vast majority of films that have been released, including each and every criterion so far. The new Powell and Pressburgers only further illustrate the wonders of high definition for older films.
So don’t throw away hundreds of stunning presentations because one release was sub par. If you had that attitude in 1998, DVD, as Bill said, would have never taken off.
@brad – “ ‘Spartacus was a disappointment, so the whole format isn’t worth a spit’.…that’s not a very valid or logical argument.”
You’re right, it’s not. Fortunately, I never said that. All I said was that a series of stories about bad discs has had me wondering if I should bother, because the long term prospects are possibly less optimistic than some had claimed. And I also said that this Imamura disc sets a Blu-Ray only precedent, I might have to cave.
So relax, everybody. I’m not the guy holding Blu-Ray down.
Bill, you may not be holding down Blu-Ray but where were you on the night of May 27th, 2008? You may be wanted for questioning concerning the death of HD-DVD.
Quiet, you! You ain’t seen nothin’, you ain’t heard nothin’! NOTHIN’!
Anyone have any idea why this (and other forthcoming) MOC blu’s are region locked? I’ve got their first few releases (Mad Detective, Sunrise, etc.), none of which are coded specifically to one region. My blu ray player was a gift, and I would never have had the extra money to get one on my own, so I’m sympathetic to those in tight financial spot.
region coding in the rare instances MoC has to do it is at the absolute insistence of the licensor. or in the case of a simultaneous nulti territory licence, like Lang’s M. You’re going to find this the case with quite a few Japanese titles, but MoC by and large are committed to region free Blus, and indeed are routinely now doing the extras in region free NTSC format for the benefit of non PAL viewers.
This is in contrast to Criterion who are simply region coding everything to “A” without even bothering to finesse the issue with the licensor.
MOC can be as “committed to region free Blus” as it wants but suggesting that this is an issue that most licensors will even consider being “finessed” on is hopelessly naïve at best.
The business is no different with Blu than it was with DVD and it’s not complicated. Major studios such as Warner, Fox and Canal have world rights to their titles, so they can decide freely whether to region encode their releases for different territories, often (as in the case of Warner) deciding not to.
Independent labels such as Criterion, Eureka/MOC, BFI, etc do not own the majority of their titles outright, so they need to license them. Licensors want to sell their titles to as many territories as they can, and if they don’t enforce region coding on their titles in one region, labels in another region will be less motivated to pick up these titles, and vice versa.
Some licensors have a more relaxed policy about this (as in MOC’s Mad Detective) but the majority do not, and why should they? As much as it would be lovely to have everything region-free, it all comes down to licensors, and this issue is nearly always non-negotiable. Attempts by labels to ignore this part of the contract and release their titles region-free anyway would likely result in seeing their product recalled and face legal proceedings brought against the label by the licensor. It would also probably bring about the end of their business, as licensors would likely stay clear of working with them in the future.
So not to beat a dead horse, but this is not, in 99% of cases, an issue of commitment that Criterion, or anyone else, is avoiding “fighting the good fight” on. MOC has been forced like everone else to region encode when it’s insisted upon by the licensor, as in the case of PDOTG.
As it was with DVD, this will be a dead issue as soon as multi-region Blu-ray players proliferate.
The French label Carlotta recently announced they’ll be releasing bluray discs of three Borzage silents: 7th Heaven, Street Angel and Lucky Star. No word on region coding but they’ll almost certainly be “B locked”. Yet more reasons to purchase a multi-region player for those who haven’t already.
So where does one find one of these so-called ‘multi-region blu-ray players’? Best Buy doesn’t seem to stock them.
Jeff, I don’t know if you’re being sarcastic, or coy, because you already know more about this than I do, but in case you’re not, Best Buy doesn’t stock region-free players, period. When I was shopping for one (that I eventually bought on-line), I went to Best Buy and was told they didn’t stock any region-free or multi-region players because they “weren’t allowed to”. That’s just what one employee told me, but anyway, there it is.
Fellas, I’ve found the info on multi-region players from DVD Beaver to be reliable and helpful, and they have links to sites whence one may purchase such items.
You don’t say!
I was being about as earnest as I can get. Thanks for the info, Glenn. (Also my most recent DVD player was bought at Best Buy, and turned out to be region-free once I looked online for hack codes.)
What do you mean You dont say?