Trilogy on Blu-Ray

[Crack that whip]

Over at the Film Score Monthly boards, a thread has come up on the subject of the music in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, with the initial poster saying the music in the mine car chase has been dialed down in the sound mix, so that it's mostly buried to the point of inaudibility under the sound effects. At least one other poster is confirming this.

I didn't notice this at the marathon screening, which I'd assumed would have used a master reflecting what we're getting on the Blu-rays, but I still don't have the actual BDs yet and haven't been able to check them out myself. Can anyone here provide some illumination?

 

[Sakis]

Here's my big question. Will it have the redone CGI Gobler cliff dive that popped up on a lot of those TV airings a while back...?

I've already made this question and the answer is at the top of the page.

 

[Udvarnoky]

Over at the Film Score Monthly boards, a thread has come up on the subject of the music in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, with the initial poster saying the music in the mine car chase has been dialed down in the sound mix, so that it's mostly buried to the point of inaudibility under the sound effects. At least one other poster is confirming this.

The mixes on the first DVDs (except maybe Last Crusade, which I think was natively 5.1) deviated a bit from my memory, which is what happens when a mono track is remade into a surround track. Marion's scream when gawking at the snake coming out of the mummy's mouth in the catacombs felt like it way LOUDER in the original mix, and Willie's "What's the matter with you?" when she's pleading with Indy to help her as she's being dragged into the sacrificial cage always seemed more drowned out by the background noise to me in the newer mix.

This is why people should be demanding the original mono track on home video releases with the same verve that they demand the movie be presented in its original aspect ratio. Of course, the Indy mixes are faithful overall - it was nothing like that mix on the original Jaws DVD with the tons of COMPLETELY REDONE foley. And that movie won a Best Sound Oscar! Fortunately, subsequent versions include the option of the original mono, which should always be the case.

 

[Crack that whip]

Ok, although the Indy movies were all released in stereo / surround formats. I'm sure the earlier ones did have mono versions for mono-only theaters, but it's not as though those would be the only way to get the "original" versions of the audio tracks.

 

[Udvarnoky]

I think I flubbed by saying "Mono." But Raiders and Temple were only 2-channel, yes?

 

[Crack that whip]

They were in Dolby Stereo, in a 4-channel system (left, center, right and surround) in 35mm, and in 70mm 6-track.

 

[Udvarnoky]

So I guess, then, that the differences would have more to do with the very fact that it is a remix rather than the number of channels it was expanded to.

Am I at least right that Last Crusade was the first Indy film to be mixed in 5.1, or would that have still been too early in the Dolby timeline?

 

[Crack that whip]

I'm really not sure, but I want to say I think split surrounds came a little later, in the '90s.

 

[Stoo]

So I guess, then, that the differences would have more to do with the very fact that it is a remix rather than the number of channels it was expanded to.

Am I at least right that Last Crusade was the first Indy film to be mixed in 5.1, or would that have still been too early in the Dolby timeline?

Without opening a whole can of worms about remixing (vs. remastering)...

"5.1" is another name for a 6 track. The term started to be widely used in the mid-'90s. Some of the newspaper advertisements that I kept for "Doom" do indeed say: 70MM - SIX-TRACK - DOLBY STEREO TM Presentation...so "Temple of Doom" was definitely done in 5.1. (I'm not sure about "Raiders".)

Personal experience:
Back in '84, I distinctly heard sounds coming from the rear of the theatre on both the left & right sides. (This was the slave children screaming in the background right before Indy goes to investigate after taking the stones from the altar. At first I thought it was actual kids crying in the cinema but soon realized it was part of the movie!)

 

[Rocket Surgeon]

Just received the BluRays in the mail in a plain white package/envelope from an address in Philadelphia.

I entered a handfull of give-a-ways and was pleasantly surprised to open the mail just now!

Can't figure out which one it was though!

Amazing.

The return address on the envelope is from a company:

ALLIED-THA is a national full-service entertainment advertising, publicity, promotion and design firm with an office in Center City, Philadelphia. ALLIED-THA’s publicity/promotion division creates and executes exciting marketing programs for new release films and more.

 

[Montana Smith]

Just received the BluRays in the mail in a plain white package/envelope from an address in Philadelphia.

I entered a handfull of give-a-ways and was pleasantly surprised to open the mail just now!

Can't figure out which one it was though!

Amazing.

The return address on the envelope is from a company:

Lucky!


(Though I think I'm having more fun with the Spartacus Blu-ray Collection I bought instead!)

 

[Lance Quazar]

Personal experience:
Back in '84, I distinctly heard sounds coming from the rear of the theatre on both the left & right sides. (This was the slave children screaming in the background right before Indy goes to investigate after taking the stones from the altar. At first I thought it was actual kids crying in the cinema but soon realized it was part of the movie!)

But what did the egg sound like?

 

[Montana Smith]

But what did the egg sound like?

I've read that there was a little farting sound in the rear left speaker when the egg was laid.

 

[Rocket Surgeon]

Lucky!

I wasn't expecting anything, so it was odd when the wife plunked it down on the table...(she thinks I spending too much!). A great moment puzzlement / surprise / elation...I'm still a bit astonished.

(Though I think I'm having more fun with the Spartacus Blu-ray Collection I bought instead!)

...any sweaty women among the throngs of sweaty men?

 

[Montana Smith]

...any sweaty women among the throngs of sweaty men?

Plenty!

I think it was episode 6 where the director told the actors in the orgy scene "to just go for it". As with the Spanish Inquisition, he didn't expect the wooden ladle insertion!

 

[Crack that whip]

Without opening a whole can of worms about remixing (vs. remastering)...

"5.1" is another name for a 6 track. The term started to be widely used in the mid-'90s. Some of the newspaper advertisements that I kept for "Doom" do indeed say: 70MM - SIX-TRACK - DOLBY STEREO TM Presentation...so "Temple of Doom" was definitely done in 5.1. (I'm not sure about "Raiders".)

Personal experience:
Back in '84, I distinctly heard sounds coming from the rear of the theatre on both the left & right sides. (This was the slave children screaming in the background right before Indy goes to investigate after taking the stones from the altar. At first I thought it was actual kids crying in the cinema but soon realized it was part of the movie!)

Oh, getting back to the discussion of the earlier movies' original surround-sound credentials, I should note Temple of Doom was a literal "poster child" for state-of-the-art theatrical sound - the poster collectors here will remember that Lucasfilm's then-still-new THX group (which was then-still-Lucasfilm's, for that matter) had an information-loaded one-sheet poster in the mid-'80s, meant to be put up in theater lobbies, to educate moviegoers on the workings and benefits of THX sound, and the movie used for the examples on the poster (with both photographic and illustrated images) was naturally the most recent/current "big" Lucasfilm escapist entertainment of the time, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

 

[Montana Smith]

It's been suggested on another forum that the UK Collector's Edition Grail Diary is a reprint of The Lost Journal.

 

[Rocket Surgeon]

Are the lithographs prints of the art work on the sleeves inside the box?

 

[IndyBr]

Amazon.uk just shipped my Collector's edition blu-ray.

Here's a review of the Collector's edition I found in youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0oveWQAIf0

Damn... I was watching the video and Montana is right... it's the Lost Journal reprinted!
I'm really disapointed with that, since I was expecting the grail diary... I wouldn't have bought it if I knew...

I guess I'll just return the box and get my money back.

 

[Montana Smith]

Amazon.uk just shipped my Collector's edition blu-ray.

Here's a review of the Collector's edition I found in youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0oveWQAIf0

Damn... I was watching the video and Montana is right... it's the Lost Journal reprinted!
I'm really disapointed with that, since I was expecting the grail diary... I wouldn't have bought it if I knew...

I guess I'll just return the box and get my money back.

What a swindle!

Play.com is advertizing it as a "Journal", but Amazon.co.uk is calling it a "Reproduction Holy Grail prop (144 pages)".