NEWS: Bond Movies Added

[steelman1991]

I watched Goldfinger (my full review here: https://www.cineluxe.com/kaleidescape-goldfinger/) and thought it looked mostly great, especially in tight focus. Some of the far field shots (like Bond on the laser cutting table or long shots in Switzerland) definitely don't have the same sharpness and detail.

Thanks John - very nice review. I, like your dad am a Connery fan and it was a real disappointment for me to have those artifacts in, to me, the most important title in the franchise - the one that introduces Bond to the world.

Are you planning a review for Dr No?

 

[TrackZ]

I was posting about this on AVS as well. I think it's important for us to delineate if the concerns have to do with the Kaleidescape encode or the core assets of the movies in general.

I own all these titles on iTunes (where they are also UHD) and had intended to begin buying/watching them on Kaleidescape for better quality in my theater. I could start with Dr. No since that's been mentioned as on a concerning one and it's the first/oldest in the series.

If someone can post time codes and what to look for in Dr. No, I can do an A/B comparison and report back. If we find any anomalies are specific to Kaleidescape, we can begin sharing those details with them.

My gut tells me anything folks are seeing is a result of the aged and processed source material, but we can check nonetheless.

 

[Vodder]

I watched Goldfinger (my full review here: https://www.cineluxe.com/kaleidescape-goldfinger/) and thought it looked mostly great, especially in tight focus. Some of the far field shots (like Bond on the laser cutting table or long shots in Switzerland) definitely don't have the same sharpness and detail.

I just mentioned to @steelman1991 that I was unlikely to migrate to the digital Bond movies yet for a number of reasons, however, having just read your review @jmdls I think I may go nab Goldfinger now

 

[steelman1991]

I was posting about this on AVS as well. I think it's important for us to delineate if the concerns have to do with the Kaleidescape encode or the core assets of the movies in general.

I own all these titles on iTunes (where they are also UHD) and had intended to begin buying/watching them on Kaleidescape for better quality in my theater. I could start with Dr. No since that's been mentioned as on a concerning one and it's the first/oldest in the series.

If someone can post time codes and what to look for in Dr. No, I can do an A/B comparison and report back. If we find any anomalies are specific to Kaleidescape, we can begin sharing those details with them.

My gut tells me anything folks are seeing is a result of the aged and processed source material, but we can check nonetheless.

Posted my response here as well rather than going back and forth - you want to keep the discussion going here, rather than duplicating

looks like we've got a little cross-talk going on, between here and the K Owners threads.

The timestamps I've found to be most prominent in the early part of the film are

"Three Blind Mice" - looks like they're surrounded by a "noise force field" - 02.56 to 03.10
"The Bridge Game" as Strangways leave the game 03.40 to 03.46
"Bond meets Moneypenny" - again a lot of "haloing" around the characters - 09.50 onwards

I've not doubt it's a limit of the asset, but I haven't seen anything similar in the Bluray disc version, played via the DV700 and Alto.

 

[steelman1991]

I was posting about this on AVS as well. I think it's important for us to delineate if the concerns have to do with the Kaleidescape encode or the core assets of the movies in general.

I own all these titles on iTunes (where they are also UHD) and had intended to begin buying/watching them on Kaleidescape for better quality in my theater. I could start with Dr. No since that's been mentioned as on a concerning one and it's the first/oldest in the series.

If someone can post time codes and what to look for in Dr. No, I can do an A/B comparison and report back. If we find any anomalies are specific to Kaleidescape, we can begin sharing those details with them.

My gut tells me anything folks are seeing is a result of the aged and processed source material, but we can check nonetheless.

Save yourself the time - my wife reminded we had some of the Bonds in AppleTV - checked and one of them is Dr No.

Same issues with their version . Looks like I'm/we're stuck with it.

 

[jmdls]

As I mentioned in my review, there is a momentary weird frame speed issue in the opening of Goldfinger as Bond comes out of the water in the SCUBA suit; it's like he stutters in double-time speed for like a second. I rewound and rewatched on my Strato a few times to make sure it wasn't just some hiccup, but it does it every time. Then I compared that scene to the Epix 4K version (downloaded to my DISH Hopper 3) and it exhibits the exact same thing. So that was either something weird intentionally done (I need to check my original DVD version...) or something that had to be done due to lost or damaged elements during the restore. But, when you consider these are movies that were made over 60 years ago, still look pretty fantastic!

 

[josh]

Anyone interested in a uniformed alternative set of high-resolution Bond covers, I've added these to my system.

James Bond - Cover Whiz

High quality cover artwork for James Bond collection. DVD & Blu Ray covers, Album art, Plex posters, and more.

www.coverwhiz.com

Whoa, those are fantastic! great work! Downloading...

 

[josh]

So if I'm starting with, say, 3 James Bond movies to download... which are the top 3 in terms of: 1) story/movie quality; 2) Picture quality in 4K; 3) Audio quality?

Of course it's subjective... just hoping to get some recommendations on which should be my first purchases.

 

[Kostas]

So if I'm starting with, say, 3 James Bond movies to download... which are the top 3 in terms of: 1) story/movie quality; 2) Picture quality in 4K; 3) Audio quality?

Of course it's subjective... just hoping to get some recommendations on which should be my first purchases.

I have bought all 24 but I have only watched the 4 Daniel Craig movies. Skyfall and Spectre are impressive(native 4K presentations). Casino Royale(my favourite together with Skyfall) and Quantum of Solace(least favourite) look substantially better compared to the HD versions. Nothing wrong with the DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack, I used my processor's up mixer and they definitely sound much better with DTS Neural:X on.

Kostas

 

[jmdls]

So if I'm starting with, say, 3 James Bond movies to download... which are the top 3 in terms of: 1) story/movie quality; 2) Picture quality in 4K; 3) Audio quality?

Of course it's subjective... just hoping to get some recommendations on which should be my first purchases.

It's gonna be tough to beat the recent Craig films in terms of picture and sound quality, but here's a list of my favorite overall Bonds that will give you a sampling of the series...

1) Casino Royale. I just did a 1600+ review over at Cineluxe that should post today. This is just a great film and as true as you can get to Fleming's vision of Bond in my opinion. (You know, less the Craig's blonde hair.) It also upmixes wonderfully with a really immersive DTS 5.1 track. (Skyfall is also great; Javier Bardem brings a great take to the Bond villain, and the finale at Bond's family home is great fun!)
2) The Living Daylights. I think Timothy Dalton is way underrated, and he brought a much needed breath of fresh air to the series after all the humor Moore brought to Bond.
3) From Russia With Love. This one is also very true to Fleming's work, and is classic Connery Bond.
4) For Your Eyes Only. I think this is the best of the Moore series and was my favorite Bond movie for years.
5) Goldeneye. Besides being the basis for the greatest Nintendo 64 game EVER it is a solid movie. The opening scene is awesome, as is the tank driving through the city.

 

[cinelife]

I agree with most of those choices as well, but Moore never really connected with me. I liked that character for "The Saint" TV series, but the added comedy, some of it almost slapstick, doesn't work for me in the Bond films. It was Connery's Bond that I had in my mind when I joined the CIA in 1970. I worked for the DO (covert ops officer) in SE Asia for 11 years, but never got the chance to "save the world!" I did order my martini's "shaken, not stirred." (On a side note, the first time that phrase was used in a Bond film, it wasn't spoken by Bond. It was Dr.No, and he actually said "Shaken, and not stirred" implying he knew a lot about Bond. Connery didn't use the phrase until Goldfinger.

Anyway, fun times!

Jim

 

[jmdls]

For anyone interested, here's my review of the Kaleidescape download of Casino Royale:

Casino Royale (2006) - cineluxe

John Sciacca says "Casino Royale"--Daniel Craig's first foray as Bond--features a good, but sometimes uneven, 4K transfer and an excellent 5.1 mix that puts you squarely in the middle of the action.

www.cineluxe.com

 

[iansilv]

That opening of Bond driving the Aston Martin through Italy in Quantum of Solace is a great demo scene...

 

[cinelife]

Love that drive, did it in one of my Ferrari's a couple years back (Via Gardesana Centro)!

Jim

 

[andy]

Great review as usual John. Makes me want to watch Casino Royale tonight

 

[Ricster]

Great review. Have you compared the K version to the disc version please ? 90Gb vs 60Gb

 

[jmdls]

Great review. Have you compared the K version to the disc version please ? 90Gb vs 60Gb

Thanks, glad you enjoyed it! I haven't compared the two; I don't see me buying the disc version since I have the K-version...

 

[Ricster]

Thanks, glad you enjoyed it! I haven't compared the two; I don't see me buying the disc version since I have the K-version...

thought I’d ask incase you purchased the disc version many months back like I did. I’ve been buying the bonds at K.Living daylights and goldfinger (I was totally blown away with I had to share my thoughts on the Facebook k users group from my little 4k page) look impressive. Got Goldeneye to watch yet which has always had a troubled past with video transfer and OHMSS.
So really didn’t want to rebuy the craig movies again unless they’re a lot better.
Thanks.

 

[jmdls]

thought I’d ask incase you purchased the disc version many months back like I did. I’ve been buying the bonds at K.Living daylights and goldfinger (I was totally blown away with I had to share my thoughts on the Facebook k users group from my little 4k page) look impressive. Got Goldeneye to watch yet which has always had a troubled past with video transfer and OHMSS.
So really didn’t want to rebuy the craig movies again unless they’re a lot better.
Thanks.

Do you see a diff between the K versions and the discs...? I'd expect them to be super close in quality, short of maybe a few really specific freeze-frame scenes looking for fine artifacts or something. Of course, I could be wrong... Love to hear any specifics where you saw quality differences between the two!

 

[mootang]

This is

A few notes.

Before anyone mentions Atmos, note that the 4k disc Daniel Craig Collection does not have Atmos on any discs in the set.

These are all big downloads, 80GB+ in most cases for just the 4k downloads. Note that the 4k Daniel Craig Collection discs are all BD-66s. Kaleidescape is consistently delivering greater than disc quality.

Note that iTunes has had the Bond films in 4k for a little while now. On iTunes, most are only 4k and only a similar subset is in HDR. In the long run, maybe MGM will HDR update more of the movies, but the 4 of 22 in HDR on Kaleidescape is based on available assets.

I've inquired about a bundle option.

This is really interesting as I had received the 4k Daniel Craig collection as a gift earlier this year and watched a few movies. It would be really interesting to see what translates to the additional file size between the versions.