Older Films on BluRay

By Christopher P. Jacobs
Staff Writer

Upcoming BluRay editions of an impressive and varied selection of classic films were announced this week. They range from the “Star Wars” double trilogy (albeit the first three only in their 1997 revised versions), to Peter Bodanovich’s moving look at dying small towns, “The Last Picture Show” (1971), to Charles Laughton’s only directorial effort, the taut suspense thriller “Night of the Hunter” (1955), to Charlie Chaplin’s iconic last attempt at silent comedy, “Modern Times” (1936).

There are still people who question why movies over 20 years old, let alone 40 or 75 years older, should even be transferred to BluRay, since “HD wasn’t even available back then.” Well, it’s true that HD video was not available back then, but those films were shot on film—a video format that few of this generation have ever seen. Film is a completely different technology that records actual visible images photochemically rather than encoding them electronically or digitally, and uses precision mechanical devices instead of sophisticated electronics to recreate the illusion of motion.

Film has been an effective medium for photographing, projecting, and storing motion pictures since the early 1890s. However, repeated use can introduce damage and eventually will cause it to wear out. Poor storage conditions can cause it to deteriorate or even decompose into dust. And every time a film is copied (including new preservation negatives made from other prints and then reprinted) the duplicate never quite reproduces all the clarity of the copy it was copied from, and usually increases the contrast so that bright and dark areas of the image lose detail, as well as increasing the graininess.

Old movies that are transferred to BluRay from old, beat-up film prints, or copies of other copies, will look just as bad as those copies. Trying to improve them digitally may erase some dust and scratches but without extreme care, such “noise reduction” can also soften or smear fine details. Attempts to smooth out film grain or do major readjustments to contrast levels usually obliterate even more detail. Attempts to sharpen such a softened image by introducing electronic edge enhancement (a halo-like highlight around all objects) will provide an illusion of sharpness on very small or low-resolution video monitors, but when seen on a large, high-definition monitor will look more like a “ghost” image and obscure even more detail. While certain types of film damage can be very effectively “repaired” or erased digitally, any details already lost in film-to-film duplication and reduplication (“dupe” prints made from dupe negatives) can never be regained in a digital transfer.

If original film negatives still survive in good condition, and if a digital transfer from that original material is done properly (i.e., without obvious Digital Noise Reduction or Edge Enhancement), old movies often look as good as and sometimes even better than BluRay copies of recent movies. If the actual negative no longer survives, a high-quality print made directly from the original camera negative can also yield an excellent high-definition video transfer.

The reason for this is that standard 35mm film stocks for the past 100 years, and even many 16mm film emulsions (if they were properly manufactured, exposed, developed, and printed), have always had higher resolution capability than the current 1920 x 1080p “full HDTV” standard. And of course films shot on larger format negatives like VistaVision, Super Technirama, Cinerama, 56mm, Todd-AO, 65mm, and IMAX are many, many times sharper than HDTV can reproduce.

In other words, home video quality is only now just catching up to where 35mm film was about a century ago, while modern film stocks keep getting better and are substantially sharper than those of 50 years ago. Thus, “high definition” video may look impressive but still has a long way to go!

The audio quality of films made before the 1990s, on the other hand, may have more obvious differences when compared to modern digitally-recorded multitrack stereo films. However, they can still sound extremely impressive if the original magnetic recordings survive in good condition rather then merely the optical sound negatives. In fact, many major films from about 1953 and after were actually recorded in 3-track, 4-track, or 6-track magnetic stereo, even if they were often shown with mono optical sound, or after the late 1970s with stereo optical sound. Still, it wasn’t until around 1990 that virtually every Hollywood production was released in stereo sound.

Films made in the 1930s and 1940s were originally recorded with optical rather than magnetic sound technology, so they will never quite have the wide frequency response and dynamic range possible with magnetic or digital recording. Most sound films from the 1920s were recorded with electro-mechanical technology onto wax discs. But even they can sound amazingly good if the original recordings or soundtrack masters survive, were well taken care of, and can be digitally restored. And if the individual music, dialogue, and sound effects tracks happen to survive for films never released with stereo sound, they can actually be remixed into a genuine stereophonic soundtrack rather than the simulated stereo “echo” effect sometimes added digitally to mono soundtracks.

The convenience and lower expense of BluRay technology has made it possible for us to see and hear films from the past at home with at almost the same quality they would have been seen during their first showings in the best theatres (actually better than seen in later showings in lesser theatres). The older standards of 35mm film image quality often equal or exceed the films projected in today’s modern multiplexes. And of course, like DVDs, BluRays can be stored and played with a convenience undreamt of just a generation ago.

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