PAL vs. NTSC in the marketplace

Message

arsonfilms · #26 Post by **arsonfilms** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 8:36 pm

My biggest complaint about this forum is the tendency for my fellow members to presume that Criterion is even allowed by law to take other regions' releases into their business plan. Does it suck for those of you who already own the two MoC titles that Criterion is including them in a boxset? Sure. But thats the risk you take by subverting the current global licensing arrangements. Neither Criterion nor MOC is allowed by law to market to anyone outside of the territories they license, so how can you hold it against them that they decide to put out some films that are unavailable in region 1 that happen to have been released by their closest equivalent in the UK?

Even beyond that, all Criterion would have to do to beat MoC to put out the best existing releases of these films would be to include commentary tracks, preferably by Tony Rayns. Thats it. We're not talking about super-special editions here, with extra discs of interviews and short films. If Criterion added the commentaries (and keep in mind, the announcement is a day old - anything can happen), the bonus disc alone would move the set beyond any existing release. I'm sorry that you all already have some of these movies on DVD, but don't hold that against Criterion. You'd prefer they leave MoC to do their own thing and let shops and websites across the US go without having these films in stock? Buy the set if you want it, but if you don't you can always hold out hope that MoC will put out Women in the Dunes - or you could just buy the damn BFI.

GringoTex · #27 Post by **GringoTex** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 8:50 pm

Darth Lavender wrote:At first, I thought this was (bussiness wise) a dumb move from Criterion considering that most any serious Teshigahara fan (ie. anyone willing to pay Criterion prices for his films) would already have (at least) the MoC Pitfall and Face Of Another

For every hundred "serious" cinema fans in the U.S. who would buy or netflix this boxset, I bet two are region free.

Tribe · #28 Post by **Tribe** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 9:06 pm

arsonfilms wrote:I'm sorry that you all already have some of these movies on DVD, but don't hold that against Criterion.

No kidding.

And there's no need for the insults, Darth. It must suck to be you.

Tribe

HerrSchreck · #29 Post by **HerrSchreck** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 11:44 pm

arsonfilms wrote:My biggest complaint about this forum is the tendency for my fellow members to presume that Criterion is even allowed by law to take other regions' releases into their business plan. Does it suck for those of you who already own the two MoC titles that Criterion is including them in a boxset? Sure. But thats the risk you take by subverting the current global licensing arrangements. Neither Criterion nor MOC is allowed by law to market to anyone outside of the territories they license, so how can you hold it against them that they decide to put out some films that are unavailable in region 1 that happen to have been released by their closest equivalent in the UK?

Even beyond that, all Criterion would have to do to beat MoC to put out the best existing releases of these films would be to include commentary tracks, preferably by Tony Rayns. Thats it. We're not talking about super-special editions here, with extra discs of interviews and short films. If Criterion added the commentaries (and keep in mind, the announcement is a day old - anything can happen), the bonus disc alone would move the set beyond any existing release. I'm sorry that you all already have some of these movies on DVD, but don't hold that against Criterion. You'd prefer they leave MoC to do their own thing and let shops and websites across the US go without having these films in stock? Buy the set if you want it, but if you don't you can always hold out hope that MoC will put out Women in the Dunes - or you could just buy the damn BFI.

Always nice to have superior advisory minds like this, who come to our rescue each and every time during trying stretches, who can Call Cooperative Conversations To A Halt, so that they may address the group as a whole to speak directly into our collective minds to point out the errors of our Decision Making and Opinion processes.

Because every once and awhile we can slip, and forget to remember to never never forget to be ever vigilant regarding our need to keep in mind that any mild criticism of anything Criterion is a sick, venal crime.

Steven H · #30 Post by **Steven H** » Tue Apr 17, 2007 11:44 pm

GringoTex wrote:For every hundred "serious" cinema fans in the U.S. who would buy or netflix this boxset, I bet two are region free.

Definitely. Two of my best friends are cinephiles, one local the other from Bosnia. Both were flabbergasted to know that other countries *had* films that weren't available here (my Bosnian buddy knew but thought it was just his home country's films), even more impressed that they were sometimes better looking, and in a complete stupor that you could buy a special $40 DVD player that would play them for you. Everyone else I talk to about this can barely follow along without falling asleep (I usually don't bother). Personally, I would never have known had it not been for this site (or DVDBeaver). So, yeah, I'm in the (off topic as hell) "why should Criterion care?" camp.

blindside8zao · #31 Post by **blindside8zao** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 1:10 am

good grief the bitching. Too bad the covers aren't hot pink. I've seen the BFI Woman and am looking forward to these other two films. How do they compare?

Don Lope de Aguirre · #32 Post by **Don Lope de Aguirre** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 6:33 am

good grief the bitching. Too bad the covers aren't hot pink. I've seen the BFI Woman and am looking forward to these other two films. How do they compare?

Yes, it can get quite heated here! With the notable exception of Tribe, though, the standard of posting's been pretty high.

As to how the films 'compare' well... I think it's worth stressing that the set is called Three Films by as opposed to A Trilogy by... For such a big admirer of Teshigahara I should have watched these films more often than I actually have twice each off head) but these films have always struck me as being very heterogenous. Clearly, they all share heavily 'allegorical' scenarios (and therefore, at times, dialogue) but -off head- I think you'd be pleasantly surprised as to how different each film is...

Darth Lavender · #33 Post by **Darth Lavender** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 6:45 am

I started by quoting earlier replies, but I think it's faster to just answer like this. (Besides, it would be kind of hard to have a serious argument about this anyway, just because of the amount of illogical and silliness in your replies...) [edit] rereading, I was about to change "illogical" to the correct "illogic," but I don't much care about the opinions of anyone who'd make a point of spelling/grammar errors, so I'll leave it.

Also, rereading some of these posts, I want to clarify that this is only aimed at a small portion of forum members (the fanboys in question.

As to the subject of cinephiles without multi-region players, I quite forgot to discuss that and may do so later.

- Insults...

Except for the term 'fanboy' (which I maintain is completely accurate,) there were no insults in my post. Actually, I am genuinely curious to see just how much you people will 'take' (ie. prices, forced to rebuy other movies, etc. etc.) and I really do think, from a purely bussiness perspective, it would make sense for Criterion to at last try a harsher pricing scheme.

I really do think my comparison between Criterion fans and Star Trek fans (or any other kind of obsessive collectors) is an increasingly accurate one. Just look at how much money Paramount was able to make selling those Star Trek box-sets at 400% the price of most other TV-series.

- Your mad at Criterion for rereleasing DVDs you already own?

This kind of sums up why I don't think it's worth getting into a serious article with you fanboys. You've completely missed what I said very clearly in black and white. (And for an argument to be constructive and interesting, one must be able to at least understand what the other person is saying.)

I'm mad at Criterion for *only* releasing Women Of The Dunes in a set with two other films that I already have in perfectly good (probably better than the Criterion) editions.

- Your fault for interfering with the Regional-Marketing, coding, etc.

So, (reductio ad absurdum, and this is going to be a very short reductio) your saying I should completely boycott MoC releases because I don't live in England? (And, for that matter, boycott Criterion too, because I happen to live in Australia.)

- "Sucks to be you"

Actually, no. Firstly, I have seen Woman Of The Dunes and frankly I didn't really like it all that much (I think I may have actually prefered The Face of Another, and the first (ironically, more 'spooky') half of Pitfall) So, while I might have bought a decent special-edition (with a goodly set of extras,) just on the theory that it's a classic and I should make an effort to appreciate it, I'm not exactly concerned about missing out on the Criterion Edition (just gives me more time, at no cost, to spend going through my 'unwatched' pile and/or trying to cultivate a better appreciation for some of the classics that I have been able to buy at reasonable prices.)

Might also be worth clarifying; I have a basically unlimited DVD budget (average means, but I have so few other expenses that I can basically buy any DVD I want. Actually creates a problem for my relatives at Christmas-time, because any DVD I'm remotely interested in; I tend to already own.) But that doesn't mean that I'm prepared to accept being ripped-off, and $80 for one, mass-produced, SD DVD, however good the transfer, is what I consider "ripped-off"

And besides which, for all you other people out there with a DVD-budget bigger than your capacity for rational thought; ever consider giving to charity? Even if you already do, there's still plenty of needy, starving people out there (or even give to the arts, if you prefer,) and it's making a heck of a lot better use of your $80 than giving it to Criterion (via Amazon.com)

Live Long and Prosper, Fanboys,

~ Darth Lavender (now that, incidentally, is an insult)

arsonfilms · #34 Post by **arsonfilms** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 9:05 am

I feel that I'm at least partially to blame for sending this forum off track, so let me just quick apologize. I didn't intend to get Darth Lavender in the hot seat (and for the record, I feel that his above response, though pointed in my general direction, has more to do with responses to my post than the post itself). I merely wanted to point out that the heated reaction to a personal inconvenience on a public board could have been been put together less caustically. No, I'm not suggesting that anyone boycott anything, but once you go region free you lose my sympathy when different countries put out different editions of the same film. I'm sorry, but that should simply be expected. I actually prefer when films show up in box sets, because it makes it cheaper to get all of them.

Anyway, long story short I just wish that Criterion threads could stick to Criterion issues (or, you know, the films themselves) without dragging other regions into the mix. If you just want to complain about how a new box set is inconvenient, maybe you and HerrShreck should combine forces to set up a new thread like his cost-structure one in the general section.

bunuelian · #35 Post by **bunuelian** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 11:36 am

The forum would benefit from moving all this complaining to a thread titled "I have a region free player and am entitled to never double dip!" arsonfilms hits the nail on the head with respect to the legal reality. The owners of region-free players who want to play the victim would be funny if they weren't filling pages of the forum with empty kvetching.

Tommaso · #36 Post by **Tommaso** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 3:25 pm

bunuelian wrote: arsonfilms hits the nail on the head with respect to the legal reality. .

No, he doesn't. It is NOT illegal to have a region-free player, nor is it illegal to manufacture one or to modify a region-locked player in order to make it codefree. Those who invented region-coding will not like it, but that's their problem. The only thing illegal is if Criterion or Kino or whoever sell their discs directly to customers from other 'region zones'. It has been pointed out before, but it needs repetition obviously: if you use your credit card to order from amazon.com in New York (or wherever they are) it is like you're in a shop in New York and buy the disc there, regardless whether you live in Moscow or Paris or in Nairobi.

bunuelian wrote:The owners of region-free players who want to play the victim would be funny if they weren't filling pages of the forum with empty kvetching .

You're entitled to this opinion, but reality is somewhat different. If our favourite labels cater to their home audience, fine. But that doesn't change the fact that their customer base is pretty much international. But if Criterion think they can sell enough Teshigahara discs to the home audience alone, all the better for them. The extra short films on that set sound interesting, but well: if they don't make the discs available separately, those who have the MoC discs already will mostly opt for the BFI disc of "Woman in the Dunes", I assume. And Criterion will have to live with it.

arsonfilms · #37 Post by **arsonfilms** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 3:49 pm

Look Tommaso, not a single person is suggesting it is illegal to buy region free discs, its illegal to for a studio to MARKET outside of their region. I'm sure Criterion is happy to have an overseas consumer base, but it isn't something they build into their sales plans and it isn't something they have any business going after. Its been said dozens of times before that you can BUY region free, but a distributor can't SELL. Make sense?

The reason I'm still region-restricted myself is precisely the thing so many people are complaining about: It increases exponentially the chance of my wanting to double dip. Like it or not, double-dipping is a huge downside to going region free, and for all the criticism I get for not buying foreign discs I get awfully sick of hearing people complaining that multiple regions all selling the same film. Of course they do! Thats the point of licensing to different territories! Its how filmmakers make their money!

You can subvert the system all you want. Thats your right, and nobody will ever try to stop you, but quit bitching about the inherent dangers of doing so. You can't have it both ways.

Rich Malloy · #38 Post by **Rich Malloy** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 4:05 pm

Darth Lavender wrote:Might also be worth clarifying; I have a basically unlimited DVD budget (average means, but I have so few other expenses that I can basically buy any DVD I want. Actually creates a problem for my relatives at Christmas-time, because any DVD I'm remotely interested in; I tend to already own.) But that doesn't mean that I'm prepared to accept being ripped-off, and $80 for one, mass-produced, SD DVD, however good the transfer, is what I consider "ripped-off"

And besides which, for all you other people out there with a DVD-budget bigger than your capacity for rational thought; ever consider giving to charity? Even if you already do, there's still plenty of needy, starving people out there (or even give to the arts, if you prefer,) and it's making a heck of a lot better use of your $80 than giving it to Criterion (via Amazon.com)

Live Long and Prosper, Fanboys,

~ Darth Lavender (now that, incidentally, is an insult)

Hear hear!

And it's high time we put the smackdown on Masters of Cinema for having the fucking gall to release "Pitfall" and "The Face of Another" when Asmik Ace already released those films at least two years prior. I mean, the nerve of those bastards. Peerpee, I was planning on giving that money to the Indonesian sunami victims, and instead you and your lowdown company screwed them over!

And here it is, a mere two years after MOC's dastardly act, and Criterion's committing the same horrible crime against me of all people! Me, with a love for Japanese film and a multi-region player and money to spend importing DVDs from all over the world... and they screw me over!

And now I understand that BFI is yet another entity to release "Woman in the Dunes", thereby committing ass-rape upon my person and my multi-region player (which really ain't built for that sort of action). I mean, do I just stand here and get screwed from all directions? This is clearly a premeditated, unprecedented assault of multiple releases of films I love by a variety of laudible companies that each seem to feature something new and compelling, be that commentary tracks or a selection of short films, all of which are being crammed unceremoniously through my bunghole and out into the free market without a thought as to how I might feel about it. How do I fight back? How???

One more thing... I don't want to single people out unnecessarily, but I'm afraid I'm going to have name names. Bunuelian, arsonfilms, Andre Jurieu... how dare you come in this forum and clutter it up with your grammatically correct, sensible pronouncements that feature not a single insult or bit of hyperbole, or even any funny misspellings, clearly for no other purpose than to spoil all the fun, er, all my fun? This is not a place for grammatically correct, sensible pronouncements. This is a place for hyperbolic rants that start with the understanding that you other fellars are damn fools and everyone is against me. Except Darth, of course, who understands and sympathizes with my plight.

skuhn8 · #39 Post by **skuhn8** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 4:11 pm

Well, in case your bunghole is properly dilated the bfi short edit of Woman of the Dunes has been available for the anal pleasure of both you and your region-free player since '06.

Rich Malloy · #40 Post by **Rich Malloy** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 4:12 pm

Those BFI bastards screwed me without me even knowing it (at least they used the short edit)!

vogler · #41 Post by **vogler** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 4:30 pm

Rich Malloy wrote:Those BFI bastards screwed me without me even knowing it (at least they used the short edit)!

Nope, it's actually the full version (141 minutes) - Amazon is wrong. You've been well and truly buggered!

Rich Malloy · #42 Post by **Rich Malloy** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 4:36 pm

Is that how they say it over there? "Buggered"? How many euphemisms for anal sex must I learn?! Damn this globalization! Damn you British Film Institute for buggering my oppo with every last minute of the long edit!

triodelover · #43 Post by **triodelover** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 4:37 pm

skuhn8 wrote:Well, in case your bunghole is properly dilated the bfi short edit of Woman of the Dunes has been available for the anal pleasure of both you and your region-free player since '06.

First post for a long-time lurker, but Amazon.co.uk have got it wrong. I own the BFI Woman and it's 141 min. If the Criterion is simply a PAL to NTSC port of the BFI, the properly converted length turns out to be tad under 147 min, which is the time Criterion are listing. Alternatively, the Criterion could be a direct port of the Japanese NTSC Asmik Ace at 147 min.

At this point the Criterion blurb does not mention new subtitle translations, and both the BFI and Asmik have English subs. The Criterion blurb does say "New, restored high-definition digital transfers", but that's a stock line for every release as far as I can tell.

So the question becomes is there any going to be any significant difference between the BFI (or Asmik) and the Criterion that would justify buying the Criterion box as opposed to the single disc for those of us who already own the MoC titles?

Phil

Tommaso · #44 Post by **Tommaso** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 4:43 pm

arsonfilms wrote:Look Tommaso, not a single person is suggesting it is illegal to buy region free discs, its illegal to for a studio to MARKET outside of their region. I'm sure Criterion is happy to have an overseas consumer base, but it isn't something they build into their sales plans and it isn't something they have any business going after. Its been said dozens of times before that you can BUY region free, but a distributor can't SELL. Make sense?

Makes perfect sense, as this is almost precisely what I was trying to say. I'm not totally sure about Criterion not considering their international base of buyers. If only 2% of their discs are sold to customers outside the US, okay. But I doubt that this is the case.

arsonfilms wrote:The reason I'm still region-restricted myself is precisely the thing so many people are complaining about: It increases exponentially the chance of my wanting to double dip. Like it or not, double-dipping is a huge downside to going region free,

I wouldn't subscribe to that. Double-dipping is sometimes a great chance to finally see a film in a good transfer that is only available in your own region in a bad one. Thus, I'm completely happy to double-dip on "Ivan's Childhood", for example. There is just no point in double-dipping for me on a Criterion disc with a film formerly released by MoC (for example). Also, and I don't know which sort of films you normally watch, but if you're like me interested in such 'obscure' things as silent films or weirdo stuff like Greenaway or Paradjanov, often my only chance to see these films AT ALL is to go beyond my own regional zone. Going regionfree is not so much about double-dipping but being able to see what you want.

arsonfilms wrote: I get awfully sick of hearing people complaining that multiple regions all selling the same film. Thats the point of licensing to different territories! Its how filmmakers make their money!

I can't follow. Assume this: 500 discs of "Woman in the Dunes" are sold by the BFI, another 500 by Criterion. This makes 1000 copies. Now if there weren't different territories and just one dvd of "Woman in the Dunes" in the world (by the BFI, for example), 1000 copies would be sold by the BFI. The filmmakers would still have gotten the royalties for 1000 copies, but probably the BFI would have had to pay double for the rights to the film, which however they could then distribute everywhere. This is the usual procedure in the world of audio cds. There's just one label (and its subsidiaries) that owns the right to release a Pink Floyd cd worldwide, for example. Something like this however would exclude the possibility of somebody else bringing out a better version of the film in question.

arsonfilms wrote:You can subvert the system all you want.

But whose system is it? Criterion's? Regional coding was invented by the major companies who were afraid people in Europe might not crowd into the cinemas any more because they had already seen the US dvd of a film that only comes to a European cinema one year later. That was the 'official' reason, and I can even understand it. But this argumentation doesn't apply to old films, of course.

ltfontaine · #45 Post by **ltfontaine** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 4:50 pm

arsonfilms wrote:Anyway, long story short I just wish that Criterion threads could stick to Criterion issues (or, you know, the films themselves) without dragging other regions into the mix.

Why shouldn't the Criterion threads, which are specifically about DVD releases, include comparisons between Criterion and other DVD editions of the same title? A discussion comparing features present on the Criterion and MoC discs of the Teshigahara films, for instance, is absolutely germane to a consumer-oriented evaluation of these specific Criterion DVDs.

Sure, region-free consumers are in the minority, but their number is increasing, especially among the kinds of film viewers who frequent this forum. I know the moderators work hard to hold back the forces of informational anarchy, but it's in the interest of this discussion group to promote DVD region-freedom as axiomatic by expanding, not limiting, the scope of conversations about competing DVD editions.

This thread, â€œPAL vs. NTSC in the marketplace,â€

arsonfilms · #46 Post by **arsonfilms** » Wed Apr 18, 2007 8:49 pm

Alright, I'm just going to post some general, quick replies so that we're all on the same page, and then I'm never looking at this particular thread again.

First off, I'm sorry that yet another thread has been hijacked. My complaint on the other thread wasn't in response to comparison between releases(which is welcome), but to general complaints about being inconvenienced by different companies putting out the same film in different countries. I'm not trying to hurt the legitimate discussion of film or the DVDs said films are on, I'm just trying to curb unreasonable whining.

As to Tommaso, I don't necessarily disagree with any of your points, but there are some things about film distribution you need to understand to see why your argument is only half right. Studio films have a similar distribution model to the Pink Floyd case you mentioned. Warner, say, might produce a film and then release it worldwide because Warner is vertically integrated and has an infrastructure set up for international distribution. This part is obvious I'm sure, but bear with me. Independant film producers and companies though, license out their films to unrelated companies in a variety of territories. Contrary to popular belief, they don't recieve royalties for every copy that sells or every ass in a theater seat. They get paid a minimum guarentee (essentially an advance on royalties), and in many cases they don't recieve anything beyond this initial MG. The reason I say that this is how filmmakers make their money is that unless the film does very, very well, the only money they see is the MG from each territory. Part of this licensing agreement then is that no company is allowed to market to consumers outside of their territory because it impacts the sales of other licensees. If Criterion were to market, say, Pitfall in the UK, MoC would have reason to complain (or file suit) because they'd be worried about their own sales.

Does it make it any easier that regions usually define licensing territories? US and Canada is typically bought and sold as one territory, although French-speaking Canada is occasionally sold seperatly. This is why Criterion isn't allowed to consider selling outside of Region 1, and MoC isn't allowed to consider selling outside of... wherever their licensing arrangment extends. Thus, when I say you're subverting the system by going region free, I'm not saying you're doing anything wrong, and I'm not playing up some system cooked up by the studios to keep you from seeing a new movie when you want to see it. Yes, you can do absolutely whatever you want with regards to purchasing, and a retailer can (I believe) feel free to sell whatever they want to whomever they want, but Criterion trying to sell an Australian or Malaysian one of their DVDs would be in clear violation of their licensing agreement. Yes, I'm sure they're happy to have you as a customer, but they are contractually restricted from making it easy for you to buy their product or consider the implications of what licensees in other countries are doing. It might be good business to take it into consideration, but they can't legally assume that their consumers are also MoC's consumers.

If possible, I'd like this to be the end of the discussion so we can get back on topic. If anyone has any questions about any of this feel free to PM me, and If anyone has any reason to believe that I'm mistaken about something, feel free to post a correction.

manicsounds · #47 Post by **manicsounds** » Mon Nov 12, 2012 8:18 pm

peerpee wrote:When I was at MoC, I decided to let the existence of a 24fps Blu-ray dictate that the DVD should be 24fps NTSC (to keep the subtitling, length, and audio pitch the same).

There's no need whatsoever for labels to continue making PAL DVDs in Dual Format sets when the source is 24fps and the Blu-ray is 24fps. The only reason it's done is because "PAL is Europe, isn't it?", but it doesn't have to be. Any label could switch tomorrow to NTSC DVDs and it wouldn't have a detrimental effect at all.

Pointing to your contract and saying "ah, but it says here I have to issue it as PAL", doesn't mean anything either – because the Blu-ray isn't PAL, so technically, the Blu-ray breaks that part of the contract too.

That's why I never understood why some European companies used badly transferred NTSC to PAL discs. Why go that extra step to mess up the image?

peerpee · #48 Post by **peerpee** » Tue Nov 13, 2012 12:42 am

manicsounds wrote:That's why I never understood why some European companies used badly transferred NTSC to PAL discs. Why go that extra step to mess up the image?

Because they have no idea what they're doing and how what they're doing is affecting the image detrimentally. There is prevalent mindset that UK DVDs have to be PAL. 99% of authoring houses just automatically make PAL DVDs in Europe. The menu templates are all set up for PAL, everything's geared for PAL. So if they receive a native NTSC Digibeta master, which may have made a nice NTSC DVD, they'd do a cross-conversion (usually by dubbing from one tape (NTSC) to another (PAL) which ingrains all the interlacing in that new master now at source), and end up with a terrible disc. I've seen PAL Digi made by badly cross-converting an NTSC Digi broadcast on UK PAL TV!

Really, really glad to see the back of PAL / NTSC.

EddieLarkin · #49 Post by **EddieLarkin** » Tue Nov 13, 2012 6:30 am

Unfortunately it still rears its ugly head now and again. I recently bought The Uninvited from Exposure Cinema; they boast about it being from a progressive source but sure enough it's sped up for 50hz playback. This 2012 release is its first official DVD debut in the world, as far as I'm aware. The picture's fine but presumably they could have saved themselves the trouble of converting to PAL and screwing with the runtime and pitch of the film, and just keep it NTSC. I usually solely buy region 1 DVDs these days to wittle down the 50hz content in my collection, but there was no choice with this one.

The funny thing is, when I first started collecting DVDs about 10 years ago I had a 19 inch CRT set, which had been handed down to me from my parents. They must have had it since the late 90s at least. I imported my first region 1 disc (a Criterion, none the less), and sure enough it played absolutely fine on the set. It was able to switch over to NTSC/60hz no problem, the damn thing would be 15 years old now! The idea that anyone today is buying UK DVDs to play on a set that is still limited to 50hz playback is surely complete rubbish, yet we're still seeing it happen.

Zot! · #50 Post by **Zot!** » Tue Nov 13, 2012 11:31 am

Unfortunately we're not exempt from conversion in NTSC land either. Plenty of European films on NTSC dvd exhibit horrible combing/interlacing/ghosting mess as they've been sourced from PAL. Even worse multisystem TVs are almost unheard of. This might just be my favorite thing about blu-ray, as I tend to watch a lot of films from the old world. Unfortunately there are still 50hz blu-rays being produced! TV shows, Lars von Trier movies, and some discs that originate from broadcast masters. However, this is useful for adding some additional variable framerates (for purposes of screening silents like the DFI Dreyers). Although a player like an Oppo will convert framerates, anybody have any technical details regarding what kind of problems might be introduced by this process? I get an unstable image that bounces up and down slightly, and would like my next display to support 50hz natively as well (although this limits my choices considerably).

PAL vs. NTSC in the marketplace

Re: BD 40 Gate of Hell

Re: BD 40 Gate of Hell

Re: BD 40 Gate of Hell

Re: BD 40 Gate of Hell