'March of the Penguins' - High-Def Digest Review

[jed]

We just posted Peter's review of 'March of the Penguins,' and it's another winner for Warner -- a charming doc that boasts excellent picture quality and solid-enough audio (there's just so much you can do with location sound, narration and score). The slim set of extras echoes the disc's standard-def DVD release, but includes a great doc about the making of the film.

Full review here:
http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/marchofthepenguins.html

[Chris]

Does it play on European PS3?

[Merlins]

Originally Posted by Chris

Does it play on European PS3?

Yes, Warner does not region code their movies.

[Chris]

Great! I will order tonight

[diax]

I was very disapointed with the overal video quality of march of the penquins. It is very grainy, lens aberations, no detail, not at all HD quality. I fear i am not the only one.

It is all clear when i discovered that this entire movie was made with hi speed 500 asa super 16mm film. That explains everything. The choice for this smaller format is clear, the cameras are cheaper to rent and not so heavy as 35mm equipment.
But this gives some serious tradeoffs in picture quality. Super 16mm is not a good source for HD. When you do the calculations with this format it will contain hardly 1000 pixels wide. So half of what HD should be.

I can understand the choice for his format in this case but i can not understand 4 stars for the video quality. It is definitily not 4 stars, maybe 2 or 3.
But i am disappointed mister Bracke is not changing his review rating even when he admits he gave too much stars for MOTP in comparison with relentles enemies.

>>
....was shot on film, not HD video, and as such, I now feel somewhat guilty that I gave such a high video rating recently to 'March of the Penguins,' a much more high-profile documentary, also shot on film. 'Enemies' looks noticeably superior. Granted, much of the doc is shot in bright daylight, but still -- it is less grainy, with better detail and superior color reproduction
>>

So mister bracke corrects himself in this review. Why not change the original review of MOTP and give it 2 stars instead of the wrong 4 stars.
Would be fair to all the readers.

Be warned.

[Godstar]

Originally Posted by diax

It is all clear when i discovered that this entire movie was made with hi speed 500 asa super 16mm film. That explains everything. The choice for this smaller format is clear, the cameras are cheaper to rent and not so heavy as 35mm equipment.

Maybe it's because knowing that it was shot in 16mm, that didn't detract from the quality of the film transfer itself. Though if he was being un-biased because that was the filmers choice at the time, and didn't down rate the movie because of it, Peter is being inconsistant. He gives this movie a rating of 4 stars, but in a movie like Casino Royale where the director intentionally added grain and made certain areas darker than normal - he deducts a star because he disagreed with their decision. I really wish if Peter was going to rate films, he would at least be consistant with his decisions on why he does things, and hold the same standard to one film that he does for others.

[Jaws17]

Originally Posted by diax

I was very disapointed with the overal video quality of march of the penquins. It is very grainy, lens aberations, no detail, not at all HD quality. I fear i am not the only one.

It is all clear when i discovered that this entire movie was made with hi speed 500 asa super 16mm film. That explains everything. The choice for this smaller format is clear, the cameras are cheaper to rent and not so heavy as 35mm equipment.
But this gives some serious tradeoffs in picture quality. Super 16mm is not a good source for HD. When you do the calculations with this format it will contain hardly 1000 pixels wide. So half of what HD should be.

I can understand the choice for his format in this case but i can not understand 4 stars for the video quality. It is definitily not 4 stars, maybe 2 or 3.
But i am disappointed mister Bracke is not changing his review rating even when he admits he gave too much stars for MOTP in comparison with relentles enemies.

>>
....was shot on film, not HD video, and as such, I now feel somewhat guilty that I gave such a high video rating recently to 'March of the Penguins,' a much more high-profile documentary, also shot on film. 'Enemies' looks noticeably superior. Granted, much of the doc is shot in bright daylight, but still -- it is less grainy, with better detail and superior color reproduction
>>

So mister bracke corrects himself in this review. Why not change the original review of MOTP and give it 2 stars instead of the wrong 4 stars.
Would be fair to all the readers.

Be warned.

Not much of an upgrade from SD.

Great movie either way, but not worth the extra $ to get it in HD. JMO

[Ace_of_Sevens]

It does look a good deal better than the SD, though a lot of the night shots looks pretty crappy. Watch the accompanying documentary. THey were shooting in areas not accessible by snowmobile or anything, so were putting everythign they needed to film for a day on a sled and harnessing it to their back. 35mm would have been too bulky to be practical. A few shots were using digital cameras, but I'm assuming a good high-definition camera would have beyond this project's budget if it even worked in weather conditions they were facing. It's a quality 16 mm stock, though, so ultimately has more resolving power than DVD. Compare the penguin footage in the main movie with the accompanying documentary to see what I mean.