The Greensboro Summer Fest Massacre Part 2 will most definitely not take place in the Apartment of Solitude. The Cap'n has been given his marching orders by a landlord keenly interested in renting the place out for more money (so interested that he snuck in a For Rent sign while I was at work and won't return phone calls).
While this may not be news to most of you, the unfortunate part is that the new apartment the Cap'n thought he'd be moving into is suddenly not available, so I have a week and a half to avoid being homeless. I'll be hitting the pavement tomorrow in order to avoid this, but considering the time limitations, it may come to the point where beggars can't be choosers. I'm not really thrilled about that since a large living room was a big priority and the no-such-luck apartment met that criteria.
Apologies in advance if things are a bit cramp-y come July 2nd.
Speaking of which, we are starting on Thursday, July the 2nd of 2009 with a field trip to see Drag Me to Hell, followed by night one of Summer Fest shock-o-rama. They will continue, pretty much unabated, until sometime late Sunday night, July 5th. The list of films is nearly finalized and when (if) I know where it's happening, I'll put everything together in an official bulletin.
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Very quickly I'd like to address something I've been noticing online. Since Ghostbusters arrived on Blu Ray this past Tuesday, buzz online has included lots of griping about the amount of grain in the picture. Having recently seen this version of Ghostbusters, I thought I'd compare it to another movie that isn't getting this much grief but has similar grain presence.
First off, you should know that Ghostbusters is grainy. So grainy, in fact, that if you look at some of the books in the library scene, they look like aphids are crawling all over them. It can be, admittedly, distracting; this does in some respects draw away from the "perfect image" reputation Blu Ray is supposed to have. I understand that, and it takes some getting used to.
On the other hand, two things jump out immediately: 1) Many movies released on BD from the 1980s have similar grain issues. Part of this has to do with the film stock being used at the time, and part of it is because in order to "remove" that grain, studios will use something called Digital Noise Reduction. It clears up grain but also robs images of fine details. Terminator 2 has a healthy dollop of DNR and you can tell at times. The other point, 2) is that even with this grain, you can still make out more in the image for Ghostbusters than previous dvd editions. Once you get used to the grain, the picture does admittedly look better and more "film like", however you take that to mean.
More importantly, I don't hear the same complaints about Criterion's The Seventh Seal, which is getting rave reviews about it's "perfect" image but also begins with a persistent layer of grain. Under the grain, sure, it looks great but unless I'm crazy or something, it's the same essential issue. I had a similarly jarring encounter with The Third Man, which looked much grainier than I ever remembered it seeing, improved clarity or no. And yet, like The Seventh Seal, nobody seems to be mentioning it. Ghostbusters, on the other hand, is getting calls of "buyer beware!"
Personally the Cap'n finds it a little ridiculous, but if you want my opinion both of them look pretty damned good considering their age. So does The Third Man, it just took some adjusting to. Truthfully, people with smaller tv's might not even notice the grain. On a larger screen, it's pretty pervasive, but not so distracting I couldn't watch two very entertaining movies. Yeesh.
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Off to bed. I have to find something of Summer Fest is going to be tragic...
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