I have the old Tartan DVD of Trauma, which was certainly an improvement on the pan and scan video through which I first saw the film years back, but has never really struck me as being a particularly good transfer - I find the colours in it a bit murky.
Can anyone advise on whether this is a reflection of the cinematography or if there is a better looking DVD out there, preferably with both English and Italian audio options; part of the reason I ask is that I recently upgraded my Sleepless disc from the UK MIA release to the Italian Medusa one and it is so much better looking and sounding.
8 comments:
The best transfer (and supposedly a longer cut) is the Italian version, but there's no English language option or subtitles.There's also a German release, which has English and German language options only and is missing a few seconds (apparently only minor dialogue scenes, and it does contain the full closing credits missing on the UK disc apparently), but can be picked up rather cheaply (6 Euros + shipping at dtm.at and there should be even cheaper offers on amazon.de or elsewhere).
I don't know if the picture quality is any good though - the label has a terrible reputation, but has had the odd great looking title evry once in a while.
As usual, I recommend that you check with ofdb.de - it's in German, but usually a pretty good source for this kind of information.
I just checked myself and there is a picture comparison listed on ofdb.de between the anchor bay and the German release and apparently the German DVD has the better picture.
The R2 Optimum disc isn't a bad option Keith. Anamorphic widescreen and it looks a lot better than the old Tartan disc. Unfortunately there's no Italian audio, but at least it's only £4 from Amazon.co.uk!
Great blog btw!
Yes, I'd second the fact that the Optimum disc is a worthwhile step up from the Tartan one. I'm quite happy with it and it's definitely worth the money at that price!
Thanks for the input guys. I've went for the Optimum disc for the time being.
The Optimum release is the best-looking of all the English-language editions that I've seen (bearing in mind that I haven't seen the German release). However, the best picture is, in my opinion, to be found on the non-English release put out by Cecchi Gori in Italy. The colours are so much richer and more vibrant, and, while I'm not sure which of the available "versions" (the super-rich Italian DVD or the more muted palette used for all the other releases I've seen) is "correct", I know which I prefer. I actually made myself a DVD which married the Italian transfer (including the additional scenes not found on English language prints) with the English audio, which is now my preferred option for watching the film.
I made a TRAUMA comparison between the German Laser Paradise dvd and the local Hungarian disc which starts with the First Look logo and is very similar to the Anchor Bay USA print. The German version has the blue tinting during the city-search scene(around 36mins,Pal).You can check it out by clicking on Deliria or this link:
http://deliriahungaria.blogspot.com/2009/01/trauma-deeper-red.html
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