Was looking forward to this review. I remember how excited all of us fans were when Zack Snyder and Henry Cavill made the announcement for the release date back in 2020. I stayed up all night to watch the livestream. It just goes to show that studio executives should refrain from meddling with the vision of directors. It never ends well. The 2017 version was an abomination.
It's all about money Rinai and they were looking to limit the losses on the $300m they'd sunk into it. If the reports are true then they genuinely felt they had a disaster on their hands and they may well have been right. The sequence of events that led to this four hour marathon meant that the end product was not the same as the film you would have got if Zack Snyder had have finished it in 2017. Another $70m sunk into it confirms that. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Yeah, ZSJL is almost certainly not the movie we would have gotten in 2017. It seems like it was made in response to the criticism his DC films has received in the intervening years.
@@matthewweflen To condense everything into two hours would have been almost impossible but that's down to planning. A few of the characters needed to be much more minor roles but it evidently hadn't been planned out like that and they were all given back stories and showed Bruce Wayne/Batman recruiting them. If they'd have just turned up and offered their help then it would have been possible to tighten everything up and get the two hour film that Warner Bros. had stipulated. Perhaps a little too ambitious before cameras rolled then but it all worked out in the end. It's just a shame that Joss Whedon has had to put up with such abuse due to the lack of understanding from a few film fans. John.
@@KneelBeforeZod. Yes, thank you for that contribution Doomslayer!!! Gave me a laugh anyway simply because 'abomination' is such a great word and we really should all try to use it as often as possible. I've decided I'm going to start slipping the world 'chicanery' into my lingo more often too. John.
Another masterful review Sir. Thank you for such intelligent & entertaining content. I am a police officer here in the states and after a particularly ugly shift I will often put on your channel & listen to your reviews as they bring me such peace & calm. Next week my 4k Steelbook of John Carpenters 'The fog' will arrive and I surely will think of you as I watch it. This week I picked up the 4k Steelbook of '3:10 to Yuma' & it got me thinking how much we both liked the western 'Open range' and are anticipating its eventual 4k.
Being a police officer in the States today can't be easy Matthias so I wish you well in all that you do. Most of us will hopefully never some of the worst that you have to deal with for the rest of us and in that regard the police no longer get the respect they usually deserve. Open Range would be an ideal subject for a 4K disc but that Blu-ray looks so good that a 4K would have to be exceptional. I have the Blu-ray of 3:10 To Yuma as well and that's another terrific western though not quite in the same league as Open Range... then again, I don't think any other Western quite matches it. I don't have The Fog on 4K but I do have the complete film as a Super 8 'Scope print. It's not one of the great Super 8 prints but it's always exciting to run it because there's something special about having a film on film and hearing the projector drumming away. I have never got over the thrill of running a real (reel) home movie. Enjoy The Fog and 3:10 To Yuma. Don't forget the sweet treats for when you put them on. John.
I hope you decide to do a full length review of Batman Returns, John. I love that movie and even prefer it over Burton's original. Unfortunately, it was just too dark and strange for most people.
Well we watched it last night and it's not very good as a film but I'm thinking about how I can make something work because there are some interesting points about the image quality. I think image noise reduction has been used a bit more than most releases and that's why it looks so grain free. I find the 1989 film is much nicer to look at for various reasons; it's certainly a better film for me but Batman Returns could have been a much more interesting proposition if it was just Catwoman and Shreck withThe Penguin left out altogether. I know what went wrong though because they were trying to surpass what they did in 1989. John.
I liked this film its not a perfect film by any means! The aspect ratio never bothered me personally! The CG can be questionable at times. Glad to see your review!
@@munozmm88 Some of it was very good. I think the problem that film makers are having is that they're putting so much into the hands of the computer cartoonists and it's not proving possible to get everything completed in time so corners are having to be cut. It doesn't really matter with this version of Justice League as it was intended to be a television miniseries and in that regard it all works well. Would have been a different story on big cinema screens though. John.
So glad this movie got to see the light of day. Enjoyed the Zack Snyder’s series of films. Definitely interested to hear what you think of the Batman Returns 4K, probably my favourite Batman movie.
Sadly, I still don't much care for Batman Returns. I'm thinking about it all though so I may be able to fashion something interesting together because I put Batman on immediately after watching Batman Returns so maybe the two 4K discs in one video even though I've already covered the 1989 film. I really don't like fish! John.
It's a vast improvement over the 2017 film. It now been announced that WB would now rather had not released the SnyderCut under the new Discovery partnership but this was released before that merger. Alot of the effects were created in 2019 and additional footage shot. I'm thrilled we got it and would love to see the story continue but sadly doubt if that will come to pass!
If it hadn't have been for the surprising success of the 2017 version then we wouldn't have ever seen The Snyder Cut. I know most will think Joss Whedon's save job was not successful but how on earth would anyone set about cutting all this down to the contracted two hours? What an impossible job. No doubt Warner Bros. were expecting a financial black hole when they were first presented with the film but Whedon saved the day and the film has become almost legendary as a result. I knew nothing about it as I'd given up on the plethora of superhero movies years before but that's been a benefit of this channel, people have hassled me to see films I'd been avoiding and a damn good job they've hassled me too because I've really enjoyed most of them. The computer animation for the 2021 release was a bit rushed and that's why much of it is sub-standard. It was being done for a television miniseries though and in that context it's fine. Just as well it wasn't blown up on huge cinema screens though. John.
Another excellent review. Well done. I've quickly become a big fan of your videos. I really enjoy the brief history and info you provide on the films you review. I also really appreciate your calm demeanor. In today's world it's much appreciated. You are a natural at this. Keep up the great videos and stay safe. Cheers.
Thank you Mike. One of the reasons I started was because I couldn't find anyone reviewing discs that seemed to know about film. How I present the videos is largely how I am and as I've aged I've become increasingly careful about how I explain things. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Don't forget the offensive techno music for the video introduction. On a serious note: Your videos are a breath of fresh air and improve the community. Knowledgeable as you are wise about the subject matter.
@@Mowglibaloo2 I couldn't find anyone that knew about film doing reviews of home video Mowgli, hence why we now have these Movie Collector videos. Fortunately, I've been involved with some very knowledgeable people via the British Film Collectors Convention and so all my questions down the years found answers. These people spent their lives in the industry and some are still in it. One of the long term convention projectionists is still working as a video editor for big productions and we were quite excited when he got the job of editing several episodes in each of the last few series of Downton Abbey. Great people, great knowledge. i've just arranged for the delivery of the worst techno music anyone can possibly imagine so I can overlay it to the 35mm projector opening! John.
I have to say that this movie is probably my favorite live action DC movie and a true masterpiece in terms of superhero films. Its a shame we couldn't see this version in theaters cause it would've been great to see these characters done right in cinematic form
Evening Eva. It did get a cinema release in the USA but I'm not sure about other countries. I'll be surprised if it didn't have a limited release here as it's the second biggest movie market in the world. John.
@@resikin Good to know that someone thinks so Sir Rami. If we include the 1978 Superman and the sequel, 1989 Batman and the Christopher Nolan Dark Knight films though then Justice League appear fairly low down on the list for me. John.
I wasn't a massive fan of the original cinema release John, but I thought the Snyder cut was a huge improvement. I also liked the idea that the aspect ratio made the superheros seem bigger in height, as opposed to wider if in widescreen. I remember there is a B&A version of this too, but I have watched that yet. Great review as always John 👍🏻
I think yo mean a 'black and white' version Leon but all you need do there is bleed the colour out on your display. A bit of a con really. The original version seems to have turned a small profit so that really did save the day. Without that amazing turnaround of what must have been expected (i.e. a massive loss) then The Snyder Cut would never have happened. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Hi John, sorry yes I did mean black & white. Sky Movies had both a colour & Black and white versions of the Snyder cut when it was on there, I chose to watch it in colour.
Morning Brendan. Those two little red lights were originally clipped to the base of the screen a few homes back. We hadn't really used the drop down screen we're currently using since those days over 16 years ago but it's ten feet wide and we had it manufactured at that width because the room it was made for was ten feet three inches. We didn't have a spare room to use as a home cinema so the screen was dropped down from behind a pelmet complete with the lights clipped on and angled to illuminate the screen in blue at the time. When we moved to our last place and we did have dedicated cinema room we put them on top of the speakers and changed the bulbs to red. So, they're just a couple of clip on lamps with red bulbs installed that now use the clips as their base and are angled to illuminate the red of the curtains. I like to find solutions that are easy and cost almost nothing. John.
John, I love how you explain that this is a 4 perf 35mm film and not a 15 perf 65mm film, although, as you say, the 1.33:1 aspect ratio probably fooled people into thinking it was an IMAX film. It makes sense that the 4K disc for Batman Returns has superior image quality to the 4K disc for Zack Snyder's Justice League; the former was 35mm photochemical, the latter 35mm digital (4K DI). Erik.
That is exactly my conclusion too Erik. It's this backwards and forwards from fllm to the computer and then sometimes back to film and then the computer again that is making films look less lifelike than they used to. I know that many people do not know what IMAX is and accept that any movie can miraculously be made into an IMAX movie as though IMAX have some computer tool that does something that no one else can. I hope that Christopher Nolan's 'Oppenheimer' gives me a launching pad to explain it all again in detail next year but I suppose it depends on it having the famous label 'Shot and finished on film'! John.
@@moviecollector5920 I look forward to that film and your review of it. As long as the technology to shoot and finish on film exists, I think any Christopher Nolan film will have that label.
I'm not a fan of Snyder as a director but I did enjoy his Justice League quite a lot. I felt the studio really dealt him a poor hand changing the direction of the film after he left the project. They clearly asked Joss to do "another Avengers" and with half the film already shot it just wasn't a good idea. Splitting the film into two parts would have given them a much better return on their investment and it's something fans have come to accept now with longer films like Avenger Endgame, Dune and Kill Bill.
I expect there is a lot more to the story and it's mainly going to be about money and Warner Bros. fearing they had backed the wrong horse and were about to be taken to the cleaners. Joss Whedon saved the day and without that rescue to make a two hour film out of War & Peace (the Russian version!) then The Snyder Cut would never have got off the ground. John.
A fair, balanced review, John. I much preferred the extended cut when I streamed it on HBO MAx. Bought the 4K but haven’t watched it yet - it will be interesting to compare the higher resolution Atmos sound on the disc v the low res Atmos that streaming provides.
You should find that the picture has more information in it Andrew as another comment informed us that it looked different and as though it had been re-compiled at a higher rate for the 4K. I am sure that The Snyder Cut would never have seen the light of day were it not for Josh Whedon's rescue back in 2017. Perhaps in the future people will look at that afresh and see it for what it was. John.
I personally find the 4K for Batman returns to be one of the best discs from Warner Bros. It looks so natural and compared to my laserdisc and dvd is a huge improvement in picture quality while keeping the authentic look of the film. I’m not a huge Snyder fan but do enjoy, watchmen, dawn of the dead & guardian owls 3D. He is an interesting film maker with a great eye. I feel the story like with most it what makes me comeback to it or not. I’d hope that WB releases the directors cut for the previous suicide squad film since it’s just easy money to make. Like when they did Richard donnoer’s Superman 2.
i'm not sure Batman Returns is entirely accurate as I suspect there has been rather more image noise reduction applied than to most 4K releases. It seems too devoid of film grain to me and lacks the natural look of the 1989 film. Overall I prefer the look of the 4K of the 1989 film but there are some close-ups in the sequel that I expect are making many feel that it's better than it is. Distant detail is the thing to look at to gauge how good a disc is and although it's very good for a 35mm transfer it does mean that it predominantly looks like it was shot on a set. The same cannot be said of the original film so something isn't quite right and I think it may be excessive 'DNR'. But I could be wrong of course. I feel like I've seen too many superhero films lately but to be fair there doesn't seem to be much else being made these days. Let's hope the success of the Top Gun sequel helps to redress the balance and reminds a lot of people that they enjoy a regular trip to a cinema. John.
I love this film. This is how a super-heroes film is done. 242 minutes of true fun quality scenes. Fortunately we have DC franchising to make us forget our terrible Marvel late films are. The 4k quality image is amazing. I did not hesitate to purchase the steel book 4k once it came out to the market and what a joy to watch this entertaining masterpiece. Many thanks John for one more stunning review.
I was actually rather surprised that I enjoyed this one Nuno but I think sometimes it's down to expectations and when I first saw Man of Steel I really didn't like it because I was expecting a follow up to Superman Returns. Enough people told me about Justice League and all the chicanery so I was not only prepared for it but found it interesting to learn all about it too. It's funny how things sometimes turn out. Marvel only really had Spider-Man but Detective Comics had Batman and Superman so they immediately have a bit more substance when they do an Avengers/Justice League type film. John.
Enjoyed this review John. I'm glad you found this movie to be decent. I think Snyder was given free reign for this so put out "the entire story". I agree some CGI was a bit ropey but them some of it was really good... which I think was down to the time they had to get a 4 hour cut ready. I think the main story was great and all characters had their moment to shine. Not a perfect movie but I'm glad Snyder got his cut out after the circumstances of why he didn't finish it originally. I did however like the aspect ratio which was also a surprise
Funny how it seemed to work with the old academy ratio. I wouldn't have put money on that but it was actually one of its strengths. I suspect there has been a general lack of understanding or knowledge about what happened in 2017 and how and why Joss Whedon came to take over getting it completed. He almost completely saved the day in reality and must have paved the way for the 2021 version. If the 2021 version had have come first then it would have been widely trashed but as it is most have given it a fair crack of the whip. John.
@@moviecollector5920 aside from the 4 hr run time which I'm sure would of been far less on a threatrical release... why do you think this movie would do bad? I think the aspect ratio was good, people have said it made superheroes tall and "god like". Did they do that so they could release in IMAX cinema's etc or is that what would typically be done (digital video wise) so they have plenty to crop?
@@Darrenlovesmovies Zack told that he want to release as he shot it... thats why they went with this ratio...Glad he did..nice to see there are more people who appreciate that ratio :)
YOU DID IT! Love this movie, gonna come back when I’ve finished the vid. Ok first thing the 2 hour run time mandate was already in place when Zack was on board. He’d already presented 2hr45 and 2hr22 versions of ZSJL before he left. Whedon literally had no reason to do reshoots. I also think Zack putting his name in the title is the biggest Chad move a director has made. As to the CGI Zack and a couple of guys at WETA digital had only 6 months to redo all the cgi at 4K including the new design for Steppenwolf and the fully cg Darkseid and DeSaad. Really glad that you enjoyed this.
That fills in some of the gaps for what I'd been able to find out and it's good to know that I'd got things pretty much right. I didn't know that Zack Snyder had tried to condense everything he'd shot into two hours and failed so that explains why it had to be handed over to someone else and it also explains why re-shoots were required because it clearly wasn't possible to squeeze it down to two hours without some new scenes to hurry things along. Thanks for the information. John.
@@ohyeahitsthatguy9454 The lady singing the religious song at the end wasn't very good and it wasn't the right choice for the ending of the film despite what had happened to Zack's daughter. The other two that I recall suddenly starting up early on in the film were simply wrong and ridiculous. Others will disagree but I think the film would have been better without them. Might have also shortened the running time a bit by removing them. John.
What I used to do when the roll down screen we're currently using was in our former home in central London was that I'd put black card up inside the roll which held it there and masked the image off perfectly. It did the trick and it's all you need. Having a permanent room does mean that masking can also be permanent but the automation isn't really necessary as I could pull the cord by hand to close it up. It was just something that I wanted to do to see if I could. It is good fun to just sit there and press buttons though. I want to redo the bottom mask in lightweight wood as it's too flexible now it's so wide. John.
Another great review John :) I prefer Zack Snyder's Justice League to the 2017 cut and think it's a masterpiece. This version has a better storyline and character development. I'm normally not a fan of overlong films but here it works well and gives u a great experience. The only thing that annoyed me was the black bars down the side. A sequel would be wonderful but I doubt that we will get any JL2 in the future but who knows. Batman Returns is a great film but noway near as good as Burtons first Batman film. However, Michelle Pfeiffer's portrayal of Catwoman is excellent. Apparently there was supposed to be a Catwoman spinoff with Michelle Pfeiffer reprising her role and Burton directing the film but it was cancelled.
I think Michelle Pfeiffer is the best thing about Batman Returns. After watching the Blu-ray of Outland last night I put sequences of Batman Returns on again and it doesn't look quite so bad to me now but I'm not convinced of this 4K. It's very sharp but little evident film grain which probably shouldn't happen with modern film transfer methodology. A couple of times I thought faces looked a bit wet or waxy like the Predator Blu-ray but nowhere near as bad. The outdoor Gotham sets look exactly that - sets. We then put the 1989 film on again and it has none of that. Only a near perfect representation of the film from the standpoint of a master print. I still can't find any Teals that people are telling me is in it though. I think they may be getting mixed up with all the Penguins in the sequel! Projecting Justice League means the academy ratio image can be masked and I think it was issued this way so that the film would look like it was a genuine IMAX print because there were [apparently]; plans to put it into genuine IMAX cinemas. Would have had to have been cut down a bit for that but getting rid of the epilogue alone might have done that and that wouldn't have lost anything of value. John.
Always a pleasure to see your videos. I think you have ignited more of a collector mindset in my mind. Now I want to get more UHD movies! We currently moved to a large house so I finally have more room for setting up equipment. Some interesting things so far. We bought a Vista Vision Cinema camera with sensor size 40.96 mm x 21.60 mm in 8K. it is the first time I have used a cinema camera where I can almost not see any grain in the image. It is really special to watch 8K material downsampled to UHD image that is uncompressed. The normal UHD is usually using around 40-60Mbps which I think is really a bit on the low side. The data we capture can be up to 10000Mbps. When you watch the images on the TV they are really so much sharper than any normal UHD I seen. I wonder if they will increase the bitrate in the movies a bit more. I was surprised that BBC Planet Earth 2 used similar bitrates to HD bluerays. I remember that with blueray they did increase the bitrate with time on the movies and it made quite a difference. I'm looking into building a "cinema" and mixing room, probably with an LG 65" OLED (the room is not that big so larger would probably not work) and using Genelec SAM 8331A studio monitors with a heafty subwoofer 7370. Idea is to use it both for sound/music mixing but also just for fun. Have not decided if I would use a Playstation 5 or a dedicated UHD player as the source. I remember you recommended a dedicated one. So combining work and fun.
Morning Andreas. VistaVision was a horizontal 35mm film format so is this a video camera version of that? Well, it must be as you're talking about having seen the results already and it would take at least a few days to get a 35mm VistaVision to a lab and back and you'd probably have cleared out your bank account to do so. It seems to me that you now need to find a suitable video projector for a dedicated room. You'll have so much more fun watching movies with that and a film evening will be even more special. No telly can match a projection and I would say that even high definition video projection would trump a 4K telly of any sort. If you do manage to get a 4K projector though you'll be able to easily discern the difference from one disc to the next simply because the size differential of projecting as big as the room will allow means it's easier to see which disc is better than another. When I used to review new Super 8 prints for the trade fanzines and things I was always running them ten feet wide and that meant I could genuinely see how good each print was compared to another. The same screen I always used for that is now what you see behind me but it's always in the rolled down position now. I hope to get back to using a painted wall and put the screen in the living room for occasional use in there but we still haven't managed to get builders in to make all the necessary changes. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Interesting point. I will take it to hear. Last projector I used was 720p and I would usually project 100 inches. But one thing I think was always problematic with projectors is the black was never really black and also the bright spots were never that bright. I have not seen any of the new projectors though. What I do remember liking was of course the size and the pleasant softness from the projector. I would need a bigger room though! I actually plan on using the TV as a 4th monitor so I can put things from the computer on it while working and then switch to movie viewing in the evening. We may get a new house in a year or so so maybe there will be a better place then. I completely agree that with a projector you get a much more special experience for everyone. Of course nothing beats the sound from the film projector behind you...
Hi John and well done for sitting through it. I really like it, it takes its time and it feels like your watching a major event movie. A common fault of a lot of DC movies is the bad guy just ends up being a cgi mess. Still a massive improvement on the Wheedon cut.
I now realize that what I watched was six episodes of a series Clive and in that regard it was a very good television series. That also makes the poor computer animation easier to accept and understand. I do think it's something I'll be able to dip in and out of now that I've seen it and will probably see more of what we're supposed to be looking at each time I do. Whedon saved the day though because without his efforts The Snyder Cut would never have been given the green light. John.
I'm curious to know which CGI shots you felt looked poor? The Snyder Cut got great reviews for its FX especially over at the Corridor Crew channel and those guys generally call it right.
So much of it Mark but you have to remember I'm not watching it on a telly so it's easier to see the quality of movies and everything in them. The bigger the projected image the easier it is. The worst was probably the Amazonian gals riding the horses which would have been laughable if it had have been made for cinema but acceptable as it was intended as a television miniseries. We're watching this as though it's a cinema film because it's had a 4K disc release but that was not the market being aimed for. To get the new animation finished for the 2021 release was a bit of a rush and incredible that the release date was met at all so we just have to accept that in this one there is some sub-standard computer animation. But I don't think it matters because it was so spectacular anyway. The dull look disguised a lot of the limitations which helped too. I liked the way it looked but I know some didn't. John.
I find it amazing that even 35mm is still superior to video given that the film is transferred to a computer, animation added before being edited in a computer and all the detrimental effects that has upon the overall image quality. No wonder Christopher Nolan's genuine IMAX films have looked so good compared to almost anything else other than Kenneth Branagh's 70mm releases. John.
I've been waiting a review of Zack Snyder JL from you, John. It amaze me that this has Native 4k and all marvel movies are upscaled. Zack snyder truly knows how to do amazing cinematography. This is a truly masterpiece superheroe movie.
I expect the Columbia Marvel movies are shot on video. Justice League was film. Although many of the computer animated sequences were poor quality. I don't think there was enough time to do them as they'd have liked to be fair. John.
@@moviecollector5920 The Sony (Columbia) Spider Man films, with the exception of the 2012 film, were shot using 35mm film. The last Marvel film shot primarily on film was The Amazing Spider-Man 2
Greetings John, I get your point on the CGI aliens and I understand it but Steppenwolf looked quite much better in this new version and doesn't look like a vilain from the Power Rangers anymore, so I guess it's a nice improvement from the Whedon cut. :) As for Batman Returns, I've watched the film quite some times ago so I may be wrong but I remember that the overal picture quality is indeed good but the problem with some older movies (espacially if the film was shot in a studio) is that the improvement on the picture's resolution make you see much more details and, at the end, your picture is kind of screaming "MOVIE SETS" because it's not hidden anymore by a more "blurry picture".
Exactly right about Batman Returns. When it was in cinemas we saw it on huge screens for the most part. Those who went to multiplexes may not have had such an impressive screening owing to the smaller screens but the bigger an image is blown up the more any failings are disguised. Batman Returns at just nine feet wide here looked very much like a movie set. I don't think the Penguin character helped the production either and a better film would have just had Catwoman as the villain. It certainly would have done away with all the fish! John.
@@moviecollector5920 While the film has some flaws I don't agree with you about the main antagonist. I don't pretend that I'm a "Batman expert" but I've growned up with the animated serie from the early 90's and, much later, I've played the Batman Arkham games which had a similar tone. Generally speaking, Catwoman is an ambiguous character. She may be a criminal but can also be an ally and, unlike other villains like the Joker or the penguin, she doesn't try to kill innocent peoples. So, making her the main antagonist of a story would be kind of strange in my opinion. There are many others characters that can be used for that role (even if you don't like the penguin ;) )
@@lhommetrouble1246 Ah, but that's the point because Catwoman could have crossed both lines and been seen to be helping Batman get Shreck a lot of the time and then double cross him at others. Remember that Bruce Wayne married Selina Kyle in the comics so the possibilities for characterization and drama would have been the most interesting element rather than going for villainy and action. Probably wouldn't have interested the target market back in 1992 but it would have interested me a lot more. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I get your point but it confirms me the idea that she cannot really be the main antagonist. In your story, it would be Max Shreck and she would be in a kind of gray zone: helping Batman sometimes but also keeping her own interest in mind even if she has to betray him at some point. I agree on the fact that a story with a more important role for her can be interesting (even if she overshadows Max Shreck) but would it makes her really "evil / the main villain" ? I doubt it. ;) Have a nice week-end.
Another great review John of a film that I absolutely love. I’ve watched it so many times now and find that it’s just one of those movies I can rewatch over and over. I think it looks stunning in 4k and the superb Dolby Atmos track compliments the fantastic visuals so very well. The soundtrack by Tom Holkenborg matches the epic scale of the storytelling and is way, way better than Danny Elfman’s theatrical cut attempt at a film score. I love all of the main characters in the league and believe the aspect ratio does justice to the perfectly cast actors who bring the best of DC’s superheroes to life. Thanks for reviewing this one, your videos are always very entertaining.
Thanks Scott. I think you're on the right lines there and although the aliens are poor what do we expect from movies with aliens in them these days? They're always going to be done with computer animation and it rarely works so that's what we have to put up with. I've been making the point with other commenters that I think that this film would get better with each viewing. After all, once you've seen it you don't have to watch it all in one hit and could watch it like the miniseries it was originally proposed to be. John.
Greetings from a fresh children’s school year in Canada 🇨🇦! Freedom! Condolences about the Queen. A friend of mine gave this movie to me as a gift. I wasn’t horribly enthusiastic about watching it, but it was much better than the first release. The big boss man had better cgi armour and skin details. Other than that, it was a super hero movie to me. I didn’t think too hard while watching it. It’s good for what it is! Although the lack of colour in most scenes was a bit annoying. Take care!
It's terribly sad that so many of us around the world have lost the greatest monarch in history. I think we'll see Britain at its best in the coming days and probably Canada too and many other great nations. The lack of colour was an artistic choice for this version of Justice League but the overall image quality is very good even if it's not as good as films of yore such as Batman Returns. Irrespective of that it gave me four hours of fun and that's all anyone can ask for with a group of costume clad comic book characters fighting a computer animated nastie. John.
I loved the Snyder Cut it really blew me away , pity the Richard Donner cut of Superman II didn't get the same investment to finish it properly, and as for Batman Returns , I recently watched it with my son and his friend both 12, they just hated every single frame of it , it was the most uncomfortable watch I've sat thru in years , when it came out in 1992 I liked it, but watching it again recently was not a good experience , it hasn't aged well , really feels small in scale and you just know it was all shot on a sound stage , it's a Tim Burton movie that just happens to have Batman in it.
I expect Warner Bros. threw money at this Snyder Cut because Whedon had managed to turn things around with the save job he was employed to do. It probably got back WB's investment and maybe even a small profit so I can imagine the temptation to really turn it into a success as a new release for the comparatively paltry sum of $70m. As for Batman Returns, I didn't like it in 1992 and I still don't. It looks to me like someone wiped out the film grain on this 4K as it doesn't have the natural look that the 1989 film does. I put the original film on immediately afterwards and it's a real film whereas the sequel looks like a cheap knock-off restricted to studio sets. It didn't look like that before so I suspect excessive image noise reduction has been applied. Some have told me they think it's the best 4K disc in their collection but I think that's probably mainly down to the close-up of Catwoman's face in that famous shot. John.
I haven't seen the two hour version Mandeep but I have learned quite a lot while reading up on the trauma that everyone must have gone through in 2017. They appear to be almost completely different films and the 2017 release was in reality a save job so that Warner Bros. could minimize any losses. As it turned out, Joss Whedon almost got them their money back at the box office alone so I suspect it brought it quite a profit in the end after sales to streaming sites, television and home movie disc sales. That paved the way for another $70m investment in 2020 and this Snyder Cut that finally saw the light of day in April or May last year. It's quite a story and almost makes me want to take a look at the 2017 film. John.
@@moviecollector5920 thanks for thst info. I think I will watch both to compare and contrast. The 2017 version got really reviews. I am going to start a DCEU marathon and will end it with The Snyder cut
At 1 hour 15 minutes on disc one has anybody else noticed a dead pixel flash on then off as the camera is entering through the doorway on the right hand side? I’ve noticed this several times throughout the playback of both discs and unsure if it’s the source material or my TV?
I did see a small triangle of light flash on at one point in the film Samsung but I really didn't take too much notice. I did have a lazy mirror during a show about two years ago but once the projector had had a rest and struck up again it had finished its snooze and come back to life. That lazy mirror in the DLP resulted in a dead pixel sort of result on screen so if you're watching with a DLP video projector you may have spotted a brief hiccup with one of the millions of mirrors on the chip. John.
This is interesting. When I watched this on HBOmax. When it first released, I thought some of the VFX were pretty unrefined. But the disc looked extremely better. I wonder. I know the European version came out around the same time as the hbomax release, because not everyone could yet stream it. So I wonder if the international version is just the Hbomax version pressed to disc. If you liked it enough, import the US version, I want to know what looks so bad, save for that one shot from that one flash scene. Cyborg's extra arms have more detailed on my disc. I remember them looking more cartoony (smooth) on the HBOmax. Like the treasure chest at the end of the first hobbit. It's all smooth af. But I think that was to make it pop out better in 3D. It's just easier to make solid one color objects pop out.
So many of the shots of the Amazonians were poor Grant, most notably the ridiculous close-ups of them riding while shooting arrows off. The aliens were poor and obviously cartoons with little reality to them at all. But as awful as some of that animation was we have to accept that we were lucky this film was ever finished at all. The time to complete all that animation rather guaranteed that much of it was going to be less refined than it would have been if the animators had have been given a couple of years and another $100m to do it all. Films that are streamed are lower quality than 4K and Blu-ray discs so you might have just observed the inevitable drop out and the resultant image quality of that. It's unlikely there are two versions but I've learned to never rule anything out however ridiculous it may seem. John.
Dear John, another super video. If you can get your hands on " The adventures of Captain Marvel" a 1940s serial you'll see the best flying effects done in camera. The serial is on US Blu Ray.
I saw episodes of that on Super 8 years ago Dennis. I remember Captain Marvel flying through the air. It''s not really my sort of thing these days but I did enjoy the old Saturday Morning serials as a child and watched Flash Gordon every time it was repeated. Captain Marvel wasn't shown so regularly over here but I did see it when I was very young. John.
It is always great to see you, John, and listen to your opinions and explanations! Thank you very much for making all of it so interesting! I signed up to HBO Plus some months ago with an agenda to watch this film. But time goes by and I still have not seen it.. The time has come to do so! Be well.
Keep your expectations low Dmitri and you may have as much fun with it as we did. Expect a masterpiece and you'll be disappointed. I think it's a film that will improve with each viewing and you don't have to watch it in one go either. Six parts or one disc at a time is possible. John.
@@moviecollector5920 There are very few 6 hour long movies, which I could watch in one setting. One and two being Frank Herbert's Dune and Children of Dune (British mini TV series). They are both quite theatrical and mighty good! But this movie... I will take both of your advice: low expectations and watch it in few sessions. Thank you!
I'm a huge Marvel and DC fan, and I really enjoyed ZS' Justice League. Yes, it has its issues especially in the CGI depth, but the Whedon cut suffers more in that area, so the use of computer graphics here is considerably better in some areas. The stand alone Wonder Woman film is rather very good, and deserves your attention, it's better than most of the DC films to date, and Shazam is well worth a look too. Excellent review John, I look forward to seeing if you do the Batman Returns review...
I'm not really that enamoured with so many comic book adaptations Mark so I really struggle to get up the enthusiam at times. Spider-Man, Batman and Superman were the three stand-out comics when I was a child and the rest were nothing more than fillers to me although I did often enjoy Thor, Daredevil and some of the others but I never stuck with them for long. I enjoyed this version of Justice League though. It was intended to be a miniseries and with so little time to fill all those required effects sequences in we just have to accept that the animation wasn't as good as it could have been. Computer animation is often the reason why a project is considered viable nowadays but I still think there is often too much of it. Perhaps the solution is to build into future story proposals a villain or alien that is more human and moves at human speeds. Then the film makers would be able to shoot much more live on set. Batman Returns is still a bit of a disappointment but I may be able to do something interesting about both the Tim Burton Batman films. I know I've already covered the 1989 film but doing the sequel does rather need reference to the original. John.
What a thematically and visually stunning film! This film was truly everything DC fans and those that grew up with the JL animated series have wanted and more! Great review!
I didn't know there was a cartoon series. That may well be what it's based on because I read the comics occasionally and I didn't recognize those in the film. Mind you, I read the comics a long, long time ago in a galaxy.... okay, enough of that! John.
@@moviecollector5920 Most of the characters in this film were part of the original 1960s Justice League of America lineup. The one exception is Cyborg, who originated in the pages of The New Teen Titans in 1980. When the DC timeline was reworked in 2011, he was promoted to the Justice League. If the film ever manages to get a sequel, it would be nice to see the other two classic members of the team--the Martian Manhunter and the Green Lantern--join in on the action instead of being reduced to cameos.
@@MAMoreno I doubt there will ever be a sequel but I suppose that depends on how much money Justice League made for Warner Bros. in the end and whether or not they'd be prepared to risk around half a billion dollars! That seems unlikely right now so if there is another Justice League film in the future I expect it will be another of those pesky reboot films. John.
I certainly enjoyed this film a lot and the 4K presentation is far better than the VOD/streaming edition though I would like to see a proper IMAX release. I agree with what you said about the length as it feels like we’re watching one of the overly extended editions of films we hear about but usually never see the light of day.
Sadly it's not an IMAX film Jbird so you'd just be paying to see it blown up on a bigger screen. I don't think there's anything being released in IMAX now but we do have Christopher Nolan's 'Oppenheimer' due for genuine IMAX enjoyment next year. That's the one to aim for but make sure they're screening a genuine IMAX film print before setting out otherwise you'll be watching a 4K video projection. Yes, that's all they use in IMAX cinemas most of the time now. When you think the IMAX film equivalent is around 45K it rather puts things in perspective. John.
Hi John! Thanks for your work on this! Gonna agree with you here as I enjoyed this film as well but more for the sound than the film itself. I have the 4k but it streams alot on Crave here and I'll put in on in background and just listen to the 5.1 fill the room. (Have Atmos capability but don't have it hooked up yet lol) More interesting though from your review is what you said about Aliens and our (many film enthusiasts would agree I feel) need for something different. I'm sure at some point someone somewhere will come up with a new, more original idea for an alien/villain and put it to film for us hahah. Ps Jaws Imax was a hit, my daughter loved it and it was pretty packed. Felt like a kid again watching it and as you said What a piece of work by the young Spielberg. Regards to you and everyone here D in BC!
i get the impression from having watched this 'miniseries' that it will improve with each subsequent viewing. It has that sort of feel to it to me. Difficult to take it all in first time around usually means there is more to see the next time and the next time and the next time. Shame no one came up with a more viable option for the aliens though. Maybe the way to go would be characters that move at a human pace and so action could be filmed in a way that you could actually follow what is happening. Thank you for letting me know about your recent Jaws adventure Dave. It would be a thrill to see that great work of art in a packed house again today but it would have to be a top cinema otherwise I know I'd sit there fuming about the poor image quality and how it looked better in 1975. John
I hope you enjoy it James. I was expecting a terrible load of nonsense and although it's a load of nonsense, it's not terrible! The sound and the academy aspect ratio image really helped me to enjoy it but I found I liked all the main characters which was a surprise as I really wasn't expecting that. John.
The most frustrating thing about the theatrical cut of Justice League is that it overcorrected the issues with Snyder's previous films, resulting in something that felt only slightly more substantive than an episode of Super Friends. This alternate cut shows that Snyder was capable of fixing the flaws of his first two entries without turning the franchise into an imitation of Disney's Marvel films.
If Warner Bros. had have been open to a three hour version of Justice League then it's possible Zack Snyder could have pulled it off. But it did apparently take a further WB investment of $70m to get that four hour cut completed. WB did want more humour and other things within a two hour cut and that was a contractual obligation for Joss Whedon when he took over. What they were essentially looking for is what's often referred to as a 'save job'. Judging by the success at the box office considering the situation the film was in, I'd say they got it. John.
I love your explanation for the alloted runtime in the cinemas. I've never really thought of it like that. Never really had to. It'll be a while before I get to sit and watch. I've so many titles to watch. I suppose the 4×3 aspect ratio gives the film an old school movie look. I hope it's all framed nicely, i. e. Empty space round the action? Trev
The academy aspect ratio actually works surprisingly well Trevor and I thought it was one of the strengths of the film. I did look about the frame quite often and masked it off to the 'Scope ratio in my head and couldn't see how it would have worked as well. It was shot full frame Super 35 and so that's how the cameraman would have framed it so although much of the area around what would have been the 'Scope ratio was largely superfluous, it didn't seem to be while watching it. It's not a great film by any means and at times it's really quite poor but that is understandable because it was being assembled as a six part miniseries so we have to accept that that was the aim at the time. I expect the really poor computer animation was due to the short deadline to get it completed too. An interesting film though despite all the flaws. Above all though, it turned out to be surprisingly good fun. Lowered expectations certainly helped to make it enjoyable though. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I like films that are "Framed" that way because it can give you a better sense of size. I have The Flowers of War which was meant to be a 2.35:1 aspect ratio and may have been in cinemas but the BD has the masking removed. It looks lovely and almost IMAX in its 1.78:1 presentation. Great video as always John. Take it easy Trevor
Thanks for telling me that. I found that the 4K of Batman Returns had a colder look to it but I do plan to take another look at the Blu-ray of Batman Returns as although that is markedly inferior it may prove to be better as the slightly poorer image quality may disguise the inadequacy of some of the sets. Not a problem the 1989 film suffered from which looks so much better than the second film simply because it looks realistic and warmer all the way through. John.
The only reason they changed ZSJL from a series to a movie was because they realised that they'd have to negotiate new TV contracts with the actors and maybe pay more. So they stuck to their existing movie contacts by releasing it as that.
In my opinion when Man of Steel, Batman Versus Superman (the Ultimate extended edition) and the Snyder cut 4 hour Justice League, when you put these 3 movies together, they are one big long masterpiece. Warner Brothers should have allowed zach snyder to just finish his vision. I really wanted to see his Darkseid portrayal and where he was going to take it. Such a shame we might never see it. #RestoreTheSnyderVerse
Warner Bros. had too much money at risk Andrei so what they did ultimately saved the day. I've explained it all in much more detail to Troy Stone who commented about an hour before you did if you can find it. John.
I never understood the hate aimed at Zack Snyder. He does make some astonishing visuals and lots of his scenes look like splash pages from comics. He often needs reigning in but he's clearly got a real talent. As far as this film goes: it was far better than the horrendous theatre version. While I don't like Joss Whedon it can't really.blame him too much. He had an impossible job. All of this comes down to studio politics. They never had a plan and kept chopping and changing. The politics around the ZS release of justice league are astonishing. Insiders desperately trying to stop it because it would show how much they butchered the original and if it succeeded it would be an embarrassment. Anyway... It all shows that movies (and TV) cost way too much to make. There is no way movies cost 100s or even 10s of millions to make. People think CGI is expensive... It isn't, not today. The most amazing stuff can be done on consumer hardware with free software. You just need talent and a small amount of money. Even high quality cameras are here for consumer prices. Movies cost so much to make because that's how much they bring in and the money needs to be syphoned out during production. The entire Hollywood is ripe for being overturned. It's amazingly corrupt, tax fraud and money laundering. Anyway that's my rant over. I look forward to the day when people figure out how much of a fraud the movie and TV business is. The sooner we can see alternatives rise.
The fraud and corruption seems to be everywhere now winsomehax so you won't find much disagreement on here with regard to that. It's a worrying time for democracy which is the most concerning aspect of all this corruption but we won't go there. Cameras, computers and software can be purchased for comparatively little to do all these film making jobs but there is a difference between consumer cameras and film industry equipment. I sometimes get offered lenses for £50K which sounds like nonsense but it's not. Just a lens for £50k and sometimes they're a lot more than that. Cinema quality video cameras can cost an absolute fortune and way out of my league. Hiring animation companies to produce special effects that are [hopefully] life like also costs a fortune. Just employing one person costs a small fortune so you add all that into the equation and we start to see why everything costs so much to make. $370m appears to be the total cost of all the work that went into Justice League and it's easy to see how when you look at the little 'making of' featurette. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Sure... I'm not suggesting a blockbuster motion picture be made on a Samsung mobile phone. $50K for a lens though... doesn't translate into $300 million. And computer generated images are here right now for consumer prices. That hardware is here right now, and the software is free - Blender being just one example. People don't even have to take my word on it. You can look at all the SF/Horror short films being made (try the channel Dust for example). Here's another example - the combination of Unreal Engine 5 and Quixel Megascans - you can make astonishing stuff with amazing visuals for nothing. All that stuff needs is talent and time. None of it adds up to $10 million, never mind $300 million... the maths just doesn't work out. Hollywood is simply living a fantasy of grift and fraud that they cannot sustain and make out that it's legit any longer. It's so howlingly out of touch with reality that it's downfall and replacement by non-Hollywood alternatives is certain. Same for TV. When you look further ahead: Virtual sets, virtual costumes and increasingly virtual actors with AI motion and with virtual AI voices. None of this is science fiction. You can go and generate amazing voice synthesises from a few samples right now. Look up Metahuman for another example. It's all begging to supplanted by lower cost higher quality alternatives - driven by AI and the tools that exist today. You don't even need studios to distribute stuff globally any longer, that was an important function. Not any more. And it's not slowing down. All if this technology is getting better every day.
@@winsomehax Doesn't sound like a particularly interesting view of the future winsomehax. But film making is certainly expensive although you've made very good points about how ridiculously expensive it is. A production like Justice League for tens of millions would be rather exciting these days but I hope film makers don't go down the route of virtual sets and computer animated characters...whoops, they've already done that! Oh well, that probably explains why so many movies look unreal these days. Good post. Good points. To replace my cameras I only spend thousands but if I were looking for a modern cinema video camera I'd be looking at hundreds of thousands. It all starts to add up very quickly because that's just the camera body. Think about everything else that gets slapped on them. John.
Too obviously cartoons for many of us Cameron but it could be a size differential thing too because they both looked so poor projected on our screen. Maybe I'll take a look on the telly where I think a lot of the limitations of the animation will be disguised. John.
This is without a doubt the best Zack Snyder DC film. Now, that sounds like faint praise (given the two wretched prior movies), but it isn't. I actually quite enjoyed it. I wish they had cut the swearing entirely (especially by the heroes) and toned down the violence (especially WW killing the terrorists and chopping Steppenwolf's head off), just to make this a better film to watch with my boys. But the heroes were generally heroic, the charactarizations were solid, the action was exciting, and the visuals were very engaging.
I too was rather surprised by the bad language and the violence. The decapitation was done in slow motion if I remember correctly and that seems a little sick to me. Would the Wonder Woman of the comics have ever cut someone's head off? I don't recall ever seeing her in comics very often but Linda Carter wouldn't have done it, that's for sure! I think all these things were incorporated so that the film would get a more restrictive certification across the world to indicate that it was aimed at a slightly more mature audience... but I may be wrong. John.
Great review John. I absolutely loved this film. I agree with what you said about the aliens but one thing I would say is that the character of steffenwolf(bad spelling) was alot better in this than the 2017 JL
The score doesn't seem to ever let up and one of the reasons why the overall sound on this one is so special. Apparently it took seven LP's to issue it on vinyl. Must be the longest movie soundtrack in history. John.
Bit unrelated but how great would it be to get some beautiful transfers of the Coen Brothers films, especially the Roger Deakins ones. More related, why did Batman only look badass in 1989?
If home movie sales continue to do well then there are good chances of quite a lot of classic films getting re-transferred and mastered onto discs. Michael Keaton simply had the right character and look in that 1989 film. He's not as good in the sequel but having just watched that film again, I think I can see why... because it wasn't much good. John.
Hello John, I admit I enjoyed this version better than the theater version. I felt the story was more complete. Yes I don't like the shaky cam either and they are scenes that get to be just too much going on at once. But overall the length was ok for watching at home. Like the LOTR extended versions it's best if watched at home so you can pause it when needed.
Now The Lord of the Rings is another one that I need to get around to sometime Stephen. I really didn't like it in the cinema so never watched the sequels. I hadn't seen Justice League at all so it was quite a surprise that I enjoyed it as much as I did. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Yes John I'd love to hear your thoughts on LOTR's and the sequels. I highly recommend the extended cuts. I really tells more about the characters. Watch out though, The Return of the King is over 4 hrs long.
@@TheShornak The problem with The Lord of the Rings was that it was too long and nothing much happened. When things did happen the computer animation was of a poor standard and look. I haven't seen it since so I might have a change of mind on it today but I hoped I'd have a change of heart with Batman Returns from 1992 and I haven't. I don't suppose there are shorter cuts of the Rings films?!?
Batman returns is definitely worth a rewatch and in my opinion is the better of the two Burton films its extremely dark and like watching a vivid Nightmare. The 4k discs audio and pq are phenomenal
I have watched it Andrew but unfortunately I still feel the same about it. Interestingly, I have my suspicions about what may have been done to the overall image but I'll slap it on again to give it another quick look before I conclude. Right now I don't think there is enough visible film grain so it's had too much of a clean-up. It's very sharp which initially I thought was great but it is so obviously a studio bound picture that it actually hurts the end product. I put the 1989 film on immediately afterwards and the image quality does not have these issues and it has superior sets. It gives a much nicer impression. I only just found out today that the sequel was not shot at Pinewood so that explains the sets. I suppose there were reasons for shooting it at Warner Studios in Los Angeles but I don't know what they were. I've watched some of it on on the telly this afternoon and it doesn't look so fake owing to the size differential but this should be a big screen film. Shame that I have no recollections of the image quality at the cinema for this one otherwise i'd be able to reach a more conclusive conclusion! John.
Hi John. Hows things? Great review mate. I saw the Josstice League at the cinema and it was okay but I thought the Snyder Cut was excellent. Its a much more coherent film and it doesnt have so many awkward cuts. I understand that the studio would never sanction a 4 hour odd film for cinema release though. They wouldnt be able to cram as many screenings in. As a 2 disc version I understand there is very little compression on these discs? It does look very good. I havent watched it with the 5.1 audio so will have to try that. Just defaulted to atmos. Chris
Atmos may be even better Chris so maybe just switch between the two for a while to see which you prefer. I haven't seen the 2017 version of the film but it must have been a Herculean task to make sense of what had been delivered to Warner Bros. Sounds to me like Joss Whedon really saved the day for this film even if it wasn't particularly popular because he almost recouped Warner Bros. losses at the box office alone. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Joss Whedon may have put a film together and made some money back but I think the Snyder Cut is better in every way. Just my opinion of course. I just put the disc in to listen to the start with Supermans scream and the Atmos does sound a lot better. It just seems to fill the room a bit more than the 5.1
@@chrissyboy7047 The point I was trying to make was that if the circumstances that occurred in 2017 had not come to pass then The Snyder Cut would not have come to pass. Whedon saved the day and without his efforts Zack Snyder would not have been given the opportunity to put his piece of work together. Good to know that Dolby Atmos is giving a more room filling sound Chris. That's exactly as it should be. I will hopefully get the chance to look into this a little in the future but there's not much chance of being able to adapt my system into Atmos as there isn't any way of putting those large tripoles on the ceiling... even if I could find four or six more of them. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I get you John yeah. Thats a fair point. I only have the upfiring atmos speakers which supposedly bounce the sound off the ceiling but it still makes a big difference when comparing the 2 audio tracks and gives a better wall of sound from the front. It will do me for now. Chris
I expect they stuck with it because the Joss Whedon save job in 2017 appears to have turned a small profit. If not for that, then the film would have been buried and forgotten at Warner Bros. and The Snyder Cut would never have seen the light of day. John.
great review. i really liked this movie. not perfect but very enjoyable. although I could not deal with the black bars/ratio. I had to use the "zoom" feature on my TV to get the bars out of the way. still looks great since it had so many IMAX scenes.
I wouldn't have liked to watch in on a telly either Luis but others report that they really liked it in the old ratio box. Give it another try next time and you may find you quickly get used to it. It worked well projected with the masking enveloping the screen and probably made for a more enjoyable show because it was different. John.
I don't think so Neil. I might get that four film box set now it's going cheap. I think the four films are now less that that one new version of The Motion Picture. You'll have to let me know what it's like. John.
@@moviecollector5920 the iTunes streaming is impressive apparently the 4K disk is as well I got it back in 2001 on dvd bring waiting years to get the remastered version they say it taken 42 years to finish the film
@@neiltaylor6645 agree...its been a long time to get the disc and 3 versions make it as close to a great package as possible. Flaws from the theatrical release remain but i think fans and mr wise would be happier about it. Its true for many years it was considered unfinished....i would say in certain ways it still us but thats not the films fault its the story and script. I recommend if your a fan of mofel work and love a perfect music score this is a must. Paramount need to think about packaging being as its a mix of box, snapcase and steelbooks across 6 films. I think picture and sound wise many are very happy and i am one of them. Excelsior
I thought the whole soundtrack was rather special. The music didn't seem to let up very often. I wonder if it was a world record for the longest film score in history? John.
You should take a look at the movie “old”. I read that it was shot in 35mm and might be a beautiful 4K release. Good movie, both my wife & I enjoyed it. But our copy was streamed not physical.
I expect I will take a look at Old. It's just not the most appealing looking cover on the shelves whenever I'm in HMV or FOPP. I'll take a look at the trailer though and see what I think. Thank you for the suggestion. John.
Greetings from England! I really didn't like Man of Steel but I watched it again recently prior to Batman v Superman and I didn't dislike it anywhere near as much. I think a lot of what we think about films comes down to expectations and I was expecting a sequel to Superman Returns which I thought was pretty wonderful. I didn't understand what I was watching and that Warner Bros. had decided to scrap what had gone before and start all over again. The 1978 film was brilliant so why ever try to replace that? They did the same with Batman and have repeated that process again with the recent The Batman but that's the modern way I suppose. Once something is past its sell by date then just start again like Columbia did with Spider-Man (twice!) and Paramount with Star Trek. A gap of around 30 years and then I find it easier to accept but otherwise I struggle. John.
I saw this recently for £4.99 in a local charity shop! I spent my money elsewhere - Snyder is not my cup of darjeeling at all. Thanks for the review, John. PS Small typo in the video description, mate!
I really did resist watching this one and thanks to lowered expectations it was a genuine surprise that I actually rather enjoyed it. I wish I'd have been given the job of cutting it down to size because I reckon I could have got a 2.5 hour version sorted in 2017. Well, we can all dream. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I think that's where the misapprehension that Whedon "butchered" the movie came from - he was contractually obliged to deliver a 2 hour cut!
@@danhardcastle From what I learned reading everything I could about what really happened in 2017, it seems that Warner Bros. needed someone to make a film out of the marathon that had been delivered to them. Two hours looks to have been a little too ambitious but ultimately I think Joss Whedon saved the day and if he hadn't have got Justice League into cinemas in 2017 then the Snyder Cut would never have materialized. John.
Atmos mix didnt do it Justice. Fortunately I can switch to 3D Auro which made big difference pushing my hieght channels. I was frustrated with Atmos were some scenes where u expect objects flying from above only be left wondering why it sound so weak....or why i not hearing any hight sound?..untill switching to 3D Auro. There are some great atmospheric sounds like the ocean etc It is good sounding film though they didnt put enough sound production effort in the Atmos.
I don't have Atmos in my home cinema and don't feel the need for it. Everything tends to sound good through this system but I can understand what you're saying because when I first got a surround sound system more than 30 years ago I was somewhat obsessed with it and loved to hear everything moving around the room. Now it's more about the sound quality rather than the separation of the channels. THX does tend to make everything sound like Dolby Atmos or DTS-X though so that's probably why I don't feel the need to make any changes and haven't for 20 years now. This Friday I'm off to the BFI IMAX and that sound system does make just about everywhere else seem a little second rate anyway. Great that you're getting good results switching to 3D Auro. I used to use a Stereo Retrieval System (SRS) box that did similar things but I only tend to use that with Super 8 films these days. John.
Only if someone sends it to me Jack! I simply can't afford them all and I do have the first and third films on Super 8 so I know them rather too well having run them countless times over the last 30 years. John.
I enjoyed it a lot and think it stands up very well to marvel movies especially the trash they have put out since end game. It's not the Godfather or Paths of Glory but it is a fun comic book movie.
Me too Mark. I'm quite surprised that I did enjoy it but lowered (very lowered!) expectations probably helped and I think I'll actually enjoy it more next time I watch it. John.
Either 'epic' or 'ambitious' would describe it equally. Some would say 'too ambitious' but all the trouble and obstacles Justice League went through worked out in the end because there is no way a four hour film would have been released otherwise. John.
I have a whole lot of favourites Mia and not because I think they're the best films ever made. I find it difficult to work out which is right at the top though but probably Alien, The Terminator, Aliens, Jaws, 2001 A Space Odyssey, Highlander, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Apocalypse Now and a whole bunch of others that I could sit here all morning thinking about. Best films in recent years are Last Night In Soho, Le Mans '66 and Murder on the Orient Express. John.
I rarely watch them sin gin. Tend to always prefer the original version. I think this one really was more of an original version but it's also more of a miniseries and was put together on that basis. John.
Cyborg was created in the 80’s for the Teen Titans comic series. He was added to the Justice League in 2011 when DC did their big relaunch, the New 52. Many suspect he was added for diversity reasons.
Well that explains why I'd never come across him. A good version of The Terminator so a bit obvious really but he fitted in well with the other characters. John.
It is a very repeatable film Andy. I'm surprised that I actually rather liked it but lowered expectations would have helped there. Looks like we're going to get bad news about our wonderful Queen very soon. Feeling rather upset right now. John.
The studio nor the distributor manufacture the cases Stafs so they just use what they can get hold of. Amaray are no longer making disc cases and supplies have been a bit short for a couple of years from other manufacturers so unfortunately the amount of choice and availability has diminished. The labs that stamp the discs have the inlays, discs and anything else put into the cases on site via clever machinery before the finished products are cellophane wrapped and shipped to the distributor. John.
I haven't seen the original version of Justice League PAul but it certainly looks like Josh Whedon saved the day irrespective of what many think of the film. The Snyder Cut is a television miniseries and on that basis it's very good but it wouldn't have been so well received if this had have been what went out to cinemas in 2017 and I think I can say that with some certainty. I expect that it would have garnered so much vitriol that it would have died a death quite quickly and never stood a chance. As it is, everyone was ready to give the film a second chance in 2021, plus the evidence of the fan campaign to get it released, is that they wanted to like it. Given that it was now four hours long it was possible to make the story coherent - well, almost coherent anyway - and in spite of all the other issues with the finished product it was enough to be able to enjoy the film at the second attempt. It's proved to be an interesting subject so I'm glad I finally gave it and watched it. John.
Great review, John! I still haven't seen this film yet (mainly because of it's runtime) but looks like a very nice 4K disc nevertheless. I'm currently working on my blu ray review of "Pink Flamingos" But I can take my time on this video as I already have next weeks 2001 splicing video planned to upload. overall a great film shot on 16mm ektachrome stock. The colours on the restoration look amazing too. have a great day, John! I'm just about to go make a cup of tea I think :)
Greetings from Blighty Clark. It's going to be a bit of a sad time in the United Kingdom for a while following the death of the Queen. Maybe Australia will also do something to commemorate the death of the great lady as she was head of state to both our great nations. Actually she was head of state to a few billion people I think so surely the most important lady who has ever lived. Batman Returns does look better than Justice League but I may actually prefer the look of Justice League. The 1989 Batman is better than both of them though as it has the full, natural film look more than the other two. Batman Returns seems to have almost completely lost the filmic look so excessive image noise reduction perhaps? I don't know, I'll have to look at it again. Let me know when you've got the 2001 video up there as anything 2001 has the potential to be big and I want to see it pronto! We've just had a cuppa. Didn't seem to get a biccie for some reason though. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I was also a little saddened by the Queens passing. I'm sure Australia will do something to commemorate her as well. I've just had a look at the Batman Returns 4K disc and I think you're right. I hardly see any grain at all, so definitely a case of excessive DNR. as for the 2001, it was the same video I sent to you with the blue danube music playing. I'll make it public tonight I reckon. I've got the 70mm double feature I'll be attending at the orpheum, they are screenings 'Lawrence of Arabia" and "2001: A Space Odyssey" back to back, with a 1 hour intermission between the two. very excited to see lawrence of Arabia in one sitting (20 minute intermission of course). perhaps go grab yourself a biccie if you can, they always make a cup of tea nicer.
Please do a review of that Batman Returns it's personally one of my fave batmans especially with the recent dross we've seen. Be interested to see how that style worked, I thought Walken and Pfiffer were exception... and Devito in one of his finest roles... perfect casting!
I still don't like Batman Returns much Mark but there is enough of interest to talk about. Even though I've reviewed the 1989 film previously I think the only way to review Batman Returns is to cover both films so that's my train of thought at the moment. The first film looks better than the second on 4K and there seem to be reasons for that which I'll go into.... assuming I remember! John.
@@moviecollector5920 That;s interesting you're not a fan, I'd picked that up from previous reviews? Any reason why not, as I would think possibly in a minority there i.e. it's a film that a lot of people hold quite dear especially with it having keaton in the lead... be interested to hear your thoughts on this one in a review. Thanks for the reply.
@@MrPugheaven I need to think about it all some more but a lot of the problem is that it's a sequel to the 1989 film and it doesn't match up to it. If it had have been shot at Pinewood then the sets would have been up to the standard of the previous film and that would have helped but as it is it is too often obviously shot on a studio set. Too much focus on the villans and not enough on Batman. Those sort of things. It wasn't a popular film when it was first on general release as everyone that saw it seemed to be disappointed but maybe it's grown a more appreciative audience since then. I don't like fish either so that's a big negative that probably only applies to me. John.
Incredible movie but that aspect ratio bothers me too. ITs a great disc though. And if you look you can find some 'internet experts' who made 16:9 versions of the film. Looks pretty good too.
The academy aspect ratio is actually rather a nice novelty for a home cinema when you're able to mask the image fully. I realize not many people can do that but you don't need to go as far as I have as some black card tacked to a wall will do the job. No way to do in on a telly though and therein lies the problem... and that's why we all need to have a projector to hand!!! John.
I'm with you John I watched the film and tbh there's far to much chaos happening and all rather to quickly for my liking so I tend to lose interest, I'm not a massive fan of computerised Aliens or villains in films and I just think you can't beat practical effects, 1 of the many reasons I hated predator 2018 they were far to big, I like the Dark Knight trilogy and the Original Superman 78 but maybe I'm a bit old fashioned, Great review as always mate take care 👍🏻
Don't forget the 1989 Batman too Ron. That was all real world, old school film making with on set practical effects ruling the roost. Younger audiences probably wouldn't accept a reality based comic book superhero film today and that's why so much computer animation is involved and why so much of it is over the top. John.
@@moviecollector5920 oh yes I don't forget that I was 7 years old when it came out and I drove my mum and Dad up the wall with it I loved it and still do, Although I like Batman Returns to and understand your not the biggest fan of that pal 😁👍🏻
Hopefully I've managed to explain the raison d'etre for the 2017 two hour release without being too beastly about what Zack Snyder must have delivered to Warner Bros. It did sound like a bit of a disaster though and poor old Joss Whedon had to try to make something of it. Looks to me like he saved the day. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I've got Weldon's justice League on Blu-ray if you want it John, I'll post it to you if you want to submit yourself to watching it 😂
@@Gazza636 Very kind of you Gary but please keep it as you may want to watch it again one day. I expect I'll see it as a bargain somewhere one day and take a dip. Joss Whedon certainly had his work cut out for him to get that marathon finished and into cinemas. It nearly covered its costs too apparently so quite an achievement. John.
I think u ought to do a review of Aquaman, Directed by James Wan, I think it was shot digitally but is absolutely breathtaking John. And the original Pacific Rim by Del Torro…
That one will probably take quite a while for me to work up to as well Kishawn. He's not exactly the most riveting superhero the comic world ever dreamed up. Spider-Man, Batman and occasionally Superman were the comics that I tended to read. I always found every other character a bit of a poor substitute but did take a look at many of them at one time or another. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I feel the same as you, but you should definitely take your time, I’ll be anticipating to see whether or not you become pleasantly surprised, if not by the story at least the visuals, they are to die for.
I was completely enveloped in sound Reynaldo and so can't really say whether or not I much liked the score but it seemed to be ever present and helped to fuel my enjoyment... apart from those awful couple of songs of course! John.
Joss Whedon was on a contract that stipulated a 2 hour running time Bob so how he made any sense of the hours of material shot must have been an achievement in itself. He salvaged Justice League and Warner Bros. must have felt they'd found the Messiah to almost get them their money back on box office takings alone but it looks like with everything else it actually turned a profit. Well, it must have done otherwise they wouldn't have sunk a load more money into it for this 4 hour version. I find myself wanting to see that two hour cut to see exactly what Joss Whedon actually did and how he turned what looked like a disaster into a minor success. John.
I have hung on for a deal and got it in a 3 for £30 deal I was put off by running time but I will give it a go John. Great review and its taken my mind off the the news about our Queen god bless
We're both upset by the news about Queenie. Let's hope we see the best of this country in the coming days which I feel sure we will. Good buy to get this 4K in the 3 for £30 Ellis. Well done. I hope you enjoy it. The first disc is about 2 hours and 30 minutes and the second is about 1 hour and 40 so probably best watched over two evenings like we did. The 'Making of' is rather interesting and it's on disc 1 so leave that to the end. John.
@@moviecollector5920 just wondering if you have heard of madVR i use it via pc with a powerful graphics card its exceptional with bluray and very good with 4k considering i have a 1080p projector. The founder created the software for free initially but then decided to create a stand alone unit and stopped supporting the pc software which is unfortunate but rumour is he is to return. His top end video madVR processor retails for nearly $12k this might be an interesting watch for you john ua-cam.com/video/N2LK_roCAng/v-deo.html
It worked well projected with the image nicely masked all around Swissbeats. If you're watching on a telly though you're a bit stuffed really so I can understand what you're saying. You'll have to come round here next time! John.
It does really need to be projected and black velvet masks enveloping the image otherwise I suspect I'd agree with you James. But it really worked well in here and was one of the reasons why I ended up liking the film... which I didn't expect. John.
Morning Rob. Actually, it's still 'evening' where you are. We've lost Queenie so it's going to feel a little different over here for a while but we should see the best of this country over the next ten days. I hope so anyway. I'm thinking about doing a Batman/Batman Returns video even though I've covered the 1989 film already. That's because Batman Returns has some things that might be interesting to point out. I still don't like the film after all these years but that's not one of the interesting things, it's more that the image quality does not look natural to me and therefore I suspect excessive nose reduction but no one else seems to have noticed. Perhaps I'm completely wrong but why else would the film suddenly look like it's all shot on a studio set? John.
@@moviecollector5920 Hi John. Thanks for your message. We watched the BluRay of "Witness for the Prosecution" last night. Everyone loved it. I like Batman Returns and remember it looking gorgeous at the theater and on laserdisc. Would be curious to hear your thoughts on the 4K. Stay well my friend.
The runtime stuff at the beginning of this video around the 1:00 mark doesn't make any sense. Batman v Superman theatrical was 2 hours and 31 minutes long and made 230 million dollars more than Justice League theatrical which was exactly 2 hours long. I don't understand why people keep saying long runtimes hurt theaters. Avatar was almost 3 hours, 3 billion dollars. Avengers Endgame, 3 hours almost 3 billion dollars. No Way Home, 2 and a half hours, 2 bullion, Man of Steel, 2 and a half hours, 670 million (more than Justice League), Aquaman 2 and a half hours, 1.2 billion... And I can do this all day. The more showings with shorter runtimes argument is moot. If the movie is good people will see it and see it again. Clearly the 2 hour runtime did nothing for Justice League because there was no repeat business no matter how many showings theaters could squeeze into a day. BvS was significantly longer and significantly less butchered by the studio and did much better than Justice League and the even longer version was considered the more complete and cohesive film. What WB needs to do is stop meddling with directors and trust their vision or don't hire them, you wanna be like Marvel so bad, start there. Simple.
Morning Troy. I'll try to explain what I think it is you're asking. When Kevin Costner made Dances With Wolves he reinvented the longer film being a success. Longer films for a while up until that time were almost completely extinct. The three hour running time of Dances With Wolves did mean that cinemas could not fit as many showings in each day as they would have liked as just an extra show each day helps to generate the revenue they need. Kiosk sales are vital to the survival of cinemas because there is a sliding scale on how much of a film's box office take a cinema is permitted to keep for themselves and with some of the Star Wars films around the turn of the century it was as little as 10%. We can see from this sort of contractual obligation that the throughput of customers is even more important than it may first appear and that is largely why sweets and drinks inside a cinema appear to be so costly. Without that income stream it's possible there wouldn't be any cinemas. Warner Bros. invested a substantial (ridiculous?!?) amount of money in Justice League and when they saw the first rough cut it is reported that they were not best pleased. I don't know all the details but others have advised that there was a contractual obligation for the film to meet the two hour mark and certainly Josh Whedon had that stipulation when he took over directing and then completing the film. Zack Snyder had been cutting the film down to size but I think his most compact edition took it down to about two hours and twenty minutes. Reports do exist about Warner Bros. executives/senior management stating that the film was 'unwatchable'. $300m and they thought the people entrusted with this major production had produced something incoherent must have been a stressful time for senior people at WB. The director is employed or contracted to deliver a finished product and usually it all works out fine but the pressures are different when you're talking about the size of a small county's annual economy. In such a situation it is understandable that the owners stepped in to try to salvage what they could. Josh Whedon must have been regarded as a saviour by almost returning WB's whole investment through box office takings alone and that ultimately paved the way for the 2021 re-launch which apparently caused Warner Bros. to risk a further investment of $70m. It's all helped to make the film far more interesting than it ever would have been and all this chicanery has really made a little piece of cinema history. I do realize though that there are many fans out there who don't fully understand it all and think that Warner Bros. were the ones causing the problems when the truth appears to be some way away from that outlook. The upshot is that it all turned out alright in the end. John.
Well, it is the full frame from the 35mm shoot Phil. I don't know if it happened in the end but the intention was to put the finished product into genuine IMAX cinemas in 2021 and it was therefore handy that it had been shot full Super 35 because the aspect ratio is almost the same and would have only required thin black bars top and bottom. However, some of the computer animation would have looked laughable on those huge screens so it might have been just as well it was a home video and streaming only release. John.
To be fair, Warner Bros. had put a lot of money into Justice League and it was reported to have been in a bit of a mess when Joss Whedon took over to get it complete. Maybe that two hour stipulation needed a tighter script before anyone started out. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I agree 100%! Here are my top 5 superhero movies... For the #1 spot it's a tie between Snyder's JL and Captain America Winter Soldier 2 - Captain America 3 - Iron Man 4 - Raimi's Spiderman 2 5 - The Incredible Hulk I have to give an honorable mention to Aqua Man, the vision of that movie is just fantastic!
@@thumbsaloft Now you've made me think. I can't tell you what order I'd have them in but Superman The Movie, Superman 2, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2 and Batman. If I ever see any of the lesser superhero films I might be pleasantly surprised but I never particularly enjoyed their comics so never bothered with the films. John.
I think it's a film that will be better on a second watch because ome of the computer animation was a bit inadequate but understandable given what had to be done to get the end product out in time. Now that I know that it won't be such a distraction. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I feel it would've also pulled through much better if they hadn't had to do quite as much with the visual effects due to the behemoth of a runtime, because 4 hours of a grand scale sci-fi fantasy film during a pandemic would be taxing for any vfx team.
@@koltonknox9836 To get the monumental volume of computer animation done well would have taken a couple of years at least and that would have taken hundreds of animators to do it. I'm pretty sure it was done by a very small team and they only had a few months. It was intended for a television series but that changed and possibly because the actors and actresses would have been eligible for fees because their contracts specified a theatrical release film only. It may not be the greatest film ever made but it certainly proved to be interesting for all sorts of reasons. John.
@@moviecollector5920 "We worked on over 80 minutes of the movie over the course of roughly six months." Yeah, they definitely got put through the wringer.
@@koltonknox9836 I think the expectation was that it was going to go out as a television mini-series and so the special effects weren't required to match up to the big screen treatment. I've been told on here in the comments that in the end it couldn't be turned into a mini-series owing to the contracts with the actors who were all down for a theatrical film and they'd have all had to have been paid again for a television series. It does seem to make sense and that's why we ended up with it as a four hour film that apparently never saw the light of a cinema projector. John.
I do realize that the 4 hour version is actually a television miniseries now though Martin and that makes some of the questionable things that appear in that 'series' more understandable. The dodgy songs for no apparent reason, the poor computer animation here and there and the sort of episodic nature of it. It's probably better than I thought if I'd have twigged that it was originally intended as a miniseries only but it's been pointed out to me that it was probably the extra fees to all the actors for a TV series rather than a film that ultimately meant is was an overlong film in the end. John.
@@packersredhot There was no other way to get this one completely Green Bay. If it were up to me, I'd have never even attempted to make it because I know it's just not possible to do the effects justice but that probably wouldn't have been the right decision judging by the enthusiasm for the film shown in these comments. John.
Only if someone donates a copy Eric. I asked Jack Savva a few comments down to let me know what he thinks of it so maybe you could do the same. I don't usually go in for versions that weren't the original in cinemas but there have been a couple of exceptions... that I can't think of right now! John.
@@moviecollector5920 if I had a 4K setup, I'd happily do that, John. One reason I enjoy your videos is that I get to see what I'm missing. The new deluxe set of Star Trek The Motion Picture, called The Complete Adventure, includes three different cuts of the film in 4K and only 4K, which is the only reason I didn't buy it, so that might be an option to consider if you're a fellow purist like myself 🙂
@@1dbanner I'd probably only ever watch the theatrical version though Eric. I do have the film on Super 8 as a 3x400ft cut down that was released by Marketing Film International in 1980. I think that's probably better than the theatrical cut but I do like the original version. It's the best quality of the Star Trek films... or at least it was on the Blu-ray releases of the six films. John.
Some interesting points discussed here. However I just love looking at your Last Night In Soho poster. Not my favourite film of late, but it was OK to watch once.
I think it may get better with subsequent viewings. Justice League that is not Last Night In Soho which I think is one of the best films for years. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Zack Snyder’s Justice League is certainly a much better film on second watch. When I watched it the first time I thought that it was only “good,” but upon second watch it’s now one of my all time favorites!
@@resikin Good point about requiring a second watch Sir Rami. I had twigged that this one would improve with each viewing because it's a little difficult to take in at times. I still think there are some much better movies based on the D.C. comics even though I know Justice League will get better. John.
I think I am in the wrong film territory among film purists and such, but I wish this had gotten a 3D conversion. Granted, it was not an economically viable option. I understand. Just wishful thinking.
That's the trouble though, it wasn't a 3D film and would have to go through the conversion process. It wasn't made in 3D so leave it that way. To apply that process to great films like Predator at Terminator 2: Judgment Day is a money making exercise that's turned some great classics into novelties. But if it makes money to invest in other productions then that's a good thing even if I'll never want to watch the 3D re-hashes. I view film making as art but it's not always treated that way. John.
After I watched my 4K version of this film, i cannot bring myself to watch the whedon "option". On my 65" OLED this "square" version looked ok to me for overall size (in my room anyway) and the picture quality was far better than the previous version on Blu Ray. Even the bad guy looked superb for detail etc. It also made much more sense for the story overall I think. I am glad I bought this Snyder version and my best mate has even got rid of his old blu ray Whedon version, as between the two of them the whedon version made him want to vomit (so he said) after it was cut about so badly for tthe tone of the story etc. On HIS tv (an 82" LED) the size of the Snyder cut is huge to behold. The longer version also went pretty quick I found and didn't really feel as long as it actually is. A good sign in my book that a film is INTERESTING to watch, not just overpowering for effects all the time. If only more films could be done in this vein, rather than just 'silly' one liners and comic relief characters most of the time. I'm looking at you STAR TREK films.
82 inches must be about five and half feet wide so it's big for a telly. I don't know how big the image was in here but the masking opens up to almost nine feet for 'Scope ratio films so it was probably about six feet wide for the 1.33:1 image. The alien was difficult to discern most of the time and I put that down to poor design and poor animation but if it's good on a telly then it's probably poor on a bigger screen because the animators were working on computer monitors and didn't get to see what they were doing blown up to cinema screen sizes. I've been suspecting for quite a while that that is an explanation for the poor quality animation work lately. Joss Whedon was contracted to deliver a two hour version of what Warner Bros. considered to be a bit of a mess. It was a save job for them and they were probably thinking that the best they could hope for was a return of investment. Sadly it wasn't quite that successful in cinema alone but streaming and home movies might have taken them to the break even point. To sink another $70m into a failed project to re-issue it must be something unique in the history of film making. Now that I've typed that out it seems even more unbelievable! John.
It's simple, when John uploads a video, I stop what I'm doing and I watch it. Always good stuff John
That's the spirit! Many thank. John.
I've literally just done the same!
@@denzelperry7024 What a good bunch you all are!
@@DomH75 Well I hope dinner was still up to your usual standards Dominic!
Was looking forward to this review. I remember how excited all of us fans were when Zack Snyder and Henry Cavill made the announcement for the release date back in 2020. I stayed up all night to watch the livestream. It just goes to show that studio executives should refrain from meddling with the vision of directors. It never ends well. The 2017 version was an abomination.
It's all about money Rinai and they were looking to limit the losses on the $300m they'd sunk into it. If the reports are true then they genuinely felt they had a disaster on their hands and they may well have been right. The sequence of events that led to this four hour marathon meant that the end product was not the same as the film you would have got if Zack Snyder had have finished it in 2017. Another $70m sunk into it confirms that. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Yeah, ZSJL is almost certainly not the movie we would have gotten in 2017. It seems like it was made in response to the criticism his DC films has received in the intervening years.
@@matthewweflen To condense everything into two hours would have been almost impossible but that's down to planning. A few of the characters needed to be much more minor roles but it evidently hadn't been planned out like that and they were all given back stories and showed Bruce Wayne/Batman recruiting them. If they'd have just turned up and offered their help then it would have been possible to tighten everything up and get the two hour film that Warner Bros. had stipulated. Perhaps a little too ambitious before cameras rolled then but it all worked out in the end. It's just a shame that Joss Whedon has had to put up with such abuse due to the lack of understanding from a few film fans.
John.
Abomination!!!!!
@@KneelBeforeZod. Yes, thank you for that contribution Doomslayer!!! Gave me a laugh anyway simply because 'abomination' is such a great word and we really should all try to use it as often as possible. I've decided I'm going to start slipping the world 'chicanery' into my lingo more often too.
John.
Another masterful review Sir. Thank you for such intelligent & entertaining content. I am a police officer here in the states and after a particularly ugly shift I will often put on your channel & listen to your reviews as they bring me such peace & calm. Next week my 4k Steelbook of John Carpenters 'The fog' will arrive and I surely will think of you as I watch it. This week I picked up the 4k Steelbook of '3:10 to Yuma' & it got me thinking how much we both liked the western 'Open range' and are anticipating its eventual 4k.
Being a police officer in the States today can't be easy Matthias so I wish you well in all that you do. Most of us will hopefully never some of the worst that you have to deal with for the rest of us and in that regard the police no longer get the respect they usually deserve.
Open Range would be an ideal subject for a 4K disc but that Blu-ray looks so good that a 4K would have to be exceptional. I have the Blu-ray of 3:10 To Yuma as well and that's another terrific western though not quite in the same league as Open Range... then again, I don't think any other Western quite matches it. I don't have The Fog on 4K but I do have the complete film as a Super 8 'Scope print. It's not one of the great Super 8 prints but it's always exciting to run it because there's something special about having a film on film and hearing the projector drumming away. I have never got over the thrill of running a real (reel) home movie.
Enjoy The Fog and 3:10 To Yuma. Don't forget the sweet treats for when you put them on.
John.
I hope you decide to do a full length review of Batman Returns, John. I love that movie and even prefer it over Burton's original.
Unfortunately, it was just too dark and strange for most people.
Well we watched it last night and it's not very good as a film but I'm thinking about how I can make something work because there are some interesting points about the image quality. I think image noise reduction has been used a bit more than most releases and that's why it looks so grain free. I find the 1989 film is much nicer to look at for various reasons; it's certainly a better film for me but Batman Returns could have been a much more interesting proposition if it was just Catwoman and Shreck withThe Penguin left out altogether. I know what went wrong though because they were trying to surpass what they did in 1989.
John.
I liked this film its not a perfect film by any means! The aspect ratio never bothered me personally! The CG can be questionable at times. Glad to see your review!
Pretty much my thoughts too Ghetti. John.
Cgi is incredible compared to what marvel has been puking out lately
@@munozmm88 Some of it was very good. I think the problem that film makers are having is that they're putting so much into the hands of the computer cartoonists and it's not proving possible to get everything completed in time so corners are having to be cut. It doesn't really matter with this version of Justice League as it was intended to be a television miniseries and in that regard it all works well. Would have been a different story on big cinema screens though. John.
So glad this movie got to see the light of day. Enjoyed the Zack Snyder’s series of films. Definitely interested to hear what you think of the Batman Returns 4K, probably my favourite Batman movie.
Sadly, I still don't much care for Batman Returns. I'm thinking about it all though so I may be able to fashion something interesting together because I put Batman on immediately after watching Batman Returns so maybe the two 4K discs in one video even though I've already covered the 1989 film.
I really don't like fish!
John.
It's a vast improvement over the 2017 film. It now been announced that WB would now rather had not released the SnyderCut under the new Discovery partnership but this was released before that merger. Alot of the effects were created in 2019 and additional footage shot. I'm thrilled we got it and would love to see the story continue but sadly doubt if that will come to pass!
If it hadn't have been for the surprising success of the 2017 version then we wouldn't have ever seen The Snyder Cut. I know most will think Joss Whedon's save job was not successful but how on earth would anyone set about cutting all this down to the contracted two hours? What an impossible job. No doubt Warner Bros. were expecting a financial black hole when they were first presented with the film but Whedon saved the day and the film has become almost legendary as a result. I knew nothing about it as I'd given up on the plethora of superhero movies years before but that's been a benefit of this channel, people have hassled me to see films I'd been avoiding and a damn good job they've hassled me too because I've really enjoyed most of them.
The computer animation for the 2021 release was a bit rushed and that's why much of it is sub-standard. It was being done for a television miniseries though and in that context it's fine. Just as well it wasn't blown up on huge cinema screens though.
John.
Another excellent review. Well done. I've quickly become a big fan of your videos. I really enjoy the brief history and info you provide on the films you review. I also really appreciate your calm demeanor. In today's world it's much appreciated. You are a natural at this. Keep up the great videos and stay safe. Cheers.
Thank you Mike. One of the reasons I started was because I couldn't find anyone reviewing discs that seemed to know about film. How I present the videos is largely how I am and as I've aged I've become increasingly careful about how I explain things.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 and you aren't wearing a backwards baseball cap. Thank you for that sir!
@@Mowglibaloo2 I am considering using the word 'guys' in every sentence though!
@@moviecollector5920 Don't forget the offensive techno music for the video introduction.
On a serious note: Your videos are a breath of fresh air and improve the community. Knowledgeable as you are wise about the subject matter.
@@Mowglibaloo2 I couldn't find anyone that knew about film doing reviews of home video Mowgli, hence why we now have these Movie Collector videos. Fortunately, I've been involved with some very knowledgeable people via the British Film Collectors Convention and so all my questions down the years found answers. These people spent their lives in the industry and some are still in it. One of the long term convention projectionists is still working as a video editor for big productions and we were quite excited when he got the job of editing several episodes in each of the last few series of Downton Abbey. Great people, great knowledge.
i've just arranged for the delivery of the worst techno music anyone can possibly imagine so I can overlay it to the 35mm projector opening!
John.
I have to say that this movie is probably my favorite live action DC movie and a true masterpiece in terms of superhero films. Its a shame we couldn't see this version in theaters cause it would've been great to see these characters done right in cinematic form
Evening Eva. It did get a cinema release in the USA but I'm not sure about other countries. I'll be surprised if it didn't have a limited release here as it's the second biggest movie market in the world. John.
Definitely the best DC film!
@@resikin Good to know that someone thinks so Sir Rami. If we include the 1978 Superman and the sequel, 1989 Batman and the Christopher Nolan Dark Knight films though then Justice League appear fairly low down on the list for me. John.
I wasn't a massive fan of the original cinema release John, but I thought the Snyder cut was a huge improvement. I also liked the idea that the aspect ratio made the superheros seem bigger in height, as opposed to wider if in widescreen. I remember there is a B&A version of this too, but I have watched that yet. Great review as always John 👍🏻
I think yo mean a 'black and white' version Leon but all you need do there is bleed the colour out on your display. A bit of a con really.
The original version seems to have turned a small profit so that really did save the day. Without that amazing turnaround of what must have been expected (i.e. a massive loss) then The Snyder Cut would never have happened.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 Hi John, sorry yes I did mean black & white. Sky Movies had both a colour & Black and white versions of the Snyder cut when it was on there, I chose to watch it in colour.
Thanks for this really enjoying your channel recently discovered. Do you mind me asking what your uplighting set up is behind your front speakers?
Morning Brendan. Those two little red lights were originally clipped to the base of the screen a few homes back. We hadn't really used the drop down screen we're currently using since those days over 16 years ago but it's ten feet wide and we had it manufactured at that width because the room it was made for was ten feet three inches. We didn't have a spare room to use as a home cinema so the screen was dropped down from behind a pelmet complete with the lights clipped on and angled to illuminate the screen in blue at the time. When we moved to our last place and we did have dedicated cinema room we put them on top of the speakers and changed the bulbs to red. So, they're just a couple of clip on lamps with red bulbs installed that now use the clips as their base and are angled to illuminate the red of the curtains. I like to find solutions that are easy and cost almost nothing.
John.
Thanks John for such a detailed reply
John, I love how you explain that this is a 4 perf 35mm film and not a 15 perf 65mm film, although, as you say, the 1.33:1 aspect ratio probably fooled people into thinking it was an IMAX film.
It makes sense that the 4K disc for Batman Returns has superior image quality to the 4K disc for Zack Snyder's Justice League; the former was 35mm photochemical, the latter 35mm digital (4K DI).
Erik.
That is exactly my conclusion too Erik. It's this backwards and forwards from fllm to the computer and then sometimes back to film and then the computer again that is making films look less lifelike than they used to. I know that many people do not know what IMAX is and accept that any movie can miraculously be made into an IMAX movie as though IMAX have some computer tool that does something that no one else can. I hope that Christopher Nolan's 'Oppenheimer' gives me a launching pad to explain it all again in detail next year but I suppose it depends on it having the famous label 'Shot and finished on film'!
John.
@@moviecollector5920 I look forward to that film and your review of it. As long as the technology to shoot and finish on film exists, I think any Christopher Nolan film will have that label.
I'm not a fan of Snyder as a director but I did enjoy his Justice League quite a lot. I felt the studio really dealt him a poor hand changing the direction of the film after he left the project. They clearly asked Joss to do "another Avengers" and with half the film already shot it just wasn't a good idea. Splitting the film into two parts would have given them a much better return on their investment and it's something fans have come to accept now with longer films like Avenger Endgame, Dune and Kill Bill.
I expect there is a lot more to the story and it's mainly going to be about money and Warner Bros. fearing they had backed the wrong horse and were about to be taken to the cleaners. Joss Whedon saved the day and without that rescue to make a two hour film out of War & Peace (the Russian version!) then The Snyder Cut would never have got off the ground. John.
A fair, balanced review, John. I much preferred the extended cut when I streamed it on HBO MAx. Bought the 4K but haven’t watched it yet - it will be interesting to compare the higher resolution Atmos sound on the disc v the low res Atmos that streaming provides.
You should find that the picture has more information in it Andrew as another comment informed us that it looked different and as though it had been re-compiled at a higher rate for the 4K.
I am sure that The Snyder Cut would never have seen the light of day were it not for Josh Whedon's rescue back in 2017. Perhaps in the future people will look at that afresh and see it for what it was.
John.
I personally find the 4K for Batman returns to be one of the best discs from Warner Bros. It looks so natural and compared to my laserdisc and dvd is a huge improvement in picture quality while keeping the authentic look of the film.
I’m not a huge Snyder fan but do enjoy, watchmen, dawn of the dead & guardian owls 3D. He is an interesting film maker with a great eye. I feel the story like with most it what makes me comeback to it or not.
I’d hope that WB releases the directors cut for the previous suicide squad film since it’s just easy money to make. Like when they did Richard donnoer’s Superman 2.
i'm not sure Batman Returns is entirely accurate as I suspect there has been rather more image noise reduction applied than to most 4K releases. It seems too devoid of film grain to me and lacks the natural look of the 1989 film. Overall I prefer the look of the 4K of the 1989 film but there are some close-ups in the sequel that I expect are making many feel that it's better than it is. Distant detail is the thing to look at to gauge how good a disc is and although it's very good for a 35mm transfer it does mean that it predominantly looks like it was shot on a set. The same cannot be said of the original film so something isn't quite right and I think it may be excessive 'DNR'. But I could be wrong of course.
I feel like I've seen too many superhero films lately but to be fair there doesn't seem to be much else being made these days. Let's hope the success of the Top Gun sequel helps to redress the balance and reminds a lot of people that they enjoy a regular trip to a cinema.
John.
I love this film. This is how a super-heroes film is done. 242 minutes of true fun quality scenes. Fortunately we have DC franchising to make us forget our terrible Marvel late films are. The 4k quality image is amazing. I did not hesitate to purchase the steel book 4k once it came out to the market and what a joy to watch this entertaining masterpiece. Many thanks John for one more stunning review.
I was actually rather surprised that I enjoyed this one Nuno but I think sometimes it's down to expectations and when I first saw Man of Steel I really didn't like it because I was expecting a follow up to Superman Returns. Enough people told me about Justice League and all the chicanery so I was not only prepared for it but found it interesting to learn all about it too. It's funny how things sometimes turn out.
Marvel only really had Spider-Man but Detective Comics had Batman and Superman so they immediately have a bit more substance when they do an Avengers/Justice League type film.
John.
Enjoyed this review John. I'm glad you found this movie to be decent. I think Snyder was given free reign for this so put out "the entire story". I agree some CGI was a bit ropey but them some of it was really good... which I think was down to the time they had to get a 4 hour cut ready. I think the main story was great and all characters had their moment to shine. Not a perfect movie but I'm glad Snyder got his cut out after the circumstances of why he didn't finish it originally. I did however like the aspect ratio which was also a surprise
Funny how it seemed to work with the old academy ratio. I wouldn't have put money on that but it was actually one of its strengths. I suspect there has been a general lack of understanding or knowledge about what happened in 2017 and how and why Joss Whedon came to take over getting it completed. He almost completely saved the day in reality and must have paved the way for the 2021 version. If the 2021 version had have come first then it would have been widely trashed but as it is most have given it a fair crack of the whip.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 aside from the 4 hr run time which I'm sure would of been far less on a threatrical release... why do you think this movie would do bad?
I think the aspect ratio was good, people have said it made superheroes tall and "god like". Did they do that so they could release in IMAX cinema's etc or is that what would typically be done (digital video wise) so they have plenty to crop?
@@Darrenlovesmovies Zack told that he want to release as he shot it... thats why they went with this ratio...Glad he did..nice to see there are more people who appreciate that ratio :)
YOU DID IT! Love this movie, gonna come back when I’ve finished the vid.
Ok first thing the 2 hour run time mandate was already in place when Zack was on board. He’d already presented 2hr45 and 2hr22 versions of ZSJL before he left. Whedon literally had no reason to do reshoots.
I also think Zack putting his name in the title is the biggest Chad move a director has made.
As to the CGI Zack and a couple of guys at WETA digital had only 6 months to redo all the cgi at 4K including the new design for Steppenwolf and the fully cg Darkseid and DeSaad.
Really glad that you enjoyed this.
That fills in some of the gaps for what I'd been able to find out and it's good to know that I'd got things pretty much right. I didn't know that Zack Snyder had tried to condense everything he'd shot into two hours and failed so that explains why it had to be handed over to someone else and it also explains why re-shoots were required because it clearly wasn't possible to squeeze it down to two hours without some new scenes to hurry things along. Thanks for the information.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 oh I also had a question, why didn’t you like the songs chosen?
@@ohyeahitsthatguy9454 The lady singing the religious song at the end wasn't very good and it wasn't the right choice for the ending of the film despite what had happened to Zack's daughter. The other two that I recall suddenly starting up early on in the film were simply wrong and ridiculous. Others will disagree but I think the film would have been better without them. Might have also shortened the running time a bit by removing them.
John.
I made screen masks just for the Snyder Cut! Love masking. Wish mine was as automated, but it's still pretty easy to set up.
What I used to do when the roll down screen we're currently using was in our former home in central London was that I'd put black card up inside the roll which held it there and masked the image off perfectly. It did the trick and it's all you need. Having a permanent room does mean that masking can also be permanent but the automation isn't really necessary as I could pull the cord by hand to close it up. It was just something that I wanted to do to see if I could. It is good fun to just sit there and press buttons though. I want to redo the bottom mask in lightweight wood as it's too flexible now it's so wide.
John.
Always essential and wonderful viewing, superb content as always 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
Thank you Denzel. John.
Another great review John :)
I prefer Zack Snyder's Justice League to the 2017 cut and think it's a masterpiece. This version has a better storyline and character development. I'm normally not a fan of overlong films but here it works well and gives u a great experience. The only thing that annoyed me was the black bars down the side. A sequel would be wonderful but I doubt that we will get any JL2 in the future but who knows. Batman Returns is a great film but noway near as good as Burtons first Batman film. However, Michelle Pfeiffer's portrayal of Catwoman is excellent. Apparently there was supposed to be a Catwoman spinoff with Michelle Pfeiffer reprising her role and Burton directing the film but it was cancelled.
I think Michelle Pfeiffer is the best thing about Batman Returns. After watching the Blu-ray of Outland last night I put sequences of Batman Returns on again and it doesn't look quite so bad to me now but I'm not convinced of this 4K. It's very sharp but little evident film grain which probably shouldn't happen with modern film transfer methodology. A couple of times I thought faces looked a bit wet or waxy like the Predator Blu-ray but nowhere near as bad. The outdoor Gotham sets look exactly that - sets. We then put the 1989 film on again and it has none of that. Only a near perfect representation of the film from the standpoint of a master print. I still can't find any Teals that people are telling me is in it though. I think they may be getting mixed up with all the Penguins in the sequel!
Projecting Justice League means the academy ratio image can be masked and I think it was issued this way so that the film would look like it was a genuine IMAX print because there were [apparently]; plans to put it into genuine IMAX cinemas. Would have had to have been cut down a bit for that but getting rid of the epilogue alone might have done that and that wouldn't have lost anything of value.
John.
Always a pleasure to see your videos. I think you have ignited more of a collector mindset in my mind. Now I want to get more UHD movies!
We currently moved to a large house so I finally have more room for setting up equipment. Some interesting things so far. We bought a Vista Vision Cinema camera with sensor size 40.96 mm x 21.60 mm in 8K. it is the first time I have used a cinema camera where I can almost not see any grain in the image. It is really special to watch 8K material downsampled to UHD image that is uncompressed. The normal UHD is usually using around 40-60Mbps which I think is really a bit on the low side. The data we capture can be up to 10000Mbps. When you watch the images on the TV they are really so much sharper than any normal UHD I seen. I wonder if they will increase the bitrate in the movies a bit more. I was surprised that BBC Planet Earth 2 used similar bitrates to HD bluerays. I remember that with blueray they did increase the bitrate with time on the movies and it made quite a difference.
I'm looking into building a "cinema" and mixing room, probably with an LG 65" OLED (the room is not that big so larger would probably not work) and using Genelec SAM 8331A studio monitors with a heafty subwoofer 7370. Idea is to use it both for sound/music mixing but also just for fun. Have not decided if I would use a Playstation 5 or a dedicated UHD player as the source. I remember you recommended a dedicated one. So combining work and fun.
Morning Andreas. VistaVision was a horizontal 35mm film format so is this a video camera version of that? Well, it must be as you're talking about having seen the results already and it would take at least a few days to get a 35mm VistaVision to a lab and back and you'd probably have cleared out your bank account to do so. It seems to me that you now need to find a suitable video projector for a dedicated room. You'll have so much more fun watching movies with that and a film evening will be even more special. No telly can match a projection and I would say that even high definition video projection would trump a 4K telly of any sort. If you do manage to get a 4K projector though you'll be able to easily discern the difference from one disc to the next simply because the size differential of projecting as big as the room will allow means it's easier to see which disc is better than another. When I used to review new Super 8 prints for the trade fanzines and things I was always running them ten feet wide and that meant I could genuinely see how good each print was compared to another. The same screen I always used for that is now what you see behind me but it's always in the rolled down position now. I hope to get back to using a painted wall and put the screen in the living room for occasional use in there but we still haven't managed to get builders in to make all the necessary changes.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 Interesting point. I will take it to hear. Last projector I used was 720p and I would usually project 100 inches. But one thing I think was always problematic with projectors is the black was never really black and also the bright spots were never that bright. I have not seen any of the new projectors though. What I do remember liking was of course the size and the pleasant softness from the projector. I would need a bigger room though! I actually plan on using the TV as a 4th monitor so I can put things from the computer on it while working and then switch to movie viewing in the evening. We may get a new house in a year or so so maybe there will be a better place then. I completely agree that with a projector you get a much more special experience for everyone. Of course nothing beats the sound from the film projector behind you...
Hi John and well done for sitting through it. I really like it, it takes its time and it feels like your watching a major event movie. A common fault of a lot of DC movies is the bad guy just ends up being a cgi mess. Still a massive improvement on the Wheedon cut.
I now realize that what I watched was six episodes of a series Clive and in that regard it was a very good television series. That also makes the poor computer animation easier to accept and understand. I do think it's something I'll be able to dip in and out of now that I've seen it and will probably see more of what we're supposed to be looking at each time I do. Whedon saved the day though because without his efforts The Snyder Cut would never have been given the green light.
John.
I'm curious to know which CGI shots you felt looked poor? The Snyder Cut got great reviews for its FX especially over at the Corridor Crew channel and those guys generally call it right.
So much of it Mark but you have to remember I'm not watching it on a telly so it's easier to see the quality of movies and everything in them. The bigger the projected image the easier it is. The worst was probably the Amazonian gals riding the horses which would have been laughable if it had have been made for cinema but acceptable as it was intended as a television miniseries. We're watching this as though it's a cinema film because it's had a 4K disc release but that was not the market being aimed for. To get the new animation finished for the 2021 release was a bit of a rush and incredible that the release date was met at all so we just have to accept that in this one there is some sub-standard computer animation. But I don't think it matters because it was so spectacular anyway. The dull look disguised a lot of the limitations which helped too. I liked the way it looked but I know some didn't.
John.
Always goo to hear from you about the cameras used, film vs digital debate etc...
I find it amazing that even 35mm is still superior to video given that the film is transferred to a computer, animation added before being edited in a computer and all the detrimental effects that has upon the overall image quality. No wonder Christopher Nolan's genuine IMAX films have looked so good compared to almost anything else other than Kenneth Branagh's 70mm releases. John.
I've been waiting a review of Zack Snyder JL from you, John.
It amaze me that this has Native 4k and all marvel movies are upscaled. Zack snyder truly knows how to do amazing cinematography. This is a truly masterpiece superheroe movie.
I expect the Columbia Marvel movies are shot on video. Justice League was film. Although many of the computer animated sequences were poor quality. I don't think there was enough time to do them as they'd have liked to be fair.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 The Sony (Columbia) Spider Man films, with the exception of the 2012 film, were shot using 35mm film. The last Marvel film shot primarily on film was The Amazing Spider-Man 2
Greetings John,
I get your point on the CGI aliens and I understand it but Steppenwolf looked quite much better in this new version and doesn't look like a vilain from the Power Rangers anymore, so I guess it's a nice improvement from the Whedon cut. :)
As for Batman Returns, I've watched the film quite some times ago so I may be wrong but I remember that the overal picture quality is indeed good but the problem with some older movies (espacially if the film was shot in a studio) is that the improvement on the picture's resolution make you see much more details and, at the end, your picture is kind of screaming "MOVIE SETS" because it's not hidden anymore by a more "blurry picture".
Exactly right about Batman Returns. When it was in cinemas we saw it on huge screens for the most part. Those who went to multiplexes may not have had such an impressive screening owing to the smaller screens but the bigger an image is blown up the more any failings are disguised. Batman Returns at just nine feet wide here looked very much like a movie set. I don't think the Penguin character helped the production either and a better film would have just had Catwoman as the villain. It certainly would have done away with all the fish!
John.
@@moviecollector5920 While the film has some flaws I don't agree with you about the main antagonist. I don't pretend that I'm a "Batman expert" but I've growned up with the animated serie from the early 90's and, much later, I've played the Batman Arkham games which had a similar tone. Generally speaking, Catwoman is an ambiguous character. She may be a criminal but can also be an ally and, unlike other villains like the Joker or the penguin, she doesn't try to kill innocent peoples. So, making her the main antagonist of a story would be kind of strange in my opinion. There are many others characters that can be used for that role (even if you don't like the penguin ;) )
@@lhommetrouble1246 Ah, but that's the point because Catwoman could have crossed both lines and been seen to be helping Batman get Shreck a lot of the time and then double cross him at others. Remember that Bruce Wayne married Selina Kyle in the comics so the possibilities for characterization and drama would have been the most interesting element rather than going for villainy and action. Probably wouldn't have interested the target market back in 1992 but it would have interested me a lot more.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 I get your point but it confirms me the idea that she cannot really be the main antagonist. In your story, it would be Max Shreck and she would be in a kind of gray zone: helping Batman sometimes but also keeping her own interest in mind even if she has to betray him at some point. I agree on the fact that a story with a more important role for her can be interesting (even if she overshadows Max Shreck) but would it makes her really "evil / the main villain" ? I doubt it. ;)
Have a nice week-end.
Another great review John of a film that I absolutely love. I’ve watched it so many times now and find that it’s just one of those movies I can rewatch over and over. I think it looks stunning in 4k and the superb Dolby Atmos track compliments the fantastic visuals so very well. The soundtrack by Tom Holkenborg matches the epic scale of the storytelling and is way, way better than Danny Elfman’s theatrical cut attempt at a film score. I love all of the main characters in the league and believe the aspect ratio does justice to the perfectly cast actors who bring the best of DC’s superheroes to life.
Thanks for reviewing this one, your videos are always very entertaining.
Thanks Scott. I think you're on the right lines there and although the aliens are poor what do we expect from movies with aliens in them these days? They're always going to be done with computer animation and it rarely works so that's what we have to put up with. I've been making the point with other commenters that I think that this film would get better with each viewing. After all, once you've seen it you don't have to watch it all in one hit and could watch it like the miniseries it was originally proposed to be.
John.
Greetings from a fresh children’s school year in Canada 🇨🇦! Freedom!
Condolences about the Queen.
A friend of mine gave this movie to me as a gift. I wasn’t horribly enthusiastic about watching it, but it was much better than the first release. The big boss man had better cgi armour and skin details. Other than that, it was a super hero movie to me. I didn’t think too hard while watching it. It’s good for what it is! Although the lack of colour in most scenes was a bit annoying. Take care!
It's terribly sad that so many of us around the world have lost the greatest monarch in history. I think we'll see Britain at its best in the coming days and probably Canada too and many other great nations.
The lack of colour was an artistic choice for this version of Justice League but the overall image quality is very good even if it's not as good as films of yore such as Batman Returns. Irrespective of that it gave me four hours of fun and that's all anyone can ask for with a group of costume clad comic book characters fighting a computer animated nastie.
John.
I loved the Snyder Cut it really blew me away , pity the Richard Donner cut of Superman II didn't get the same investment to finish it properly, and as for Batman Returns , I recently watched it with my son and his friend both 12, they just hated every single frame of it , it was the most uncomfortable watch I've sat thru in years , when it came out in 1992 I liked it, but watching it again recently was not a good experience , it hasn't aged well , really feels small in scale and you just know it was all shot on a sound stage , it's a Tim Burton movie that just happens to have Batman in it.
I expect Warner Bros. threw money at this Snyder Cut because Whedon had managed to turn things around with the save job he was employed to do. It probably got back WB's investment and maybe even a small profit so I can imagine the temptation to really turn it into a success as a new release for the comparatively paltry sum of $70m.
As for Batman Returns, I didn't like it in 1992 and I still don't. It looks to me like someone wiped out the film grain on this 4K as it doesn't have the natural look that the 1989 film does. I put the original film on immediately afterwards and it's a real film whereas the sequel looks like a cheap knock-off restricted to studio sets. It didn't look like that before so I suspect excessive image noise reduction has been applied. Some have told me they think it's the best 4K disc in their collection but I think that's probably mainly down to the close-up of Catwoman's face in that famous shot.
John.
i just picked up the Snyder cut on blu-ray. Is it worth it to watch the 2 hr Justice League cut, or just skip and watch the 4 hr cut John?
I haven't seen the two hour version Mandeep but I have learned quite a lot while reading up on the trauma that everyone must have gone through in 2017. They appear to be almost completely different films and the 2017 release was in reality a save job so that Warner Bros. could minimize any losses. As it turned out, Joss Whedon almost got them their money back at the box office alone so I suspect it brought it quite a profit in the end after sales to streaming sites, television and home movie disc sales. That paved the way for another $70m investment in 2020 and this Snyder Cut that finally saw the light of day in April or May last year. It's quite a story and almost makes me want to take a look at the 2017 film.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 thanks for thst info. I think I will watch both to compare and contrast. The 2017 version got really reviews. I am going to start a DCEU marathon and will end it with The Snyder cut
At 1 hour 15 minutes on disc one has anybody else noticed a dead pixel flash on then off as the camera is entering through the doorway on the right hand side? I’ve noticed this several times throughout the playback of both discs and unsure if it’s the source material or my TV?
I did see a small triangle of light flash on at one point in the film Samsung but I really didn't take too much notice. I did have a lazy mirror during a show about two years ago but once the projector had had a rest and struck up again it had finished its snooze and come back to life. That lazy mirror in the DLP resulted in a dead pixel sort of result on screen so if you're watching with a DLP video projector you may have spotted a brief hiccup with one of the millions of mirrors on the chip.
John.
This is interesting.
When I watched this on HBOmax. When it first released, I thought some of the VFX were pretty unrefined. But the disc looked extremely better. I wonder. I know the European version came out around the same time as the hbomax release, because not everyone could yet stream it. So I wonder if the international version is just the Hbomax version pressed to disc.
If you liked it enough, import the US version, I want to know what looks so bad, save for that one shot from that one flash scene. Cyborg's extra arms have more detailed on my disc. I remember them looking more cartoony (smooth) on the HBOmax. Like the treasure chest at the end of the first hobbit. It's all smooth af. But I think that was to make it pop out better in 3D. It's just easier to make solid one color objects pop out.
So many of the shots of the Amazonians were poor Grant, most notably the ridiculous close-ups of them riding while shooting arrows off. The aliens were poor and obviously cartoons with little reality to them at all. But as awful as some of that animation was we have to accept that we were lucky this film was ever finished at all. The time to complete all that animation rather guaranteed that much of it was going to be less refined than it would have been if the animators had have been given a couple of years and another $100m to do it all.
Films that are streamed are lower quality than 4K and Blu-ray discs so you might have just observed the inevitable drop out and the resultant image quality of that. It's unlikely there are two versions but I've learned to never rule anything out however ridiculous it may seem.
John.
Dear John, another super video. If you can get your hands on " The adventures of Captain Marvel" a 1940s serial you'll see the best flying effects done in camera. The serial is on US Blu Ray.
I saw episodes of that on Super 8 years ago Dennis. I remember Captain Marvel flying through the air. It''s not really my sort of thing these days but I did enjoy the old Saturday Morning serials as a child and watched Flash Gordon every time it was repeated. Captain Marvel wasn't shown so regularly over here but I did see it when I was very young.
John.
It is always great to see you, John, and listen to your opinions and explanations! Thank you very much for making all of it so interesting!
I signed up to HBO Plus some months ago with an agenda to watch this film. But time goes by and I still have not seen it.. The time has come to do so!
Be well.
Keep your expectations low Dmitri and you may have as much fun with it as we did. Expect a masterpiece and you'll be disappointed. I think it's a film that will improve with each viewing and you don't have to watch it in one go either. Six parts or one disc at a time is possible.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 There are very few 6 hour long movies, which I could watch in one setting. One and two being Frank Herbert's Dune and Children of Dune (British mini TV series). They are both quite theatrical and mighty good! But this movie... I will take both of your advice: low expectations and watch it in few sessions. Thank you!
I'm a huge Marvel and DC fan, and I really enjoyed ZS' Justice League. Yes, it has its issues especially in the CGI depth, but the Whedon cut suffers more in that area, so the use of computer graphics here is considerably better in some areas.
The stand alone Wonder Woman film is rather very good, and deserves your attention, it's better than most of the DC films to date, and Shazam is well worth a look too.
Excellent review John, I look forward to seeing if you do the Batman Returns review...
I'm not really that enamoured with so many comic book adaptations Mark so I really struggle to get up the enthusiam at times. Spider-Man, Batman and Superman were the three stand-out comics when I was a child and the rest were nothing more than fillers to me although I did often enjoy Thor, Daredevil and some of the others but I never stuck with them for long. I enjoyed this version of Justice League though. It was intended to be a miniseries and with so little time to fill all those required effects sequences in we just have to accept that the animation wasn't as good as it could have been. Computer animation is often the reason why a project is considered viable nowadays but I still think there is often too much of it. Perhaps the solution is to build into future story proposals a villain or alien that is more human and moves at human speeds. Then the film makers would be able to shoot much more live on set.
Batman Returns is still a bit of a disappointment but I may be able to do something interesting about both the Tim Burton Batman films. I know I've already covered the 1989 film but doing the sequel does rather need reference to the original.
John.
What a thematically and visually stunning film! This film was truly everything DC fans and those that grew up with the JL animated series have wanted and more! Great review!
I didn't know there was a cartoon series. That may well be what it's based on because I read the comics occasionally and I didn't recognize those in the film. Mind you, I read the comics a long, long time ago in a galaxy.... okay, enough of that! John.
@@moviecollector5920 Most of the characters in this film were part of the original 1960s Justice League of America lineup. The one exception is Cyborg, who originated in the pages of The New Teen Titans in 1980. When the DC timeline was reworked in 2011, he was promoted to the Justice League.
If the film ever manages to get a sequel, it would be nice to see the other two classic members of the team--the Martian Manhunter and the Green Lantern--join in on the action instead of being reduced to cameos.
@@MAMoreno I doubt there will ever be a sequel but I suppose that depends on how much money Justice League made for Warner Bros. in the end and whether or not they'd be prepared to risk around half a billion dollars! That seems unlikely right now so if there is another Justice League film in the future I expect it will be another of those pesky reboot films.
John.
I certainly enjoyed this film a lot and the 4K presentation is far better than the VOD/streaming edition though I would like to see a proper IMAX release. I agree with what you said about the length as it feels like we’re watching one of the overly extended editions of films we hear about but usually never see the light of day.
Sadly it's not an IMAX film Jbird so you'd just be paying to see it blown up on a bigger screen. I don't think there's anything being released in IMAX now but we do have Christopher Nolan's 'Oppenheimer' due for genuine IMAX enjoyment next year. That's the one to aim for but make sure they're screening a genuine IMAX film print before setting out otherwise you'll be watching a 4K video projection. Yes, that's all they use in IMAX cinemas most of the time now. When you think the IMAX film equivalent is around 45K it rather puts things in perspective.
John.
Hi John! Thanks for your work on this! Gonna agree with you here as I enjoyed this film as well but more for the sound than the film itself. I have the 4k but it streams alot on Crave here and I'll put in on in background and just listen to the 5.1 fill the room. (Have Atmos capability but don't have it hooked up yet lol) More interesting though from your review is what you said about Aliens and our (many film enthusiasts would agree I feel) need for something different. I'm sure at some point someone somewhere will come up with a new, more original idea for an alien/villain and put it to film for us hahah. Ps Jaws Imax was a hit, my daughter loved it and it was pretty packed. Felt like a kid again watching it and as you said What a piece of work by the young Spielberg. Regards to you and everyone here D in BC!
i get the impression from having watched this 'miniseries' that it will improve with each subsequent viewing. It has that sort of feel to it to me. Difficult to take it all in first time around usually means there is more to see the next time and the next time and the next time. Shame no one came up with a more viable option for the aliens though. Maybe the way to go would be characters that move at a human pace and so action could be filmed in a way that you could actually follow what is happening.
Thank you for letting me know about your recent Jaws adventure Dave. It would be a thrill to see that great work of art in a packed house again today but it would have to be a top cinema otherwise I know I'd sit there fuming about the poor image quality and how it looked better in 1975.
John
I still need to see this version. Thanks for the review, its motivated me to finally place an order for it.
I hope you enjoy it James. I was expecting a terrible load of nonsense and although it's a load of nonsense, it's not terrible! The sound and the academy aspect ratio image really helped me to enjoy it but I found I liked all the main characters which was a surprise as I really wasn't expecting that. John.
The most frustrating thing about the theatrical cut of Justice League is that it overcorrected the issues with Snyder's previous films, resulting in something that felt only slightly more substantive than an episode of Super Friends. This alternate cut shows that Snyder was capable of fixing the flaws of his first two entries without turning the franchise into an imitation of Disney's Marvel films.
If Warner Bros. had have been open to a three hour version of Justice League then it's possible Zack Snyder could have pulled it off. But it did apparently take a further WB investment of $70m to get that four hour cut completed. WB did want more humour and other things within a two hour cut and that was a contractual obligation for Joss Whedon when he took over. What they were essentially looking for is what's often referred to as a 'save job'. Judging by the success at the box office considering the situation the film was in, I'd say they got it.
John.
I had a feeling you were going to review this, nice job!
I'd been hassled to do it quite a lot Gary. Glad for that now. John.
I love your explanation for the alloted runtime in the cinemas. I've never really thought of it like that. Never really had to.
It'll be a while before I get to sit and watch. I've so many titles to watch.
I suppose the 4×3 aspect ratio gives the film an old school movie look. I hope it's all framed nicely, i. e. Empty space round the action?
Trev
The academy aspect ratio actually works surprisingly well Trevor and I thought it was one of the strengths of the film. I did look about the frame quite often and masked it off to the 'Scope ratio in my head and couldn't see how it would have worked as well. It was shot full frame Super 35 and so that's how the cameraman would have framed it so although much of the area around what would have been the 'Scope ratio was largely superfluous, it didn't seem to be while watching it. It's not a great film by any means and at times it's really quite poor but that is understandable because it was being assembled as a six part miniseries so we have to accept that that was the aim at the time. I expect the really poor computer animation was due to the short deadline to get it completed too.
An interesting film though despite all the flaws. Above all though, it turned out to be surprisingly good fun. Lowered expectations certainly helped to make it enjoyable though.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 I like films that are "Framed" that way because it can give you a better sense of size. I have The Flowers of War which was meant to be a 2.35:1 aspect ratio and may have been in cinemas but the BD has the masking removed. It looks lovely and almost IMAX in its 1.78:1 presentation.
Great video as always John.
Take it easy
Trevor
A thing to note is Batman returns was re colour graded the same as Burton's 1st movie as per Buttons request.
Thanks for telling me that. I found that the 4K of Batman Returns had a colder look to it but I do plan to take another look at the Blu-ray of Batman Returns as although that is markedly inferior it may prove to be better as the slightly poorer image quality may disguise the inadequacy of some of the sets. Not a problem the 1989 film suffered from which looks so much better than the second film simply because it looks realistic and warmer all the way through.
John.
The only reason they changed ZSJL from a series to a movie was because they realised that they'd have to negotiate new TV contracts with the actors and maybe pay more. So they stuck to their existing movie contacts by releasing it as that.
That makes a lot of sense David. Thanks for that.
John.
In my opinion when Man of Steel, Batman Versus Superman (the Ultimate extended edition) and the Snyder cut 4 hour Justice League, when you put these 3 movies together, they are one big long masterpiece. Warner Brothers should have allowed zach snyder to just finish his vision. I really wanted to see his Darkseid portrayal and where he was going to take it. Such a shame we might never see it. #RestoreTheSnyderVerse
Warner Bros. had too much money at risk Andrei so what they did ultimately saved the day. I've explained it all in much more detail to Troy Stone who commented about an hour before you did if you can find it.
John.
I never understood the hate aimed at Zack Snyder. He does make some astonishing visuals and lots of his scenes look like splash pages from comics. He often needs reigning in but he's clearly got a real talent.
As far as this film goes: it was far better than the horrendous theatre version. While I don't like Joss Whedon it can't really.blame him too much. He had an impossible job.
All of this comes down to studio politics. They never had a plan and kept chopping and changing.
The politics around the ZS release of justice league are astonishing. Insiders desperately trying to stop it because it would show how much they butchered the original and if it succeeded it would be an embarrassment.
Anyway... It all shows that movies (and TV) cost way too much to make. There is no way movies cost 100s or even 10s of millions to make. People think CGI is expensive... It isn't, not today. The most amazing stuff can be done on consumer hardware with free software. You just need talent and a small amount of money. Even high quality cameras are here for consumer prices.
Movies cost so much to make because that's how much they bring in and the money needs to be syphoned out during production.
The entire Hollywood is ripe for being overturned. It's amazingly corrupt, tax fraud and money laundering.
Anyway that's my rant over. I look forward to the day when people figure out how much of a fraud the movie and TV business is. The sooner we can see alternatives rise.
The fraud and corruption seems to be everywhere now winsomehax so you won't find much disagreement on here with regard to that. It's a worrying time for democracy which is the most concerning aspect of all this corruption but we won't go there.
Cameras, computers and software can be purchased for comparatively little to do all these film making jobs but there is a difference between consumer cameras and film industry equipment. I sometimes get offered lenses for £50K which sounds like nonsense but it's not. Just a lens for £50k and sometimes they're a lot more than that. Cinema quality video cameras can cost an absolute fortune and way out of my league. Hiring animation companies to produce special effects that are [hopefully] life like also costs a fortune. Just employing one person costs a small fortune so you add all that into the equation and we start to see why everything costs so much to make. $370m appears to be the total cost of all the work that went into Justice League and it's easy to see how when you look at the little 'making of' featurette.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 Sure... I'm not suggesting a blockbuster motion picture be made on a Samsung mobile phone. $50K for a lens though... doesn't translate into $300 million. And computer generated images are here right now for consumer prices. That hardware is here right now, and the software is free - Blender being just one example. People don't even have to take my word on it. You can look at all the SF/Horror short films being made (try the channel Dust for example). Here's another example - the combination of Unreal Engine 5 and Quixel Megascans - you can make astonishing stuff with amazing visuals for nothing. All that stuff needs is talent and time.
None of it adds up to $10 million, never mind $300 million... the maths just doesn't work out.
Hollywood is simply living a fantasy of grift and fraud that they cannot sustain and make out that it's legit any longer. It's so howlingly out of touch with reality that it's downfall and replacement by non-Hollywood alternatives is certain. Same for TV.
When you look further ahead: Virtual sets, virtual costumes and increasingly virtual actors with AI motion and with virtual AI voices. None of this is science fiction. You can go and generate amazing voice synthesises from a few samples right now. Look up Metahuman for another example.
It's all begging to supplanted by lower cost higher quality alternatives - driven by AI and the tools that exist today. You don't even need studios to distribute stuff globally any longer, that was an important function. Not any more.
And it's not slowing down. All if this technology is getting better every day.
@@winsomehax Doesn't sound like a particularly interesting view of the future winsomehax. But film making is certainly expensive although you've made very good points about how ridiculously expensive it is. A production like Justice League for tens of millions would be rather exciting these days but I hope film makers don't go down the route of virtual sets and computer animated characters...whoops, they've already done that! Oh well, that probably explains why so many movies look unreal these days.
Good post. Good points. To replace my cameras I only spend thousands but if I were looking for a modern cinema video camera I'd be looking at hundreds of thousands. It all starts to add up very quickly because that's just the camera body. Think about everything else that gets slapped on them.
John.
I love the Steppenwolf and Darkseid CGI.
Too obviously cartoons for many of us Cameron but it could be a size differential thing too because they both looked so poor projected on our screen. Maybe I'll take a look on the telly where I think a lot of the limitations of the animation will be disguised. John.
This is without a doubt the best Zack Snyder DC film. Now, that sounds like faint praise (given the two wretched prior movies), but it isn't. I actually quite enjoyed it. I wish they had cut the swearing entirely (especially by the heroes) and toned down the violence (especially WW killing the terrorists and chopping Steppenwolf's head off), just to make this a better film to watch with my boys. But the heroes were generally heroic, the charactarizations were solid, the action was exciting, and the visuals were very engaging.
I too was rather surprised by the bad language and the violence. The decapitation was done in slow motion if I remember correctly and that seems a little sick to me. Would the Wonder Woman of the comics have ever cut someone's head off? I don't recall ever seeing her in comics very often but Linda Carter wouldn't have done it, that's for sure! I think all these things were incorporated so that the film would get a more restrictive certification across the world to indicate that it was aimed at a slightly more mature audience... but I may be wrong.
John.
Great review John. I absolutely loved this film. I agree with what you said about the aliens but one thing I would say is that the character of steffenwolf(bad spelling) was alot better in this than the 2017 JL
Hard to believe Steppenwolf could have been worse David! John.
I think this cut of the movie show us how important the score is. Danny Elfmans first score felt misplaced while Junkie XL is a masterpiece.
The score doesn't seem to ever let up and one of the reasons why the overall sound on this one is so special. Apparently it took seven LP's to issue it on vinyl. Must be the longest movie soundtrack in history.
John.
I can't wait to watch this review by you, thanks, John.
It was rather good fun doing it Boss. John.
Bit unrelated but how great would it be to get some beautiful transfers of the Coen Brothers films, especially the Roger Deakins ones.
More related, why did Batman only look badass in 1989?
If home movie sales continue to do well then there are good chances of quite a lot of classic films getting re-transferred and mastered onto discs.
Michael Keaton simply had the right character and look in that 1989 film. He's not as good in the sequel but having just watched that film again, I think I can see why... because it wasn't much good.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 Agreed, Returns is not a good Batman film, but.... it's a pretty good Burton film if you love that Burton / Elfman kooky magic
Hello John, I admit I enjoyed this version better than the theater version. I felt the story was more complete. Yes I don't like the shaky cam either and they are scenes that get to be just too much going on at once. But overall the length was ok for watching at home. Like the LOTR extended versions it's best if watched at home so you can pause it when needed.
Now The Lord of the Rings is another one that I need to get around to sometime Stephen. I really didn't like it in the cinema so never watched the sequels. I hadn't seen Justice League at all so it was quite a surprise that I enjoyed it as much as I did. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Yes John I'd love to hear your thoughts on LOTR's and the sequels. I highly recommend the extended cuts. I really tells more about the characters. Watch out though, The Return of the King is over 4 hrs long.
@@TheShornak The problem with The Lord of the Rings was that it was too long and nothing much happened. When things did happen the computer animation was of a poor standard and look. I haven't seen it since so I might have a change of mind on it today but I hoped I'd have a change of heart with Batman Returns from 1992 and I haven't. I don't suppose there are shorter cuts of the Rings films?!?
Batman returns is definitely worth a rewatch and in my opinion is the better of the two Burton films its extremely dark and like watching a vivid Nightmare. The 4k discs audio and pq are phenomenal
I have watched it Andrew but unfortunately I still feel the same about it. Interestingly, I have my suspicions about what may have been done to the overall image but I'll slap it on again to give it another quick look before I conclude. Right now I don't think there is enough visible film grain so it's had too much of a clean-up. It's very sharp which initially I thought was great but it is so obviously a studio bound picture that it actually hurts the end product. I put the 1989 film on immediately afterwards and the image quality does not have these issues and it has superior sets. It gives a much nicer impression. I only just found out today that the sequel was not shot at Pinewood so that explains the sets. I suppose there were reasons for shooting it at Warner Studios in Los Angeles but I don't know what they were. I've watched some of it on on the telly this afternoon and it doesn't look so fake owing to the size differential but this should be a big screen film. Shame that I have no recollections of the image quality at the cinema for this one otherwise i'd be able to reach a more conclusive conclusion!
John.
Hi John. Hows things? Great review mate.
I saw the Josstice League at the cinema and it was okay but I thought the Snyder Cut was excellent. Its a much more coherent film and it doesnt have so many awkward cuts. I understand that the studio would never sanction a 4 hour odd film for cinema release though. They wouldnt be able to cram as many screenings in.
As a 2 disc version I understand there is very little compression on these discs? It does look very good. I havent watched it with the 5.1 audio so will have to try that. Just defaulted to atmos.
Chris
Atmos may be even better Chris so maybe just switch between the two for a while to see which you prefer. I haven't seen the 2017 version of the film but it must have been a Herculean task to make sense of what had been delivered to Warner Bros. Sounds to me like Joss Whedon really saved the day for this film even if it wasn't particularly popular because he almost recouped Warner Bros. losses at the box office alone.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 Joss Whedon may have put a film together and made some money back but I think the Snyder Cut is better in every way. Just my opinion of course.
I just put the disc in to listen to the start with Supermans scream and the Atmos does sound a lot better. It just seems to fill the room a bit more than the 5.1
@@chrissyboy7047 The point I was trying to make was that if the circumstances that occurred in 2017 had not come to pass then The Snyder Cut would not have come to pass. Whedon saved the day and without his efforts Zack Snyder would not have been given the opportunity to put his piece of work together.
Good to know that Dolby Atmos is giving a more room filling sound Chris. That's exactly as it should be. I will hopefully get the chance to look into this a little in the future but there's not much chance of being able to adapt my system into Atmos as there isn't any way of putting those large tripoles on the ceiling... even if I could find four or six more of them.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 I get you John yeah. Thats a fair point.
I only have the upfiring atmos speakers which supposedly bounce the sound off the ceiling but it still makes a big difference when comparing the 2 audio tracks and gives a better wall of sound from the front. It will do me for now.
Chris
I like the black white version.
I might take a look with the colour bled out NightBreaker. It is easy to do so worth a look. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I watched all the version and the black white version looks good and fits the well overall. Anyways thanks for the review.
I really enjoyed the Zack Snyider version way better.. can't believe they sticked with it
I expect they stuck with it because the Joss Whedon save job in 2017 appears to have turned a small profit. If not for that, then the film would have been buried and forgotten at Warner Bros. and The Snyder Cut would never have seen the light of day.
John.
great review. i really liked this movie. not perfect but very enjoyable. although I could not deal with the black bars/ratio. I had to use the "zoom" feature on my TV to get the bars out of the way. still looks great since it had so many IMAX scenes.
I wouldn't have liked to watch in on a telly either Luis but others report that they really liked it in the old ratio box. Give it another try next time and you may find you quickly get used to it. It worked well projected with the masking enveloping the screen and probably made for a more enjoyable show because it was different.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 i do mean to watch it again soon on my new TV. we shall see.
Will you be getting Star Trek the motion picture directors addition to review
I don't think so Neil. I might get that four film box set now it's going cheap. I think the four films are now less that that one new version of The Motion Picture. You'll have to let me know what it's like. John.
@@moviecollector5920 the iTunes streaming is impressive apparently the 4K disk is as well I got it back in 2001 on dvd bring waiting years to get the remastered version they say it taken 42 years to finish the film
@@neiltaylor6645 agree...its been a long time to get the disc and 3 versions make it as close to a great package as possible. Flaws from the theatrical release remain but i think fans and mr wise would be happier about it. Its true for many years it was considered unfinished....i would say in certain ways it still us but thats not the films fault its the story and script. I recommend if your a fan of mofel work and love a perfect music score this is a must. Paramount need to think about packaging being as its a mix of box, snapcase and steelbooks across 6 films. I think picture and sound wise many are very happy and i am one of them. Excelsior
The music is the best part. Way better than the Whedon music. Reusing music from the 78 Superman and 89 Batman wasn’t the best choice IMO.
I thought the whole soundtrack was rather special. The music didn't seem to let up very often. I wonder if it was a world record for the longest film score in history? John.
@@moviecollector5920 It’s even longer on UA-cam if you look it up. It’s 7 hours. :)
I think that must have alternate takes included
@@thribs That would take a few LP's to get that all released!
@@moviecollector5920 There is a LP. It has 7 vinyls. I own that bad boy.
I think it’s just under 4 hours in length
@@thribs Good grief! I was joking but they've actually done it. John.
You should take a look at the movie “old”. I read that it was shot in 35mm and might be a beautiful 4K release. Good movie, both my wife & I enjoyed it. But our copy was streamed not physical.
I expect I will take a look at Old. It's just not the most appealing looking cover on the shelves whenever I'm in HMV or FOPP. I'll take a look at the trailer though and see what I think. Thank you for the suggestion.
John.
Great honest review! I really like man of steel, director's cut batman v superman, and zsjl. Greetings from Utah!
Greetings from England! I really didn't like Man of Steel but I watched it again recently prior to Batman v Superman and I didn't dislike it anywhere near as much. I think a lot of what we think about films comes down to expectations and I was expecting a sequel to Superman Returns which I thought was pretty wonderful. I didn't understand what I was watching and that Warner Bros. had decided to scrap what had gone before and start all over again. The 1978 film was brilliant so why ever try to replace that? They did the same with Batman and have repeated that process again with the recent The Batman but that's the modern way I suppose. Once something is past its sell by date then just start again like Columbia did with Spider-Man (twice!) and Paramount with Star Trek. A gap of around 30 years and then I find it easier to accept but otherwise I struggle.
John.
Great review John I'm looking forward to seeing your review for Black Adam
Ha! No chance!!! John.
I saw this recently for £4.99 in a local charity shop! I spent my money elsewhere - Snyder is not my cup of darjeeling at all. Thanks for the review, John.
PS Small typo in the video description, mate!
I really did resist watching this one and thanks to lowered expectations it was a genuine surprise that I actually rather enjoyed it. I wish I'd have been given the job of cutting it down to size because I reckon I could have got a 2.5 hour version sorted in 2017. Well, we can all dream. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I think that's where the misapprehension that Whedon "butchered" the movie came from - he was contractually obliged to deliver a 2 hour cut!
@@danhardcastle From what I learned reading everything I could about what really happened in 2017, it seems that Warner Bros. needed someone to make a film out of the marathon that had been delivered to them. Two hours looks to have been a little too ambitious but ultimately I think Joss Whedon saved the day and if he hadn't have got Justice League into cinemas in 2017 then the Snyder Cut would never have materialized. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Sad news about Her Majesty, John. All the best. Dan.
Atmos mix didnt do it Justice. Fortunately I can switch to 3D Auro which made big difference pushing my hieght channels. I was frustrated with Atmos were some scenes where u expect objects flying from above only be left wondering why it sound so weak....or why i not hearing any hight sound?..untill switching to 3D Auro. There are some great atmospheric sounds like the ocean etc It is good sounding film though they didnt put enough sound production effort in the Atmos.
I don't have Atmos in my home cinema and don't feel the need for it. Everything tends to sound good through this system but I can understand what you're saying because when I first got a surround sound system more than 30 years ago I was somewhat obsessed with it and loved to hear everything moving around the room. Now it's more about the sound quality rather than the separation of the channels. THX does tend to make everything sound like Dolby Atmos or DTS-X though so that's probably why I don't feel the need to make any changes and haven't for 20 years now. This Friday I'm off to the BFI IMAX and that sound system does make just about everywhere else seem a little second rate anyway.
Great that you're getting good results switching to 3D Auro. I used to use a Stereo Retrieval System (SRS) box that did similar things but I only tend to use that with Super 8 films these days.
John.
Hi John, any chance we'll also get a review of the Indiana Jones box set?
Only if someone sends it to me Jack! I simply can't afford them all and I do have the first and third films on Super 8 so I know them rather too well having run them countless times over the last 30 years.
John.
I enjoyed it a lot and think it stands up very well to marvel movies especially the trash they have put out since end game. It's not the Godfather or Paths of Glory but it is a fun comic book movie.
That's about the size of it Alex. Good fun and who could ask for more from a film based on a comic? John.
Great video sir, glad you liked this flick.
Me too Mark. I'm quite surprised that I did enjoy it but lowered (very lowered!) expectations probably helped and I think I'll actually enjoy it more next time I watch it.
John.
Love how you describe it as an epic! That perfectly encapsulates what it is, I also didn’t like the end credits song 😂
Either 'epic' or 'ambitious' would describe it equally. Some would say 'too ambitious' but all the trouble and obstacles Justice League went through worked out in the end because there is no way a four hour film would have been released otherwise. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Thank you for all of your considerate replies, and keep up the great work!
@@resikin I'll try Sir Rami. Thank you.
Movie Collector What's your top 5 movies all time?
I have a whole lot of favourites Mia and not because I think they're the best films ever made. I find it difficult to work out which is right at the top though but probably Alien, The Terminator, Aliens, Jaws, 2001 A Space Odyssey, Highlander, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Apocalypse Now and a whole bunch of others that I could sit here all morning thinking about. Best films in recent years are Last Night In Soho, Le Mans '66 and Murder on the Orient Express.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 nice, cheers for the reply.
7 of mine in your list .👍
I like nothing better than watching director's cuts
I rarely watch them sin gin. Tend to always prefer the original version. I think this one really was more of an original version but it's also more of a miniseries and was put together on that basis. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I think director cuts are the original vision of the director, it's how he wanted us to see it.....Or she.
Cyborg was created in the 80’s for the Teen Titans comic series. He was added to the Justice League in 2011 when DC did their big relaunch, the New 52.
Many suspect he was added for diversity reasons.
Well that explains why I'd never come across him. A good version of The Terminator so a bit obvious really but he fitted in well with the other characters. John.
I really liked it I must have rewatched it 5 times in 2 weeks when it came out. Great review John
GOD SAVE THE QUEEN
It is a very repeatable film Andy. I'm surprised that I actually rather liked it but lowered expectations would have helped there.
Looks like we're going to get bad news about our wonderful Queen very soon. Feeling rather upset right now.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 yeah me to John been in tears tbh a day none of us ever wanted to witness
How does ur case have doors n my disc are Stacked
The studio nor the distributor manufacture the cases Stafs so they just use what they can get hold of. Amaray are no longer making disc cases and supplies have been a bit short for a couple of years from other manufacturers so unfortunately the amount of choice and availability has diminished. The labs that stamp the discs have the inlays, discs and anything else put into the cases on site via clever machinery before the finished products are cellophane wrapped and shipped to the distributor.
John.
Hey John, i liked the Zack Snyders version a lot more than Josh Whedons, hopefully DC can get back on track with it's movies
I haven't seen the original version of Justice League PAul but it certainly looks like Josh Whedon saved the day irrespective of what many think of the film. The Snyder Cut is a television miniseries and on that basis it's very good but it wouldn't have been so well received if this had have been what went out to cinemas in 2017 and I think I can say that with some certainty. I expect that it would have garnered so much vitriol that it would have died a death quite quickly and never stood a chance. As it is, everyone was ready to give the film a second chance in 2021, plus the evidence of the fan campaign to get it released, is that they wanted to like it. Given that it was now four hours long it was possible to make the story coherent - well, almost coherent anyway - and in spite of all the other issues with the finished product it was enough to be able to enjoy the film at the second attempt.
It's proved to be an interesting subject so I'm glad I finally gave it and watched it.
John.
Great review, John! I still haven't seen this film yet (mainly because of it's runtime) but looks like a very nice 4K disc nevertheless.
I'm currently working on my blu ray review of "Pink Flamingos" But I can take my time on this video as I already have next weeks 2001 splicing video planned to upload.
overall a great film shot on 16mm ektachrome stock. The colours on the restoration look amazing too.
have a great day, John! I'm just about to go make a cup of tea I think :)
Greetings from Blighty Clark. It's going to be a bit of a sad time in the United Kingdom for a while following the death of the Queen. Maybe Australia will also do something to commemorate the death of the great lady as she was head of state to both our great nations. Actually she was head of state to a few billion people I think so surely the most important lady who has ever lived.
Batman Returns does look better than Justice League but I may actually prefer the look of Justice League. The 1989 Batman is better than both of them though as it has the full, natural film look more than the other two. Batman Returns seems to have almost completely lost the filmic look so excessive image noise reduction perhaps? I don't know, I'll have to look at it again.
Let me know when you've got the 2001 video up there as anything 2001 has the potential to be big and I want to see it pronto!
We've just had a cuppa. Didn't seem to get a biccie for some reason though.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 I was also a little saddened by the Queens passing. I'm sure Australia will do something to commemorate her as well.
I've just had a look at the Batman Returns 4K disc and I think you're right. I hardly see any grain at all, so definitely a case of excessive DNR.
as for the 2001, it was the same video I sent to you with the blue danube music playing. I'll make it public tonight I reckon.
I've got the 70mm double feature I'll be attending at the orpheum, they are screenings 'Lawrence of Arabia" and "2001: A Space Odyssey" back to back, with a 1 hour intermission between the two. very excited to see lawrence of Arabia in one sitting (20 minute intermission of course).
perhaps go grab yourself a biccie if you can, they always make a cup of tea nicer.
Please do a review of that Batman Returns it's personally one of my fave batmans especially with the recent dross we've seen. Be interested to see how that style worked, I thought Walken and Pfiffer were exception... and Devito in one of his finest roles... perfect casting!
I still don't like Batman Returns much Mark but there is enough of interest to talk about. Even though I've reviewed the 1989 film previously I think the only way to review Batman Returns is to cover both films so that's my train of thought at the moment. The first film looks better than the second on 4K and there seem to be reasons for that which I'll go into.... assuming I remember!
John.
@@moviecollector5920 That;s interesting you're not a fan, I'd picked that up from previous reviews? Any reason why not, as I would think possibly in a minority there i.e. it's a film that a lot of people hold quite dear especially with it having keaton in the lead... be interested to hear your thoughts on this one in a review. Thanks for the reply.
@@MrPugheaven I need to think about it all some more but a lot of the problem is that it's a sequel to the 1989 film and it doesn't match up to it. If it had have been shot at Pinewood then the sets would have been up to the standard of the previous film and that would have helped but as it is it is too often obviously shot on a studio set. Too much focus on the villans and not enough on Batman. Those sort of things. It wasn't a popular film when it was first on general release as everyone that saw it seemed to be disappointed but maybe it's grown a more appreciative audience since then. I don't like fish either so that's a big negative that probably only applies to me.
John.
Incredible movie but that aspect ratio bothers me too. ITs a great disc though. And if you look you can find some 'internet experts' who made 16:9 versions of the film. Looks pretty good too.
The academy aspect ratio is actually rather a nice novelty for a home cinema when you're able to mask the image fully. I realize not many people can do that but you don't need to go as far as I have as some black card tacked to a wall will do the job. No way to do in on a telly though and therein lies the problem... and that's why we all need to have a projector to hand!!!
John.
@@moviecollector5920 wouldn't that be nice 😀
Always top notch reviewing! Appreciate your work!
Thank you MLG. John.
I'm with you John I watched the film and tbh there's far to much chaos happening and all rather to quickly for my liking so I tend to lose interest, I'm not a massive fan of computerised Aliens or villains in films and I just think you can't beat practical effects, 1 of the many reasons I hated predator 2018 they were far to big, I like the Dark Knight trilogy and the Original Superman 78 but maybe I'm a bit old fashioned, Great review as always mate take care 👍🏻
Don't forget the 1989 Batman too Ron. That was all real world, old school film making with on set practical effects ruling the roost. Younger audiences probably wouldn't accept a reality based comic book superhero film today and that's why so much computer animation is involved and why so much of it is over the top. John.
@@moviecollector5920 oh yes I don't forget that I was 7 years old when it came out and I drove my mum and Dad up the wall with it I loved it and still do, Although I like Batman Returns to and understand your not the biggest fan of that pal 😁👍🏻
I love the Snyder cut, so much better than the Weldon vision,it's my favourite superhero movie,Great Review John👍🏻
Hopefully I've managed to explain the raison d'etre for the 2017 two hour release without being too beastly about what Zack Snyder must have delivered to Warner Bros. It did sound like a bit of a disaster though and poor old Joss Whedon had to try to make something of it. Looks to me like he saved the day.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 I've got Weldon's justice League on Blu-ray if you want it John, I'll post it to you if you want to submit yourself to watching it 😂
@@Gazza636 Very kind of you Gary but please keep it as you may want to watch it again one day. I expect I'll see it as a bargain somewhere one day and take a dip. Joss Whedon certainly had his work cut out for him to get that marathon finished and into cinemas. It nearly covered its costs too apparently so quite an achievement. John.
I think u ought to do a review of Aquaman, Directed by James Wan, I think it was shot digitally but is absolutely breathtaking John. And the original Pacific Rim by Del Torro…
That one will probably take quite a while for me to work up to as well Kishawn. He's not exactly the most riveting superhero the comic world ever dreamed up. Spider-Man, Batman and occasionally Superman were the comics that I tended to read. I always found every other character a bit of a poor substitute but did take a look at many of them at one time or another.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 I feel the same as you, but you should definitely take your time, I’ll be anticipating to see whether or not you become pleasantly surprised, if not by the story at least the visuals, they are to die for.
I liked the Snyder Cut much more than the Whedon cut, but I found the music a bit lacking when compared to Dawn of Justice.
I was completely enveloped in sound Reynaldo and so can't really say whether or not I much liked the score but it seemed to be ever present and helped to fuel my enjoyment... apart from those awful couple of songs of course!
John.
This movie was MUCH better than the Weaton Version...long but worth every minute. The charters had more time to develop and the story was just better.
Joss Whedon was on a contract that stipulated a 2 hour running time Bob so how he made any sense of the hours of material shot must have been an achievement in itself. He salvaged Justice League and Warner Bros. must have felt they'd found the Messiah to almost get them their money back on box office takings alone but it looks like with everything else it actually turned a profit. Well, it must have done otherwise they wouldn't have sunk a load more money into it for this 4 hour version. I find myself wanting to see that two hour cut to see exactly what Joss Whedon actually did and how he turned what looked like a disaster into a minor success.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 Thanks for the details...never knew that.
I have hung on for a deal and got it in a 3 for £30 deal I was put off by running time but I will give it a go John. Great review and its taken my mind off the the news about our Queen god bless
We're both upset by the news about Queenie. Let's hope we see the best of this country in the coming days which I feel sure we will.
Good buy to get this 4K in the 3 for £30 Ellis. Well done. I hope you enjoy it. The first disc is about 2 hours and 30 minutes and the second is about 1 hour and 40 so probably best watched over two evenings like we did. The 'Making of' is rather interesting and it's on disc 1 so leave that to the end. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Thanks will do
@@moviecollector5920 will do john thanks
@@moviecollector5920 just wondering if you have heard of madVR i use it via pc with a powerful graphics card its exceptional with bluray and very good with 4k considering i have a 1080p projector. The founder created the software for free initially but then decided to create a stand alone unit and stopped supporting the pc software which is unfortunate but rumour is he is to return. His top end video madVR processor retails for nearly $12k this might be an interesting watch for you john
ua-cam.com/video/N2LK_roCAng/v-deo.html
The aspect ratio on the Synder cut was the only thing I didn't like about it.
It worked well projected with the image nicely masked all around Swissbeats. If you're watching on a telly though you're a bit stuffed really so I can understand what you're saying. You'll have to come round here next time!
John.
Hate the aspect ratio, Was pulling my hair out, What little I have left : )
It does really need to be projected and black velvet masks enveloping the image otherwise I suspect I'd agree with you James. But it really worked well in here and was one of the reasons why I ended up liking the film... which I didn't expect.
John.
Hey John, always lovely to see you! This is not my cuppa, though have not seen it. Very curious about Batman Returns. Stay well my friend.
Morning Rob. Actually, it's still 'evening' where you are. We've lost Queenie so it's going to feel a little different over here for a while but we should see the best of this country over the next ten days. I hope so anyway.
I'm thinking about doing a Batman/Batman Returns video even though I've covered the 1989 film already. That's because Batman Returns has some things that might be interesting to point out. I still don't like the film after all these years but that's not one of the interesting things, it's more that the image quality does not look natural to me and therefore I suspect excessive nose reduction but no one else seems to have noticed. Perhaps I'm completely wrong but why else would the film suddenly look like it's all shot on a studio set?
John.
@@moviecollector5920 Hi John. Thanks for your message. We watched the BluRay of "Witness for the Prosecution" last night. Everyone loved it. I like Batman Returns and remember it looking gorgeous at the theater and on laserdisc. Would be curious to hear your thoughts on the 4K. Stay well my friend.
Great job John 👍👍👍....I haven't seen justice League at all yet.....have to pick it soon.
Don't expect a masterpiece Roy and you should be okay with it. I was expecting a complete turkey so it was a nice surprise. John.
The runtime stuff at the beginning of this video around the 1:00 mark doesn't make any sense. Batman v Superman theatrical was 2 hours and 31 minutes long and made 230 million dollars more than Justice League theatrical which was exactly 2 hours long. I don't understand why people keep saying long runtimes hurt theaters. Avatar was almost 3 hours, 3 billion dollars. Avengers Endgame, 3 hours almost 3 billion dollars. No Way Home, 2 and a half hours, 2 bullion, Man of Steel, 2 and a half hours, 670 million (more than Justice League), Aquaman 2 and a half hours, 1.2 billion... And I can do this all day. The more showings with shorter runtimes argument is moot. If the movie is good people will see it and see it again. Clearly the 2 hour runtime did nothing for Justice League because there was no repeat business no matter how many showings theaters could squeeze into a day. BvS was significantly longer and significantly less butchered by the studio and did much better than Justice League and the even longer version was considered the more complete and cohesive film. What WB needs to do is stop meddling with directors and trust their vision or don't hire them, you wanna be like Marvel so bad, start there. Simple.
Morning Troy. I'll try to explain what I think it is you're asking. When Kevin Costner made Dances With Wolves he reinvented the longer film being a success. Longer films for a while up until that time were almost completely extinct. The three hour running time of Dances With Wolves did mean that cinemas could not fit as many showings in each day as they would have liked as just an extra show each day helps to generate the revenue they need. Kiosk sales are vital to the survival of cinemas because there is a sliding scale on how much of a film's box office take a cinema is permitted to keep for themselves and with some of the Star Wars films around the turn of the century it was as little as 10%. We can see from this sort of contractual obligation that the throughput of customers is even more important than it may first appear and that is largely why sweets and drinks inside a cinema appear to be so costly. Without that income stream it's possible there wouldn't be any cinemas.
Warner Bros. invested a substantial (ridiculous?!?) amount of money in Justice League and when they saw the first rough cut it is reported that they were not best pleased. I don't know all the details but others have advised that there was a contractual obligation for the film to meet the two hour mark and certainly Josh Whedon had that stipulation when he took over directing and then completing the film. Zack Snyder had been cutting the film down to size but I think his most compact edition took it down to about two hours and twenty minutes. Reports do exist about Warner Bros. executives/senior management stating that the film was 'unwatchable'. $300m and they thought the people entrusted with this major production had produced something incoherent must have been a stressful time for senior people at WB. The director is employed or contracted to deliver a finished product and usually it all works out fine but the pressures are different when you're talking about the size of a small county's annual economy. In such a situation it is understandable that the owners stepped in to try to salvage what they could. Josh Whedon must have been regarded as a saviour by almost returning WB's whole investment through box office takings alone and that ultimately paved the way for the 2021 re-launch which apparently caused Warner Bros. to risk a further investment of $70m. It's all helped to make the film far more interesting than it ever would have been and all this chicanery has really made a little piece of cinema history. I do realize though that there are many fans out there who don't fully understand it all and think that Warner Bros. were the ones causing the problems when the truth appears to be some way away from that outlook. The upshot is that it all turned out alright in the end.
John.
So wish it would of been full open matte full screen
Well, it is the full frame from the 35mm shoot Phil. I don't know if it happened in the end but the intention was to put the finished product into genuine IMAX cinemas in 2021 and it was therefore handy that it had been shot full Super 35 because the aspect ratio is almost the same and would have only required thin black bars top and bottom. However, some of the computer animation would have looked laughable on those huge screens so it might have been just as well it was a home video and streaming only release.
John.
Snyder's JL is one of the ABSOLUTE GREATEST COMIC BOOK MOVIES EVER! WB is ABSOLUTELY BRAINDEAD not to let him finish his trilogy!
To be fair, Warner Bros. had put a lot of money into Justice League and it was reported to have been in a bit of a mess when Joss Whedon took over to get it complete. Maybe that two hour stipulation needed a tighter script before anyone started out. John.
@@moviecollector5920 Maybe, what I do know is that Snyder's JL is as I said one of the ABSOLUTE GREATEST COMIC BOOK MOVIES EVER!
@@thumbsaloft Funny how things sometimes turn out. From out of a near disaster a much loved film was ultimately created.
@@moviecollector5920 I agree 100%!
Here are my top 5 superhero movies...
For the #1 spot it's a tie between Snyder's JL and Captain America Winter Soldier
2 - Captain America
3 - Iron Man
4 - Raimi's Spiderman 2
5 - The Incredible Hulk
I have to give an honorable mention to Aqua Man, the vision of that movie is just fantastic!
@@thumbsaloft Now you've made me think. I can't tell you what order I'd have them in but Superman The Movie, Superman 2, Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2 and Batman. If I ever see any of the lesser superhero films I might be pleasantly surprised but I never particularly enjoyed their comics so never bothered with the films. John.
I adore this movie and I'm glad you had a good time with it.
I think it's a film that will be better on a second watch because ome of the computer animation was a bit inadequate but understandable given what had to be done to get the end product out in time. Now that I know that it won't be such a distraction. John.
@@moviecollector5920 I feel it would've also pulled through much better if they hadn't had to do quite as much with the visual effects due to the behemoth of a runtime, because 4 hours of a grand scale sci-fi fantasy film during a pandemic would be taxing for any vfx team.
@@koltonknox9836 To get the monumental volume of computer animation done well would have taken a couple of years at least and that would have taken hundreds of animators to do it. I'm pretty sure it was done by a very small team and they only had a few months. It was intended for a television series but that changed and possibly because the actors and actresses would have been eligible for fees because their contracts specified a theatrical release film only. It may not be the greatest film ever made but it certainly proved to be interesting for all sorts of reasons.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 "We worked on over 80 minutes of the movie over the course of roughly six months."
Yeah, they definitely got put through the wringer.
@@koltonknox9836 I think the expectation was that it was going to go out as a television mini-series and so the special effects weren't required to match up to the big screen treatment. I've been told on here in the comments that in the end it couldn't be turned into a mini-series owing to the contracts with the actors who were all down for a theatrical film and they'd have all had to have been paid again for a television series. It does seem to make sense and that's why we ended up with it as a four hour film that apparently never saw the light of a cinema projector. John.
I enjoyed this movie even the super extended cut 😁
I do realize that the 4 hour version is actually a television miniseries now though Martin and that makes some of the questionable things that appear in that 'series' more understandable. The dodgy songs for no apparent reason, the poor computer animation here and there and the sort of episodic nature of it. It's probably better than I thought if I'd have twigged that it was originally intended as a miniseries only but it's been pointed out to me that it was probably the extra fees to all the actors for a TV series rather than a film that ultimately meant is was an overlong film in the end.
John.
What is rare is wonderful as far as cgi goes.
There are some very good animation sequences... particularly the ones where you never even realize you're looking at animation! John.
@@moviecollector5920 ill have to watch it again but in general cgi is over used and more frequently poorly implemented.
@@packersredhot There was no other way to get this one completely Green Bay. If it were up to me, I'd have never even attempted to make it because I know it's just not possible to do the effects justice but that probably wouldn't have been the right decision judging by the enthusiasm for the film shown in these comments. John.
I hope you have a look at the new 4k release of Star Trek The Motion Picture, John🙂
Only if someone donates a copy Eric. I asked Jack Savva a few comments down to let me know what he thinks of it so maybe you could do the same. I don't usually go in for versions that weren't the original in cinemas but there have been a couple of exceptions... that I can't think of right now! John.
@@moviecollector5920 if I had a 4K setup, I'd happily do that, John. One reason I enjoy your videos is that I get to see what I'm missing.
The new deluxe set of Star Trek The Motion Picture, called The Complete Adventure, includes three different cuts of the film in 4K and only 4K, which is the only reason I didn't buy it, so that might be an option to consider if you're a fellow purist like myself 🙂
@@1dbanner I'd probably only ever watch the theatrical version though Eric. I do have the film on Super 8 as a 3x400ft cut down that was released by Marketing Film International in 1980. I think that's probably better than the theatrical cut but I do like the original version. It's the best quality of the Star Trek films... or at least it was on the Blu-ray releases of the six films. John.
Some interesting points discussed here.
However I just love looking at your Last Night In Soho poster.
Not my favourite film of late, but it was OK to watch once.
I think it may get better with subsequent viewings. Justice League that is not Last Night In Soho which I think is one of the best films for years.
John.
@@moviecollector5920 Zack Snyder’s Justice League is certainly a much better film on second watch. When I watched it the first time I thought that it was only “good,” but upon second watch it’s now one of my all time favorites!
@@resikin Good point about requiring a second watch Sir Rami. I had twigged that this one would improve with each viewing because it's a little difficult to take in at times. I still think there are some much better movies based on the D.C. comics even though I know Justice League will get better. John.
I think I am in the wrong film territory among film purists and such, but I wish this had gotten a 3D conversion. Granted, it was not an economically viable option. I understand. Just wishful thinking.
That's the trouble though, it wasn't a 3D film and would have to go through the conversion process. It wasn't made in 3D so leave it that way. To apply that process to great films like Predator at Terminator 2: Judgment Day is a money making exercise that's turned some great classics into novelties. But if it makes money to invest in other productions then that's a good thing even if I'll never want to watch the 3D re-hashes. I view film making as art but it's not always treated that way.
John.
After I watched my 4K version of this film, i cannot bring myself to watch the whedon "option". On my 65" OLED this "square" version looked ok to me for overall size (in my room anyway) and the picture quality was far better than the previous version on Blu Ray. Even the bad guy looked superb for detail etc. It also made much more sense for the story overall I think.
I am glad I bought this Snyder version and my best mate has even got rid of his old blu ray Whedon version, as between the two of them the whedon version made him want to vomit (so he said) after it was cut about so badly for tthe tone of the story etc. On HIS tv (an 82" LED) the size of the Snyder cut is huge to behold.
The longer version also went pretty quick I found and didn't really feel as long as it actually is. A good sign in my book that a film is INTERESTING to watch, not just overpowering for effects all the time. If only more films could be done in this vein, rather than just 'silly' one liners and comic relief characters most of the time. I'm looking at you STAR TREK films.
82 inches must be about five and half feet wide so it's big for a telly. I don't know how big the image was in here but the masking opens up to almost nine feet for 'Scope ratio films so it was probably about six feet wide for the 1.33:1 image. The alien was difficult to discern most of the time and I put that down to poor design and poor animation but if it's good on a telly then it's probably poor on a bigger screen because the animators were working on computer monitors and didn't get to see what they were doing blown up to cinema screen sizes. I've been suspecting for quite a while that that is an explanation for the poor quality animation work lately.
Joss Whedon was contracted to deliver a two hour version of what Warner Bros. considered to be a bit of a mess. It was a save job for them and they were probably thinking that the best they could hope for was a return of investment. Sadly it wasn't quite that successful in cinema alone but streaming and home movies might have taken them to the break even point. To sink another $70m into a failed project to re-issue it must be something unique in the history of film making. Now that I've typed that out it seems even more unbelievable!
John.