Tartan Asia Extreme

Region 0 - PAL

2.35:1 Original Aspect Ratio

16X9 enhanced
Average Bitrate: 7.83 mb/s
PAL 720x576 25.00 f/s

NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.

Tartan -PAL

Tartan -NTSC

Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen anamorphic - 2.35:1

Edition Details:
• Audio commentary by Park Chan-wook
• Audio commentary by Park Chan-wook and Jeong Jeong-hun
• Audio commentary by Park Chan-wook and selected Cast
• Trailer
• Disc 2:
• Flash (22:57)
• The Cast Remembers (10:58)
• Production Design (13:14)
• CGI featurette (7:10)
• The Music Score (16:50)
• Le Grand Prix at Cannes (8:51)
• Exclusive interview with Park by Mark Salisbury (22:13)
• 11 Interviews with director, writer, cast and crew (41:20)
• 10 Deleted Scenes with optional audio commentary by Park (24:17)
• Newly digital remastered with new English subtitles

DVD Release Date: February 28, 2005
2 disc Keep Case

Chapters 16

Sound:
The difference between the Dolby 5.1 in the UE and DTS in the SE is negligible. They pretty much sound the same to me. I've listened to a few scenes and I can't really tell which is better. Can't compare with the Tartan releases.


Picture:
The Tartan R0 still looks the best. The SE is probably closer to what the theatrical presentation looked like, which is why it's so different from the other releases. The framing seems to be different in a few scenes also (capture 5). After all the tinting and timing, the differences are small, but the Tartan R0 seems to have slightly better detail.


Extras:
Well...take a guess. Even without understanding Korean, there's still plenty of great stuff on the UE. The 3 1/2-hour doc, deleted scenes, one short film, the Cannes footage and the Harry Knowles commentary are worth watching, even if you only speak English. The SE and UE extras seem to have been made as a set (the doc in 2 parts, for example, and the packaging).
There's no overlap between the extras, save for the OST. The UE box also came with a foam square, which is the same size as the SE box. Evidently, Starmax intended you to put the SE inside the UE box. The Tartan R0, though, has a lot of nice stuff, also, which includes the 40 minutes of interviews (which I find strange because, the PAL interviews run longer than the NTSC ones...) and 3 of the commentaries. (The one that's missing is the critics commentary, and the Harry Knowles one.)

Pat Pilon

NOTE2: From H. (Thanks!)

Addition - The Tartan Region 1. - Well it appears as though Tartan actually converted to NTSC before transferring which is a nice gesture, but the DVD (unlike the PAL counterparts) is not progressively scanned (see combing in last 2 large captures). It also falls short in the extras department. Stick with the Tartan Asian Extreme from the UK.

*****

Tartan - PAL:

Image
The image is simply incredible, amongst the best ever from Tartan. I have not been able to find any compression artefacts. There are no ghosting visible, not even during fight sequences. The only element of critic should be, that in Image #7, the green of the oceans fades into her arm.

The image at times grainy and has extreme light / contrast elements (see Image #6), but based on how I recall it from the cinema, they are due to the directorial decision and not to blame any transfer issues.

Sound
All DVD editions I've heard, as well as the film theatrically, has been extremely dynamic. The new 6.1 DTS ES mix is almost reference quality, in how subtle background sound plays in the rears. Compared to both the 5.1 Dolby Digital and the DTS, the 2.0 Dolby Digital is sadly very tame.

Extras
The film is accompanied by three audio commentaries. Best of these is the solo Park commentary, where he discusses the film itself, next is the director / cinematographer commentary, which notes upon the technical aspects, and finally the director / cast commentary, which is very chatty and sort of "lets say something".

On disc 2 we first have 48-minutes of production of production featurettes. In general can be said, that the more specific the topic is, the better they are.

Next comes 12 interviews, where the main interview is a by Tartan for this DVD made 22 minute interview with Park, and 10 deleted scenes with optional audio commentary by Park.

 - Henrik Sylow