1014 Roma (2018)

[FlickeringWindow]

Once more, in the great tradition of Criterion being dragged by the heels screaming into any new direction (anamorphic widescreem, Blu Ray) we now have a Roma which has been quarantined to DVD and Blu Ray hard media. No word of 4K UHD. which locks up this title for the idnefinite future. Yet they followed the lead of a few other labels and included the Dolby Atmos track.

WHat the fuck is it with Criterion and their aversion to top level outcomes? Thanks to them I won't buy this disc nor will I recommend anyone else should. At least Netflix maintains 4K streaming (which was one of is best masters so far in that medium, including basic but carefully managed HDR.) I really am sick to death of this fucking label to say nothing for the last fewmonths of unbelievably uninspired "new" titles. I wish any other label got and and could have negotiatred physical media rights for this, and I wish Cuaron could have exercised some authority in at least pushing them in the UHD direction.

Fuck Criterion.

Given that Warner Bros. released Pan's Labyrinth on their own and Universal wouldn't even let Arrow do the UHD for Waterworld, it's unlikely Criterion is able to do the UHD for Roma. It doesn't help that there's only three US boutique UHD releases (barring Shout! Factory's IMAX discs) as of the end of 2019. Also, Criterion was releasing Blu-rays ahead of most other boutique labels. I think only BFI had a few months head start. It's also not like Criterion was the only studio releasing non-16x9 discs. They offered a 16x9 upgrade of Charade a year before Universal had 16x9 versions of Psycho and Vertigo, which were box set exclusives.

It honestly wouldn't surprise me if a UHD edition ended up being added in a month or two, much like what happened with Bottle Rocket and Chunking Express (the DVDs came out a full month ahead of the Blu-rays).

[tenia]

It doesn't help that there's only three US boutique UHD releases (barring Shout! Factory's IMAX discs) as of the end of 2019.

Surprisingly, there are more French indie labels having done UHDs than US ones.

Also, Criterion was releasing Blu-rays ahead of most other boutique labels. I think only BFI had a few months head start.

I was surprised by this claim but it seems actually true. The BFI and Carlotta had their first BD release in Oct 08, Eureka in Nov 08, Arrow in Jan 09 (but the next one was in March 2010), etc, while Criterion released their first BDs in Dec 08.

[MichaelB]

In all cases, I suspect they were waiting for the HD format war to be definitively over.

[tenia]

The war already had a clear winner mid-2007 and basically ended in early 2008 with the first studios dropping HD DVDs and Toshiba annoucing the death of the format in Feb 2008. I guess part of the delay is inertia, but it still left for some more than 2 years of "waiting". Which I guess was rather looking at whether BD sales rather than the format war.

[MichaelB]

I suspect any delays had less to do with inertia and rather more to do with working out whether this expensive new format would be commercially viable given the far greater costs of production and per-unit manufacture. Precisely the same calculations are being made right now with regard to UHD BDs, of course.

[eerik]

Also what other Netflix films have received Blu-ray releases? It seems a bit unusual to me.

The Cloverfield Paradox was released on blu-ray.

Cloverfield Paradox (and many others) was a production by a major studio (Paramount) that was dumped on Netflix instead of a theatrical release. Roma, The Irishman, Buster Scruggs, etc. were funded and produced by Netflix from the start.

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

Roma was fully funded by Participant Media; Netflix only picked up the distribution rights after completion. This is the big reason why I'm not taking this Criterion release to mean that the floodgates are now open for Netflix titles.

[eerik]

Oh, I was not aware of that. I remember seeing Cuaron praise Netflix a lot, so I just assumed they had a bigger role in this. I guess it was just a formality. Naive me.

[domino harvey]

Netflix picked it up solely to cement their Oscar bonafides. They poured more money into the marketing than it cost to make and acquire. So from Cuaron’s perspective, they absolutely did everything they could for the movie. And it worked

[colinr0380]

I'm all for Netflix doing this if other companies can pick up the slack with physical media releases down the line. Okja next, please!

[yoloswegmaster]

Runtimes for the extras:

[tenia]

The French Amazon product page was talking about 3hrs of extras, which surprised me, but here they are.

[domino harvey]

The French Amazon product page was talking about 3hrs of extras, which surprised me, but here they are.

Extras score from Blu-Ray.com: 3/5

[yoloswegmaster]

Seems like the video essay from :: kogonada has beenremoved.

[Never Cursed]

Extras score from criterionforum.org: 5/5

[domino harvey]

Extras score from criterionforum.org: 5/5

I'm picturing Cuaron watching the essay, having a good laugh, and then telling Criterion to take it the fuck off his movie

[tenia]

The French Amazon product page was talking about 3hrs of extras, which surprised me, but here they are.

Extras score from Blu-Ray.com: 3/5

It's Criterion. If Svet reviews it, an hour of extras would yield a 5/5.
I'd love to read his take on the movie, though.

[nitin]

1 disc with that length of movie, an atmos track and 3 hrs of video extras?

[tenia]

It wouldn't be a worry if this wasn't encoded by their usual authoring houses... Note also that the Atmos track isn't an issue per se, since it will be the only soundtrack and it doesn't take that much extra space : DTS HD MA is the most used audio codec and has a slightly lower compression factor than Dolby TrueHD. DTS HD MA 5.1 48/24 are usually 4 Mbps, and DTHD 7.1 Atmo 48/24 tracks 4-5 Mbps. Not much of a difference.

All calculations done, you can keep the movie at 30 Mbps with a 5 Mbps Atmos track on the same disc than the 3hrs extras by encoding the extras down to 7 Mbps AND managing their sound encodes (I'd go for DD 2.0 192kbps for anything not requiring more, and keep the Sound featurette with DTS HD MA 5.1 48/16 with a 768kbps core). Anything more than this for the extras will impact the movie's AVB, because this calculated configuration uses 99% of a BD-50.

[nitin]

Digital capture (so no grain), lots of static non mobile shots, and black and white scope all help but yeah hopefully they still give the main feature ample room to breathe.

[tenia]

I thought so too, but I haven't seen the movie, so I don't know how heavy it is on very fine elements.

[tenia]

French release cover :

The German one is similar too.

I guess nobody cares about selling to French and German customers the release #1014 from a collection they've never heard of.

[Nasir007]

Promising review from dvdbeaver.

I am most interested in the extra features which seem extensive. I am iffy on the film itself having reservations about how it is conceived but the direction is dazzling and I remain a huge fan of Cuaron. I am most curious to see behind the scenes for the corpus cristi sequence. I know people love the beach shot but the corpus cristi shot is one of the most remarkable shots I have seen in some time and I am looking to see how they pulled it off.

[cdnchris]

I don't see if it was mentioned here but the disc is region free (A/B/C).

It also comes with the descriptive audio track that's on Netflix. They pretty much took whatever Netflix is using and slapped it on a disc.

The picture looks great and is better than streaming (4K would be better, but that's a whole other thing) but what blew me away was the Atmos track. I updated my system last summer, though it's only a 5.1.2 configuration. I haven't figured out how to set up for 7.1 yet in my living room, but once I do I'll be getting the other two Atmos speakers for the rears so I can run wires at the same time. At first I was mostly underwhelmed with some of the tracks I've listened to and I did blame it on the fact I only had the two Atmos fronts. Some stood out but my expectations were probably too high. But do I feel better after watching Roma: the track on here sounds fucking amazing, just blew me away, and once I get the other speakers set up I'll be revisiting it. It's not the film I thought I'd be using as a demo disc to show to others what Atmos can do.

[DarkImbecile]

Since I know domino was worried it would be lost to future generations of scholars: ::kogonada’s video essay on Roma