UHD Titles Worth/Not Worth Upgrading [Archive]

[Blutarsky]

My old blu ray player broke in 2019 and rather then spending money on a regular blu ray player, I upgraded to a 4K player. One of the first titles I got when I upgraded was Goodfellas as it was only $10 and when I bought my 4K player, and I wanted a movie to test out. Over time I have gotten other titles that have shown that the jump to 4K is worth it, such as Space Odyssey. However, Goodfellas looks almost the exact same as the old blu ray release, and in some places the color is just a real travesty. Casino, on the other hand, looks wonderful in 4K.

[swo17]

I'd heard that about Goodfellas and it being dark, but is it possible that it plays better if your setup is properly calibrated and your room sufficiently dark?

[tenia]

Terminator 2 is the abysmal 4k restoration. It technically is better than the older BD but still. What I read is that the UHD also has a bonkers HDR grade on top of that.

I seem to recall the Goodfellas UHD has a very peculiar HDR grade but is overall good, though the SDR downconverted BD is a mess (as are many Warner remastered BDs sadly).

Peter Jackson's King Kong has a earth scorching HDR grade that is overall accepted as possibly being a technical mistake on Universal's side since it's just so bad.

Also from Universal : the 1st 2 Jason Bourne (and possibly the 3rd one) are older masters with a peculiar HDR grade slapped on them.

Finally, some of Turbine's UHDs in Germany seem strange, such as Crying Freeman and An American Werewolf in London, both being contenders for that claim it's "AI regrained and fake HDR graded" from James Flower.

These are what I'd deem not just "UHD not worthy of upgrading" because too close to their BD counterparts but UHDs to be avoided altogether. I'm not sure that, past that, cutting off at UHDs possibly being too close to BD counterparts is a good idea as it might, in some ways, either eliminate many UHDs or actually remind that since the bump might be more subtle and less linear than in the past, most UHDs are offering something worth the upgrade anyway thanks to HDR.

[cdnchris]

The Bourne movies are a bit questionable. The last two might be legitimately 4K (and from what I could find online Jason Bourne is from a 4K intermediate) but I suspect 2 and 3 are 2K upscales. They don't look bad but not worth it if you already have them on BD. I had the first three on HDDVD so it was worth picking up the set on sale.

Except the first film legitimately looks like a DVD upscale. It looks fucking ridiculous.

The Disney discs are hit and miss. The colours on stuff like Coco and even the Guardians of the Galaxy films look great, but if you already bought them on BD it's probably not worth it.

Edit: and Tenia beat me on the Bourne movies. As he said, the first three are most certainly upscales. And again, if someone told me the 1st was a 480p upscale I wouldn't be surprised.

Another Edit: Based on more online research it appears The Bourne Legacy was completed in 2K, so that one is also an upscale, but it's a newer one (at least) and looks pretty good.

[dwk]

I believe the German Texas Chain Saw Massacre UHD is one to avoid, as the encode is so bad that it looks worse than the Second Sight Blu-ray.

[EddieLarkin]

Goodfellas is a fantastic UHD, which got a very bad rep from those who did not understand what they were looking at or how HDR works in comparison to SDR (the Blu-ray.com review is still up with a 1/5 for video quality).

The UHD is no darker than the BD, and in fact it has far more shadow detail visible in direct comparison. What it does have is a very low nit grade. IIRC, a max average frame level of 60 nits (so parked presumably in the exact same range the BD is), and max highlights of around 250 nits (so just barely entering HDR territory), almost certainly reserved for a few streetlamps and car headlights etc.

But, HDR is an absolute luminance system. You don't have a choice at what nit level you watch something in HDR, these levels are fixed. SDR on the otherhand is relative, if a title averages 60 nits you can if you want play it back on your TV with luminance maxed out, meaning it'll be outputting at something more like 300-400 nits. So someone who is doing this, and comparing the two, it's going to seem like the BD is much brighter than the UHD. And it is, but only because they are making it so. Combine this with a bright room and you're probably not going to be able to make out the UHD at all.

Another issue is how older TV sets tonemapped HDR10 content. Whilst Goodfellas was graded to this very low nit level, it was graded ON a 4000 nit monitor (being a WB title). The way TVs often used to interpret HDR10 metadata was to look at the maximum brightness of the grading monitor, rather than the brightness of the actual content (these two bits of information is essentially what the metadata is). So a TV that could hit say 500 nits of brightness, that should in theory be able to playback a title like Goodfellas on UHD 1:1, instead acts like it's receiving a 4000 nit light cannon, and maps it down accordingly, crushing the already low brightness grade into imperceptibility. To put it midly, HDR has never been well implemented from Day 1.

But, if you're using a more current and advanced TV (especially something from Panasonic or Sony, rather than LG), and you're watching in a relatively controlled light environment, and you don't watch your SDR content pumped up to false levels of brightness, Goodfellas is a stellar disc and a very nice upgrade over the BD. Not only for the aforementioned superior shadow detail, but the 4K resolution and grain give it a lovely velvety authentic 35mm feel.

As for Terminator 2, avoid that piece of shit like the plague.

[EddieLarkin]

I've also read that Disney generally uses 4K as a sales gimmick, and that their releases usually aren't that distinguishable from the Blu-ray editions.

I'm willing to bet this is solely the result of the vast bulk of Disney's UHD releases being either the Marvel movies, or their animated titles. Which means 2K upscales in every single case. Which sadly means idiotic vitriol from certain quarters. But their application of HDR in nearly all of these cases is just as good as the other studios and I wouldn't hesitate to pick them up, if they're you're bag.

And the very few film based live action titles they've released show plenty of promise; Hocus Pocus is an absolutely fantastic disc.

[cdnchris]

The reactions to Goodfellas are so unbelievably mixed it's bizarre, so I suspected there had to be something with the equipment being used to watch it; I was not seeing what most of the negative comments were referring to. I've owned the film on just about every format so I upgraded to 4K without a second thought. I don't know if it's one most will see the value in upgrading to from BD, but I thought it was worth it.

[denti alligator]

A good thread to have, though with so few titles it would also be great to make this a place to recommend upgrades, as it appears is already happening with Goodfellas. I got 2001 and The Big Lebowski. They both look fantastic.

[EddieLarkin]

Obvious big upgrades are 2001, Apocalypse Now, Midsommar, The Revenant, My Fair Lady, Spartacus, Dawn of the Dead etc, but most people already know these.

Some lesser appreciated titles released by the studios (and thus can be found pretty cheap at times) that really show off how brilliantly UHD can present film, with lovely grain and respectful but impressive HDR include, Beetlejuice, Animal House, Gremlins, Shutter Island and the already mentioned Casino.

[swo17]

That's all very interesting, Eddie, thanks!

[denti alligator]

Obvious big upgrades are 2001, Apocalypse Now, Midsommar, The Revenant, My Fair Lady, Spartacus, Dawn of the Dead etc, but most people already know these.

Some lesser appreciated titles released by the studios (and thus can be found pretty cheap at times) that really show off how brilliantly UHD can present film, with lovely grain and respectful but impressive HDR include, Beetlejuice, Animal House, Gremlins, Shutter Island and the already mentioned Casino.

I wouldn’t mind you filling in that “etc.” …

[EddieLarkin]

Obvious big upgrades are 2001, Apocalypse Now, Midsommar, The Revenant, My Fair Lady, Spartacus, Dawn of the Dead etc, but most people already know these.

Some lesser appreciated titles released by the studios (and thus can be found pretty cheap at times) that really show off how brilliantly UHD can present film, with lovely grain and respectful but impressive HDR include, Beetlejuice, Animal House, Gremlins, Shutter Island and the already mentioned Casino.

I wouldn’t mind you filling in that “etc.” …

Of those I've seen:

The Hitchcocks
The 90s Batmans
Black Hawk Down
Blade Runner
Close Encounters and E.T.
Flash Gordon
First Man
The Matrix Trilogy
The Mummy
Superman The Movie
plus basically everything from the indies has been incredible (Arrow, Blue Underground, Vinegar Syndrome and Suspiria in Synapse's sole case).

I've left Sony titles out mostly but that isn't to say they aren't great too (their restorations/remasters are probably the best around), but sometimes their HDR applications can be a bit wild, especially the further back into the format's history you go. But titles like Boyz n the Hood, Stand By Me, Bram Stoker's Dracula, and from what I hear, those from the 6 film Classics box set are all brilliant.

[denti alligator]

Anyone seen Die Hard, Parasite, or The Arrival?

[Finch]

Can we also list films that have been botched on Blu-Ray but fixed on UHD? Big Lebowski and Predator come to mind. Anything else?

[RitrovataBlue]

Die Hard and Predator both look excellent. Arrival is a surprisingly substantial upgrade, with much better contrast than the standard Blu. I own the Parasite 4K but haven't watched it yet.

I own a few Turbine 4Ks: Crash, The Princess Bride, and An American Werewolf in London. The first two look superb and are strong upgrades from Blu. An American Werewolf does not look like an artificially regrained film to me. It is, however, a relatively dark film with a very muted HDR grade. I thought it offered a modest improvement in the Arrow Blu. A number of commenters on the other forum accuse anything without extreme contrast of being "fake HDR," so I suspect this one is being unfairly accused. But I don't have the tools to closely inspect the transfer, so it's possible that I'm wrong. your mileage may vary.

As for other controversial releases, I own all the Studiocanal 4Ks reputed to have terrible encodes(the John Carpenters, Total Recall, Le cercle rouge, etc). My setup has Dolby Vision, and I have not noticed any of the compression artifacts/black crush these discs are reputed to be infested with. However, I have read that the DV metalayer somehow corrects these issues, whereas they are plainly visible when viewed without DV. So again, your mileage may vary here.

The biggest upgrades I've seen include Suspiria, all the Warner Kubricks (especially 2001), The Big Lebowski, Beetlejuice, Dune, The Thing, Dawn of the Dead, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Rear Window, Predator, Alien, Mad Max, The Princess Bride, Evil Dead, Blade Runner, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Don't Look Now, Gremlins, King of New York, The Birds, Mission: Impossible, and Santa Sangre. But some of these are major upgrades less because they're visually stunning than because the previous Blu was mediocre or terrible.

[soundchaser]

Can we also list films that have been botched on Blu-Ray but fixed on UHD? Big Lebowski and Predator come to mind. Anything else?

The Back to the Future trilogy. Even discounting the beautiful use of HDR (especially on Part III), the UHD discs are far less egregious in terms of noise reduction and edge enhancement.

[swo17]

I'm getting the sense that, while some titles will be bigger upgrades than others, literally every UHD title provides some kind of an improvement with the exception of Terminator 2

[andyli]

Five UHD titles that have impressed me the most so far.

1. Apocalypse Now

By any standard this should be my go-to disc for showcasing what a good 4K HDR remaster could do to a classic film. Beautiful grain, contrast, color and sound. I especially love how the relatively dark scenes are handled. It's like a whole new experience. The disc carries a feature that talks about how they use Dolby tools to perfect the look of the film. I also appreciate Coppola's dedication for his films and efforts to make all versions available.

2. Gemini Man

The movie is shit but this disc showcases 4K 60fps on the home video front. My jaw dropped when the scene of two assassins' first encounter came up and this instantly made me consider my system upgrade worthwhile. It's a different kind of cinema for sure and I wish some day actually good films shot in this format will start to appear.

3. Almost Famous

This easily blows the age-old transfer on the original blu-ray out of water. And it sets a good example how smaller titles should be treated by the studios. If all the nonblockbuster titles I want to own can come out like this in 4K I'm definitely on board.

4. The Revenant

The magnificent cinematography calls for the upgrade and I've got zero regret. Probably one of the best looking UHDs of newer films out there...

5. A Perfect Planet

This to UHD is the counterpart of Planet Earth to blu-ray. Buy it, throw it in your 4K player and let your TV blow you mind all day long. You can also go for other recent nature documentaries like Seven Worlds, One Planet. I believe the latter's content is a tad better than APP but picture quality a tad lower.

[tenia]

An American Werewolf does not look like an artificially regrained film to me. It is, however, a relatively dark film with a very muted HDR grade. I thought it offered a modest improvement in the Arrow Blu.

Turbine are clearly using the Universal master as a source and its video incarnations are DNRed. It could have been that they managed to get a pre-DNR version of it but I trust Geoff D over blu-ray.com when he says grain looks very artificial in the way it moves but also in the fact its size and aspect is pretty much constant along the movie, while it should vary during opticals and other shots whose grain is usually thicker. Except it doesn't.

Same goes for Crying Freeman which uses the same base as the French BD which IIRC wasn't even a 4k restoration but possibly a simple HD remaster with definitely not the fine grain "4k looking" the Turbine UHD has.

[MichaelB]

The biggest upgrades I've seen include Suspiria

Which version of Suspiria, and an upgrade from what?

I have the Synapse Blu-ray (sourced from the same 4K cinematographer-approved restoration), and was umming and aahing about whether it was really worth upgrading to the UHD, but I'm not under the impression that it's a particularly big upgrade.

Oh, and The Revenant is my HDR demo title - there are some extraordinary shots in that which appear to be lit by nothing but moonlight, and yet shadow detail on the ground is perfectly clear.

[EddieLarkin]

I'm getting the sense that, while some titles will be bigger upgrades than others, literally every UHD title provides some kind of an improvement with the exception of Terminator 2

Pretty much, yes. It's the exact same story with Blu-ray, where going from a botched/poor DVD to a brand new 2K/4K Blu-ray transfer can obviously be a massive uprade, whilst going from an adequate but old transfer on DVD and sticking with that same transfer for Blu-ray would yield a far more minimal upgrade, but an upgrade nonetheless. What you saw at the start of that format was the same umming and aahing about just what to upgrade, but then once we were a decade deep into it pretty much everyone was happy to upgrade to any semi-decent looking Blu-ray disc, regardless of how good the DVD already might have been. I think many adopters will reach the same point with UHD eventually, especially as UHDs become more frequently available at bargain sale prices.

Taking Michael's examples, BOTH Suspiria and The Revenant are sourced from the same excellent transfers in their Blu-ray and UHD editions, so the same upgrade/no upgrade logic can be applied to both if you're just looking at that basis. The real question is how much difference is the HDR aspect making, which varies title to title. In The Revenant's case it evidently makes a big difference, but that may largely be driven by the cinematography rather than solely HDR as a system. Everyone's mileage is going to vary title to title, and it's basically impossible with this format to make a judgement with the screencaps because they specifically cannot demonstrate the gains HDR is going to offer! AND most reviewers don't know what the heck they're talking about, and almost never describe directly comparing UHD HDR to Blu-ray SDR like Geoff D does (which is why so many people like his reviews) so it's difficult to use them as a basis as well. Ultimately the only way you're going to know for sure whether a UHD is worth it over the BD you already own is to watch it.

[jegharfangetmigenmyg]

Great thread! Don't think any of my favorites hasn't been mentioned, but I do agree that StudioCanal's Carpenters are pretty crappy, and oh yes, do avoid Terminator 2! Keep in mind that I'm a projector user, but I must say that I didn't like the look of It's a Wonderful Life at all. It looked very waxy to my. The same goes for Wizard of Oz also felt way to blown out and extreme for my taste. Will have to check out Mr. Smith Goes to Washington if that can be labeled as "older film demo material". I also steered away from Goodfellas, but reading Eddie's post about, I will have to check it out as actually prefer the more dimly mastered UHD's. I'm also much a fan of the natural and very filmic look of The Big Lebowski, and I will second Apocalypse Now which is just a world of a difference compared to earlier the blu-ray.

@EddieLarkin: Being somewhat of an "layman expert" within this field, do you know if Criterion will have any say in the HDR mastering their UHD titles? Or will the just license masters from the studios? If they only license them, then I guess that the quality of their UHD titles will vary just as extremely as everything else on the market. But of course I'm hoping that they will be able to provide reference releases of archival titles just like they have (mostly) been able to up until now.

[EddieLarkin]

I'm sure it will depend on the title. Mulholland Drive and Uncut Gems will certainly be wholly done by StudioCanal and Netflix, and I would guess the same for Citizen Kane/WB. Perhaps Menace II Society could be their own work though.

[bad future]

Can we also list films that have been botched on Blu-Ray but fixed on UHD? Big Lebowski and Predator come to mind. Anything else?

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory had botched framing on the blu-ray which has been corrected on UHD.