The Wes Anderson Archive: Ten Films, Twenty-Five Years

[Zot!]

I'm sure you all know this, but the additional advantage of a 4K disc is that you get the 4K image pixel-for-pixel, done on pro-equipment, presumably as approved by the director/DP, as opposed to letting your TV or disc player do the up-rezzing on the fly, which can vary in quality. Personally, I don't know if this is a good enough reason to upgrade. It is not for me.

The directors who used the 2k DIs in that era, were presumably happy viewing the results on a cinema screen. It's not inconceivable that they believe they are still happy and consider it to be job done.

[ChunkyLover]

With DI-based films, at least from the 00s, it's rare that a conformed cut-negative was ever produced (one notable exception I can think of is Snyder's "Dawn of the Dead"). Besides having to redo post-production work, there's the cost of having to go through boxes of film canisters (if they weren't trashed or misplaced) trying to find the final takes.

[nicolas]

With DI-based films, at least from the 00s, it's rare that a conformed cut-negative was ever produced (one notable exception I can think of is Snyder's "Dawn of the Dead"). Besides having to redo post-production work, there's the cost of having to go through boxes of film canisters (if they weren't trashed or misplaced) trying to find the final takes.

Universal and Sony / Columbia actually had the negatives and VFX filmouts conformed up until the mid-00s for most films, such as Cinderella Man to name a very recent example. It’s a huge blessing for all the reasons you mentioned.

[tenia]

For Mission Cléopatre, they had to go through 300 cannisters of unedited O-neg. They also had to find how to retrieve some 1K VFX stored on DTF tapes that had specifically to be rescued (though I don't remember if it was because they couldn't be read anymore, or nobody had anything to read them anymore), just to be able to digitize these at 2k.

[domino harvey]

It’s got to be hard to spend that on the Chabat film knowing that they prob won’t be able to recoup part of it by licensing it in the US/UK due to indifference to the film and the IP. Having seen it, the kind of audiences who would most enjoy it here would never watch a foreign film in the first place, and it obv doesn’t have the nostalgia that would presumably drive a lot of the French sales

[tenia]

It sold quite a lot in France, drove new TV sales, and did quite a succesful (for rereleases) rerelease theatrical run. It's a huge movie in France, as in the 4th most successful French movie in France, and the ninth biggest movie here (all nationalities included).
It definitely isn't watched as much as it used to during TV reruns, but it still gets a 25% Market share pretty much every time.

[mfunk9786]

Thought it might be useful to provide the restoration notes for some of these titles (will add more as they pop up elsewhere). Should also point out that all of the discs in this set appear to be BD-100 discs (except Fantastic Mr Fox) that have bitrates up in the 80+ Mbps neck of the woods:

Rushmore

RUSHMORE is presented in the aspect ratio of 2.40:1 on the 4K Ultra HD disc. Supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson, the new 4K restoration presented on the 4K UHD disc was created from the 35 mm original camera negative. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the 35 mm magnetic track. The feature is presented in Dolby Vision HDR (high dynamic range) on the 4K UHD disc.

• Mastering supervisors: Lee Kline, Giles Sherwood • Remastering color supervision: Gareth Spensley/Company 3, London • Colorist: Mishel Hassidim/Resillion, New York • Image restoration: Prasad Corporation, Burbank, CA • Disc mastering: NexSpec

The Royal Tenenbaums

THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS is presented in the aspect ratio of 2.40:1. Supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson, the new 4K restoration presented on the 4K Ultra HD disc was created from the 35 mm original camera negative. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the 35 mm magnetic track. The feature is presented in Dolby Vision HDR (high dynamic range) on the 4K UHD disc.

• Mastering supervisors: Lee Kline, Giles Sherwood • Remastering color supervision: Gareth Spensley/Company 3, London • Colorist: Mishel Hassidim/Resillion, New York • Image restoration: Resillion • Disc mastering: NexSpec

The Life Aquatic

THE LIFE AQUATIC WITH STEVE ZISSOU is presented in the aspect ratio of 2.40:1 on the 4K Ultra HD disc. Supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson, the new 4K restoration presented on the 4K UHD disc was created from the 35 mm original camera negative and the 35 mm digital negative. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the 35 mm magnetic track. The feature is presented in Dolby Vision HDR (high dynamic range) on the 4K UHD disc.

• Mastering supervisors: Lee Kline, Giles Sherwood • Colorists: Mishel Hassidim/Resillion, New York; Gareth Spensley/Company 3, London • Image restoration: Prasad Corporation, Burbank, CA • Disc mastering: NexSpec

The Darjeeling Limited / Hotel Chevalier

THE DARJEELING LIMITED is presented in the aspect ratio of 2.40:1. Supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson, this new 4K digital master was upscaled from the 2K digital intermediate, which was created from scans of the 35 mm original camera negative. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the original digital audio files.

HOTEL CHEVALIER is presented in the aspect ratio of 2.40:1. Supervised and approved by Anderson, this new 4K digital master was upscaled from the 2K digital intermediate, which was created from scans of the 35 mm original camera negative. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the original digital audio files.

Both films are presented in Dolby Vision HDR (high dynamic range) on the 4K UHD disc, to preserve the wide-color gamut of the theatrical presentation.

• Mastering supervisors: Lee Kline, Giles Sherwood • Colorists: Joe Gawler/Technicolor, New York; Mishel Hassidim/Resillion, New York • Disc mastering: NexSpec

Fantastic Mr Fox

FANTASTIC MR. FOX is presented in the aspect ratio of 1.85:1. Supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson, the new 4K digital master presented on the 4K Ultra HD disc was upscaled from the 2K digital intermediate, which was created from the original digital camera media. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the original digital audio files. The feature is presented in Dolby Vision HDR (high dynamic range) on the 4K UHD disc, to preserve the wide-color gamut of the theatrical presentation

• Mastering supervisors: Lee Kline, Giles Sherwood • Remastering color supervision: Gareth Spensley/Company 3, London • Colorists: Max Horton/Technicolor, London; Mishel Hassidim/Resillion, New York • Disc mastering: NexSpec

The Grand Budapest Hotel

THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL is presented in the aspect ratios of 1.37:1, 1.85:1, and 2.40:1. Supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson, the new 4K digital master presented on the 4K Ultra HD disc was upscaled from the 2K digital source master, which was created from scans of the 35 mm original camera negative. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the original digital audio files. The feature is presented in Dolby Vision HDR (high dynamic range) on the 4K UHD disc, to preserve the wide-color gamut of the theatrical presentation.

• Mastering supervisors: Lee Kline, Giles Sherwood • Remastering color supervision: Gareth Spensley/Company 3, London • Colorist: Jill Bogdanowicz/Modern VideoFilm, Burbank, CA • Disc mastering: NexSpec

Isle of Dogs

ISLE OF DOGS is presented in the aspect ratio of 2.40:1. Supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson, the new 4K digital master presented on the 4K Ultra HD disc was upscaled from the 2K digital source master, which was created from the original digital camera media. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the digital audio files. The feature is presented in Dolby Vision HDR (high dynamic range) on the 4K UHD disc, to preserve the wide-color gamut of the theatrical presentation.

• Mastering supervisors: Lee Kline, Giles Sherwood • Remastering color supervision: Gareth Spensley/Company 3, London • Colorist: Asa Shoul/Molinare, London • Disc mastering: NexSpec

The French Dispatch

THE FRENCH DISPATCH OF THE LIBERTY, KANSAS EVENING SUN is presented in the aspect ratios of 1.37:1, 1.85:1, and 2.40:1. For the new 4K digital master presented on the 4K Ultra HD disc, colorist Gareth Spensley returned to his original color project and scans of the 35 mm camera negative to create a new Dolby Vision HDR (high dynamic range) presentation that was supervised and approved by director Wes Anderson. The original 5.1 surround soundtrack was remastered from the digital audio files. The feature is presented in Dolby Vision HDR on the 4K UHD disc.

• Mastering supervisors: Lee Kline, Giles Sherwood • Colorist: Gareth Spensley/Company 3, London • Disc mastering: NexSpec

[nicolas]

The pixel peepers at the other forum also analyzed the HDR plots and the films are essentially SDR in a HDR container. Caps for Grand Budapest Hotel were already posted and the upgrade is really minimal. In motion, compression will likely benefit the most but the films wouldn’t have needed BD-100s to showcase the full range. This set would’ve been a disappointment had it not been for the restorations of his pre-DI films.

[tenia]

I see Grand Budapest didn't get his AR handling modified as to avoid bottom and upper black bars for 1.33 and 1.66. Oh well.

[nicolas]

I see Grand Budapest didn't get his AR handling modified as to avoid bottom and upper black bars for 1.33 and 1.66. Oh well.

Same for French Dispatch. BD caps were just posted.

[cdnchris]

I thought The French Dispatch looked really good. Isle of Dogs is... fine. Can't complain, but then I can also say the same for the Fox Blu-ray.

[mfunk9786]

This set would’ve been a disappointment had it not been for the restorations of his pre-DI films.

Not sure if "working with what is available" = a disappointment, and those pre-DI films are the best ones, imo, so I can't complain too much. Maybe I wish he'd gone back to brass tacks for some of them (The Darjeeling Limited could be something really special if restored from the 35mm source) but it is what it is.

[Zot!]

I see Grand Budapest didn't get his AR handling modified as to avoid bottom and upper black bars for 1.33 and 1.66. Oh well.

Same for French Dispatch. BD caps were just posted.

Sorry, what does that mean? They are windowboxed?

[omegadirective]

Yes

[Zot!]

Yes

I looked at the other site to find the screenshots of the old disc. The uprezzing I understand, but honestly I am shocked that this passed muster for a bougie objet d'art, be-all-all-end-all, bookshelf flex package of this sort. Looks like they were just lazy to fix this, otherwise what possible reason are we protecting for CRT overscan in 2025?

[mfunk9786]

Yes

I looked at the other site to find the screenshots of the old disc. The uprezzing I understand, but honestly I am shocked that this passed muster for a bougie objet d'art, be-all-all-end-all, bookshelf flex package of this sort. Looks like they were just lazy to fix this, otherwise what possible reason are we protecting for CRT overscan in 2025?

Seems silly to think Anderson hasn't deliberately chosen every aspect of his images.

[tenia]

Well, actually, I still think this isn't a conscious decision but an artefact of AR standards being different for theater and video.

[cdnchris]

It's essentially framed at 1.85:1, with black sections on the right and left for 1.37:1 scenes, and thicker bars top and bottom for 2.40:1.

[andyli]

Yes that's what I figured. The thin black bars are the give-away. Nothing to blame them for as the 1.85:1 container must be a universal choice for both DCP and home media deliverables.

[tenia]

It's nothing exotic indeed, we know where it stems from. But it's something that can be handled differently in video, allowing 1.66 and 1.33/1.37 to be full screen instead of being within the 1.85 container. It can be done, and my view is that it should be done.

[andyli]

Just for the sake of discussing the methodology, I think going the extra mile might not be that straightforward an approach, and could incur unwanted side effects. This involves solely enlarging the 1.37:1 segment to get rid of the bars while keeping the 1.85:1 and 2.39:1 segments unchanged. This subtly alters the relatively proportion of the object size within those different aspect ratios. This may not sound like much but with a film this carefully designed as to employ different ARs for different parts, one can assume the filmmakers have reasons beyond technicality to maintain a specific size consistency across different segments. And to change this would affect the presentation‘s aesthetic accuracy. After all, in some films with different ARs, the filmmakers have intentionally made the 1.37:1 (or some other AR’s) image much smaller than necessary (i.e. thicker bars than usual), obviously just to achieve certain proportions that satisfy the aesthetics. I can’t remember if this film does this but I’ve definitely seen it done in other movies. In that case one can be forgiven to remain on the prudent side unless the filmmakers do want further experiment and tinkering.

[tenia]

I think this is going one step too far.

The issue is that this is simple windowboxing, something that I don’t recall happened to the movie in theaters, where Academy would haved had black bars bottom and top. To me, this happened on video solely because of the authoring/encoding facility, not because of aesthetic reasons. It's easier to "force" the encode at 1.85 and handle everything within it, than using the whole screen and selecting scene by scene the lines of pixels the software need to ignore because they're all black. This happens because TV screens currently are 1.78, while theatrical screens nowadays often are scope (2.35 ? 2.40 ?). Going from scope to 1.37 in theaters crop the screen left and right. Doing the same on TV opens the screen up and down. They’re not the same shifts and thus require different technical handling.

In the case of Grand Budapest, this is done with a format per period, and I doubt it goes beyond this and that we’re thinking in terms of optical field, so it stumbles back to how to encode it : either kind of lazily, or more carefully.

In any case, it's a very minor inconvenience because it's only 1.85, but I do believe it's something that could have been fixed here (fixed as in I believe it's a technical video issue, not a feature).

[nicolas]

Fantastic Mr. Fox caps by NLScavenger @BR: https://slow.pics/c/6Ncsfqek

The French Dispatch (anonymous): https://slow.pics/c/TccAznrw

[mfunk9786]

Just so all are aware, I'm keeping this post upthread updated as transfer info comes in on each title.

[andyli]

This happens because TV screens currently are 1.78, while theatrical screens nowadays often are scope (2.35 ? 2.40 ?). Going from scope to 1.37 in theaters crop the screen left and right. Doing the same on TV opens the screen up and down. They’re not the same shifts and thus require different technical handling.

I doubt that’s the case for theaters. In my experience theater screens are mostly 1.85:1 and ‘Scope screen are rarer. And even when they are using ‘Scope screens to project a 1.85:1 film they’d just use the curtains to block the far sides. So for a film like TGBH, the 2.39:1 segment would’ve still been shown in a letterbox format because the DCP is 1.85:1. Hence my earlier suggestion of a universal 1.85:1 container for all purposes. This would also allow the filmmakers to prepare one final product in terms of the relative size proportion from one AR to another. Maybe people can chime in with their recollections of the theatrical viewing experience. I really doubt they prepared a DCP that would utilize the full ‘Scope screen (and then bookend the 1.37:1 image with ugly, fat pillars).

Then again this is purely discussion for discussion’s sake. I don’t mind they did it one way or the other.