The best and worst of Blu-Ray quality

So I finally broke down and got myself a cheap BR player. I haven't started buying discs yet, esp. since not many at the library have BR, so there's lots of good titles on the racks and short wait-lists for those not there.

My first one watched was the new Friday the 13th and I was pretty blown away. Everything was so clear, almost too clear.
Then I watched Predator, Saw 5, 28 Days Later (my lone owned so far) and Resident Evil. They all looked good, but not jaw-dropping.

Last night we watched the first Pirates of the Caribbean flick and holy fucking shit. I recall a buddy telling me how hese looked damn near 3-D, and see what he was saying. Felt like I could at any time walk into my 65" set, grab a sword, and start swashbuckling!
Then we checked out The Prestige, also amazingly clear and sharp.

So what are others opinions and facts of what you've watched?
What are the best, reference-quality discs you've seen?
What is a waste of the format?
Any where a dvd version is actually better (besides for extras or a better cut of the film)?

 

Baraka the best looking Blu Ray ever so far everyone should have it in there collection.

 

Hey Bigdaddy, glad to see you on board.

I agree that Baraka looks amazing.

I'll just mention some of the best
For catalog titles,
Dirty Harry Collection (especially love how the first two films look)
Friday the 13th- 1 to 3
Nightmare on Elm St. (Canadian)

Newer stuff:
No Country For Old Men
Casino Royale
I, Robot
Shoot 'Em Up

 

I think Dr. No looks fan-fucking-tastic. I don't know if I've ever seen a film that old look so good.

 

bigdaddyhorse, you can't expect a film like 28 Days Later, filmed on poor resolution video, to look good on BR. Add to that that most horror movies today tend to have this "gritty / dark / docu-feel" look because, well, I am not really sure. Maybe because it adds to the atmosphere? There are the notable excpetions of course (The Descent being the most jarring one - you gotta see this on BR). So keep in mind that everything you see, most times is in accordance to the original material.

My favorites:
Baraka
Dirty Harry
Salo (BFI) - it looks just great - made the shit scene all the more disturbing
Sweeny Todd

 

Dark Knight. The Imax scenes are breath-taking.

 

I thought about this after buying it, but it was cheap, I had a $5 rewardzone cert. and only a dub of the real dvd, so I got it. Trying not to re-buy everything, just the important ones, starting with ones I don't have and massive upgrades (gotta find The Thing since I only have old dvd) first.
Descent will be in my collection soon, just gotta find a nice price on it.

Got Dirty Harry from library yesterday. I haven't seen this film in about 15 years and never WS so I'm looking forward to it, esp. after seeing the BR trailer on another disc.

 

Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter on Blu looks phenomenal for being shot on regular 16mm on a Bolex. I find it hilarious how every review I've read for it has given it 1 or 1.5 stars out of 5 on video quality, when it can't look any better except if you projected the film print itself. How can you rate something so low when it's the best it'll look for the source format? Honestly, for a 16mm film, it looks exactly how it should look and that deserves a 5 out of 5 for video quality from me. If any of you have the DVD version, you know the quality is shit and compressed a ton (Lee Demarbre even said the DVD transfer only cost $300 because that's all the money they had left after completing the film). They were actually offered and did a hi-def remaster for the Blu, and it's well worth the upgrade if you have not picked it up!

 

The Shining is probably the most incredible looking BD I've watched so far! I can't even count the number of times I thought to myself something along the lines of "Wow, this really looks great!" while watching it and it's not like I was watching it to rate the quality or anything. The same day I watched Terminator III and I found myself questioning how much better most of it looked than the upconverted DVD I watched a while ago but it really didn't look bad or anything. I think I said this somewhere else but I also agree about Salo, especially considering the fact that the last time I watched it I was watching a grainy VHS dub! Watching older movies on BD seems more satisfying than watching newer ones so far but I don't have any real complaints with anything I've seen so far.

 

Ones to stay away from are
Evil Dead 2 (Heavy DNR) The DVD looks better in many places
Escape from NY (HD Broadcast version looks better)
The Fog (HD Broadcast version looks better)
The Terminator (Not much better than the DVD)

Ones to enjoy are
Halloween (Even with the "incorrect" color timing)
Friday the 13th part 2 (Best looking of the 3 so far)
Jason vs Freddy (Looks amazing, ultra clear)
Hot Fuzz (One of the best looking discs ever)
Shawn of the Dead
Dawn of the Dead (Both versions)

 

Big Trouble In Little China is a must, As are,

Dawn Of The Dead
Day Of The Dead
Land Of The Dead
The Thing
Carrie
The Amityville Horror
Lost Boys
The Omega Man
Planet Of The Apes Collection

Just a few of the top of my head, So many out there that look amazing

 

One disc that kind of annoyed me was the Swedish release of Inside, the only BD release of this movie that I know of. I have my player set to HDMI Auto-Select for resolution however if you put this disc in to play it then you have to manually set it to 1080i in order for it to play back properly (disc is actually 1080i, or so I've read) because on HDMI Auto-Select when you play it you get tearing and stuttering! :/ I haven't actually watched this one, just sampled it, because since finding out how to play it I haven't had the desire to see this movie again. I was really looking forward to seeing this one in HD too but at least I have it for when I do get the urge to watch it again...

 

The most amazing disc I've seen is the Blade Runner 5-Disc Collector's Edition. Blade Runner is now one the most stunning visual materpeices of all-time.

Other great discs are:
Crank (Extremely Crisp)
Dr. No
Casino Royale
Live Free Die Hard

 

28 Days Later looks like shit, but it has always looked like shit from day one. I figure the blu-ray is probably about as nice as it'll get. The last ten minutes looks really good, though, since that was done with film and not cruddy DV. The Road Warrior, Blade Runner, 2001, and The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly are absolutely stunning to look at considering their age. If you are fans of those films, I highly recommend getting them. The Fifth Element and the Kill Bill movies (especially Vol. 1) are just a joy to look at, but that's basically a given.

 

Some of the best Blu-ray transfers I've seen are these, or at least significant upgrades from the DVD versions:

3:10 to Yuma
The 7th Voyage of Sinbad
Apocalypto
Assault on Precinct 13 (1976)
Beowulf
The Boys from Brazil
Bridge to Terabithia
The Descent
Fargo
From Hell
The Legend of Zorro
The Longest Day
Poltergeist
The Road Warrior
The Ruins
Run Lola Run
S. Darko: A Donnie Darko Tale (like it or hate it, it has a crystal transfer)
Sophie Scholl
Sunshine
Trading Places
X-Men Trilogy
Zodiac

As for truly terrible Blu-rays, I'm glad I cancelled this one which I had pre-ordered:
The Beast

 

I really love the Sinbad films and was looking forward to this blu-ray, but it really didn't seem to be that much of an upgrade from the standard DVD. I'm sure it won't get any better, but I was expecting a bit more out of the picture quality.

 

Granted, it's a 50+ year old film. However, the color grading on the old DVD's transfer always made me cringe. The colors on the Blu-ray release (and the newer DVD) looked far more natural to me. There's some comparisons over at DVD Beaver. The 1.66:1 framing is also improved.

 

Sunshine was the film that really got me on the Blu-ray bandwagon. Seeing it in DLP while it was in theaters, I knew I had to own it in best possible quality. Cloverfield also looks stunning. When I watched the DVD (before the film hit Blu-ray), I was distressed by how the awesome visual of the stealth bombing the creature looked way darker than what I'd seen theatrically. Thankfully, the Blu-ray rectified that problem. Doomsday, The Ruins, A Scanner Darkly and Before the Devil Knows You're Dead are a few others that stand out in my mind as being superior examples of BR product.

As far as catalogue titles go, Assault on Precinct 13 is the one that has impressed me the most so far. I was actually quite surprised by how terrific it looks. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre does as well, and they fixed the sound effects from the DVD to boot.

 

Really? I thought Terminator looked great and ED 2, even with DNR, surpassed the DVD.

 

This is the title I would have picked as well. The Shining was the first Blu-Ray I bought and it has never looked so good. It was like watching the film fo the first time. The detail, sound, depth and color is damn near flawless. I also would recommend American Psycho. Looks amazing on Blu-Ray.