Close Encounters of the
Third Kind (Blu-ray
+ DVD-Video Deluxe Edition Sets)
Picture:
A-/B+ Sound: A-/B+ Extras: A- Film: B-
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) represents in my opinion
what would be called or considered Steven Spielberg’s first full throttle
production. What I mean by that is that
this is his film film in which he went all out in just about all aspects:
production, camera, lighting, story, and it really showed the world what a young
filmmaker with a budget could do. Of
course two years prior Spielberg became successful with Jaws, but the scope of this film is far superior and its ambition
shows off. For this film Spielberg would
write and direct the film and in many respects this film serves as his first
film that is uniquely ‘his’. The other
major player involved is getting cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond, who was just
coming off shooting with Brian DePalma on Obsession. Zsigmond would deliver some unforgettable
images here and create a memorable film, plus go on the following year to do
Michael Cimino’s The Deer Hunter. There is no doubt that he is one of the best
in the business and his work here truly demonstrates why.
Other
important factors are enlisting Richard Dreyfuss, who of course worked with
Spielberg on Jaws and this time
around Dreyfuss really gets to demonstrate his acting chops instead of
competing with veteran actor Robert Shaw.
These two would go on to make only one more film together to date and
that came with 1989’s Always. Other talents include Teri Garr, French
director Francois Truffaut, and Lance Henriksen.
Of course
in many respects Close Encounters of the
Third Kind acts as a near-sequel to Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece 2001: A Space Odyssey in that the
“third kind” represents contact. Of
course a few years later MGM/UA did a really dumb thing and made 2010: The Year We Make Contact, which
was a failed attempt to answer the questions posed by 2001. Even director Peter
Hyams could not make that work. I am
certainly not implying that Close
Encounters answers those questions either, but it’s simply engaging its
audience with the possibility of what if we were not alone and more importantly
what if something landed here. Unlike
many of the Science Fiction films before this one, the idea of ‘Martians’ or
extra-terrestrial life coming to Earth was not uncommon, but the treatment of
it here in a very ambiguous and mystery way is what separates it from the films
prior, besides the fact that most space films involved ‘aliens’ coming to do harm.
Spielberg
would visit this idea again in 1981 with E.T.
and would do so through the eyes of a child, but here we are given a very
adult-like view into the situation and that is certainly why this film is taken
more serious than E.T. Although I have to say that the film tends to
wear off it’s effectiveness in the latter portion after it explores the mystery
a bit too far it becomes more clichéd and loses it’s impact, but that doesn’t
stop Close Encounters from being a
classic in many respects, although it is commonly not referred to when people
are discussing important Science Fiction works and this is no doubt due to the
fact that the same year another important film arrived: Star Wars.
So could
this new DVD and Blu-ray set change peoples minds?
Close Encounters arrived a bit late on DVD and was
a highly anticipated release and arrived in the Spring of 2001 in a 2-disc
collectors edition, which would feature the directors cut of the film and would
be available in DTS 5.1 as well, which was a plus. Now the film is re-issued here in a 30th
Anniversary Ultimate Edition DVD set as well as a Blu-ray 2-disc set, both
contain 3 cuts of the film: theatrical, special edition, and directors
cut. More importantly though is the new
transfer of the film and the Blu-ray also contains Dolby TrueHD as well as
DTS-HD Master audio.
The
anamorphically enhanced 2.35 X 1 scope image on the 1080p Blu-ray is nothing
short of amazing. I do mean
…amazing! I was not that impressed with
the 2001 DVD release of the film, which had a softness to the image that make
it look dated on arrival. Here the
colors are vibrant and lively and contain a huge sense of depth as well. Having never seen the film in theaters I was
only exposed to poor broadcasts and VHS-like quality offerings, but this new
transfer is just staggering. Even the
new DVD looks incredibly good even given the limitations of DVD in comparison
to the Blu-ray. Just when you think that
the DVD looks about as good as it gets you simply pop in the Blu-ray disc and
all is forgotten. Now it’s like a
different experience all together. The
crispness, the lifelike images, the deep dark blacks and the glowing whites put
the DVD to shame. What is even more
amazing is the depth of the color, which has incredible fidelity that I have
not seen very much of in a film of this age.
Video red for example is still limited on the DVD’s transfer, but the
Blu-ray manages in several scenes to give bright vibrant red set against dark
black in amazing detail without any bleed or distortion. There is a bit of grain evident throughout
both transfers, but the Blu-ray has far superior sharpness and resolution as
can be expected and the grain gives the film its character anyway.
Since the
film utilized ‘light’ in several key scenes and Zsigmond’s cinematography is
always engaging it’s necessary for detail to be there and the DVD suffers in
several of the special effects scenes making them look a bit dated, but the
Blu-ray truly shines in this particular area giving it a huge advantage over
the DVD. Then there are the desert
scenes, which are more orange and yellow in nature and again the Blu-ray looks
superb, especially in the way it handles a wide gamut of color ranges with
movement in several scenes without any problems. The DVD almost seems fatigued at moments with
the color balance and it shows. I really
can’t say enough good things about both transfers, but the Blu-ray is in a
league of its own and makes you wonder if it’s not from “The Third Kind” as
well.
I did not
notice much difference when switching between the 3 various cuts of the film,
although I think the director’s cut might be my favorite if I had to
choose. The various cuts are nearly the
same, but run at different lengths. The
Special Edition cut runs 132-minutes, the Theatrical Cut runs 135-minutes, and
the directors cut runs 137-minutes. All
of them are a bit long if you ask me and the film tends to suffer at times by
being a bit too long. You can choose DTS
Audio on all three cuts of the film on the DVD’s, but the Blu-ray again offers
some great things in the audio department.
All three cuts of the film offer DTS-HD master audio as well as Dolby
Digital TrueHD, which are both superior in all aspects to the really well mixed
DTS 5.1 on the DVD. I suppose the
easiest way to describe it though is that the Blu-ray audio tracks are fuller,
thicker, and sound more realistic overall in comparison. The DVD audio tracks sound pretty good with
some nice .1 LFE action happening at times, but this does not come close to the
power and depth that the Blu-ray manages to muster. The fidelity is greatly approved in all
aspects with voices coming through much cleaner and sharper, plus the John
Williams score, including the annoying little synthesizer sound, is richer and
gives a much more 3-dimensional soundstage.
He sound
was originally available at its best in a 4.1 70mm blow-up mix with Dolby
magnetic noise reduction, but Spielberg and Columbia had upgraded the film’s
sound over the years and the efforts to restore and preserve the original stems
has paid off here in a big way.
What I
became aware of very quickly with the Blu-ray is just how much I was able to
appreciate this film far more than ever before.
I had seen the film several times, never really cared for it all that
much, but this Blu-ray disc can easily turn anyone into a fan of the film as it
certainly brings the film to life and into the home in ways like never
before. It’s titles like this that are
being released that are enabling people to embrace the HD formats and their
abilities as well as appreciate the film medium in a much broader, more
insightful, and more meaningful way.
The
supplements are also quite good and are the same on both Deluxe sets and the
include Spielberg’s 30th Anniversary retrospective, which is very
good and a nice addition this time around, plus there is a making of
documentary, which was on the previous DVD as well as the 1977 Featurette “Watch the Skies”, so some of this
material is recycled, but that’s not a bad thing by any means. One thing that I do like about the DVD set
though is that it’s a slightly bigger package, which contains a poster and
booklet, the poster shows the differences in the various cuts of the film via
timeline, but the booklet is a bit larger in the DVD set, which is key because
it has pictures inside.
If this
Blu-ray set is any indication of how the format can deliver older films and do
things right, then we are looking at a very bright future with HD material and
I can only hope that more key titles are released to really help ramp up
peoples expectations and anticipation to important films. Not only that, but this also raises the bar
on just how good a transfer needs to be in order to meet the new standards of HD
and that is exciting and should excite any film enthusiast to know that films
30+ years in age can indeed be restored to pristine condition again, especially
if the original elements are preserved and this also puts a new awareness out
there to maintain the preservation of these older films in order to give them
HD treatment the way that they should be, and finally this gives new audiences
reasons to celebrate seeing and hearing films in amazing detail, which can only
add to the experience. Thanks to Blu-ray
these indeed seem like possibilities!
- Nate Goss
