Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind arrives on Blu-Ray in North America today. I'll be looking around for my copy, which may prove more challenging than I first expected. There are some reports that the disc isn't being stocked at many retailers, although it's still early in the day, so we'll see what happens today. Nausicaa is an obscure anime movie by Hollywood standards, so don't feel surprised when Megamind outsells it fifty-to-one at retail. Just be persistent and if all else fails, order from Amazon.
Oh, and Tales From Earthsea arrives on DVD at last. Sigh. I suppose we should pick it up, as a show of solidarity with Studio Ghibli, of course. I do hope Goro-san has improved his skills for Kokuriko-Zaka Kara. I'm not going to be happy if he kills his father's movie studio.
7 comments:
No one is going to kill Ghibli except Hayao Miyazaki treating the studio like a vanity project. The whole lot of them are putting way too much weight on finding "a worthy successor" to Miyazaki the Elder and doing so in-house.
Even the Walt Disney Company survived the passing of its founder and creative head, so Ghibli should have no problem. It may miss its mark a few times as it finds its voice again, but it will come. If they give it a chance.
The worst mistake they're making right now is not on relying on Miyazaki the Younger, but on not actively pursuing young auteur directors with their own strong creative visions. I've said before that I'm blown away by the fact that they didn't scoop up Makoto Shinkai after Voices of a Distant Star. They need people who can lead Ghibli into the future, not imitate what was done in the past.
Gah, so freakin' hyped for this release!
Since 99% of the time my local stores never have any anime in them(100% of the time being anime that I actually want to buy), I didn't take a chance on waiting to go to Amazon and have it shipped late. Just decided to pre-order from Amazon from the start.
So, yeah--copy got shipped earlier on. It was only a couple of states off from mine, so if I'm lucky it'll be here tomorrow. :D Realistically, though, Thursday's gonna be the date.
So, I'm sure you have it by now. What do you think of the blu-ray? How does it look? Sound quality's good, I assume? I hear people praise it, then I heard a others(primarily the japanese) bash it for one reason or another.
I'm watching the Blu-Ray right now, and scrambling online for some comparison screenshots. It's right about now that I'm wishing I had the Japanese disc to compare. And, yes, I'll probably buy the Japan import one of these days.
Everything looks terrific, but the video file on the US disc is notably smaller than the Japan version (26gb vs 40gb). Also, the film grain seems very smoothed out. Did Disney use the Optimum UK release, or was file compression a factor? Or maybe I'm just really impressed with how good this Sony TV looks? Heh heh.
This is definitely a MUST BUY, so don't worry about a thing. But I'd really like to hear what others think about the matter.
Alright, good to hear it. :D I also plan to import the Japanese blu-rays, but a little bummed out that apparently none of them(save for Nausicaa, of course) are going to have the English dub track included.
But I just can't pass up having though beautifully simple cases on my shelf. xD.
Anyway, thanks. I'll be sure to give my opinions on the blu-ray as well, once mine finally arrives.
I went down to the local Fry's yesterday with coupon in hand to pick up the BD. The BD was indeed in stock (a first for this location to have an anime title in stock on its street date), but they wouldn't accept the coupon. I ended up buying the BD at the local Best Buy instead.
I'll be grabbing the Earthsea DVD sometime in the next couple of days.
I own the J-versions of both of these. So far, my only negative comment on this US BD is I don't care for having the US voice credits permanently crammed in all around the J-credits. Minor quibble. I'm glad I have the J-versions.
After an unexplained 1-day delay, my copy finally came in about 30 minutes ago, and it's beautiful. :D
For one reason or another, though, I won't be able to watch the blu-ray version of the movie at my house ATM, so I'll stick with the DVD tonight. A close family member of mine has this insane HD setup, though, and I'm heading over there tomorrow. Might as well bring Nausicaa along with me. ;D
I've missed this movie so damn much--it's gonna be intense watching it in HD tomorrow. For tonight, though, the DVD is good enough for me.
Alright, so I finished watching the blu-ray a couple of hours ago and I've definitely say it deserved every bit of praise it recieved.
I mean, I watched the DVD last night, and in comparison to the BD, it looks like a high-end VHS. :roll: The BD was beautiful--the colors looked more fleshed out and brighter, there were textures and detailings in the movie that you simply couldn't see on the DVD, the various special effects were far more dazzling, ugh--the damn thing just looked so much f**king better. 8O And on top of that, it sounded hella better as well.
So, yeah. Beautiful stuff. Damn near soiled my pants thinking of how amazing Princess Mononoke will look in HD as well. O.O
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