Yume Pictures

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MichaelB · #26 Post by **MichaelB** » Wed Jan 16, 2008 10:15 am

If you really can't wait, you can order both those titles from Italy right now - Yume tells me that the transfers will be the same (non-anamorphic Scope in the case of Naked Youth), and the Italian discs have English subtitles.

Steven H · #27 Post by **Steven H** » Wed Jan 16, 2008 10:22 am

MichaelB wrote:If you really can't wait, you can order both those titles from Italy right now - Yume tells me that the transfers will be the same (non-anamorphic Scope in the case of Naked Youth), and the Italian discs have English subtitles.

I have those discs, the Raro ones. They're not that impressive (picture quality or subtitles), actually, and VERY overpriced. I guess they went with those transfers since they're PAL, because the Japanese DVDs are *beautiful* but NTSC. A serious shame.

Don Lope de Aguirre · #28 Post by **Don Lope de Aguirre** » Wed Jan 16, 2008 4:32 pm

If you really can't wait, you can order both those titles from Italy right now - Yume tells me that the transfers will be the same (non-anamorphic Scope in the case of Naked Youth), and the Italian discs have English subtitles.

Terrible, terrible news!

The picture quality of the Italian R2 DVDs is pretty crappy. I had high hopes for the Yume releases but these have been dashed. Oh well, if you can afford it the Italian DVDs have good extras (filmed discussion and booklet).

The Fanciful Norwegian · #29 Post by **The Fanciful Norwegian** » Thu Jan 17, 2008 2:45 am

I bought the Raro Naked Youth and never bothered with the others because the picture on the former was so poor. I take it Yume's Violence at Noon and Night in Fog in Japan will be Raro ports as well. More UK distributors should take a cue from MOC and release Japanese films as unconverted NTSC if no equivalent PAL master is available.

Murasaki53 · #30 Post by **Murasaki53** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 6:58 am

Silent Duel appears to have been out for a while. But there's nothing on Beaver.

Anyone bought the DVD and care to comment?

MichaelB · #31 Post by **MichaelB** » Wed Feb 27, 2008 6:16 am

I just watched Yume's The Sun's Burial - and sadly, it's another terrible transfer.

Non-anamorphic, smeary, faded colours, jerky pans (betraying an NTSC-PAL conversion job), and the subtitles aren't 16:9-friendly so I couldn't zoom the picture edge to edge. The only positive thing I can say is that it does at least appear to be the OAR, but that's really all it has going for it.

I'm guessing this is another Raro port, as the final subtitle reveals that they were done in Rome.

Steven H · #32 Post by **Steven H** » Wed Feb 27, 2008 11:21 am

Very sad news on the transfer, Michael. Thanks for the update. It will be interesting to see what the Oshima releases look like that haven't been touched by Raro.

otis · #33 Post by **otis** » Sat Mar 22, 2008 8:40 am

Screen caps from Naked Youth here. It's non-anamorphic, and there's some ghosting, but it's a lot more watchable than the Raro Night and Fog in Japan.

hamsterburger · #34 Post by **hamsterburger** » Sat Mar 22, 2008 12:10 pm

Yume Pictures have recently begun releasing some classic Japanese films on DVD in the UK like, Madadayo (Kurosawa), Naked Youth and The Suns Burial (Oshima)

I haven’t found any reviews though. Does anyone know if they are anamorphic?

MichaelB · #35 Post by **MichaelB** » Sat Mar 22, 2008 12:20 pm

Naked Youth and The Sun's Burial definitely aren't anamorphic, and the transfers are extremely mediocre NTSC-to-PAL conversion jobs.

On the other hand, I thought Yume's DVD of Yasuzo Masumura's Kisses was surprisingly good, so I suspect they licence existing transfers and the quality depends entirely on those.

Fan-of-Kurosawa · #36 Post by **Fan-of-Kurosawa** » Sun Mar 23, 2008 12:57 pm

As Michael B says, it really depends on their source.
The four Suzuki films that I have from them:
Tokyo Drifter, Branded to Kill, Pistol Opera and Angry Waves are magnificent.

On the other hand I am also very interested to know if their Madadayo release is anamorphic. I've searched everywhere for a review and I can't find anything. Hasn't anyone bought it?

Hashi · #37 Post by **Hashi** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 7:13 am

MichaelB wrote:On the other hand, I thought Yume's DVD of Yasuzo Masumura's Kisses was surprisingly good, so I suspect they licence existing transfers and the quality depends entirely on those.

Michael: don't know if you missed my earlier question about Kisses, is it NTSC->PAL transfer or not?

MichaelB · #38 Post by **MichaelB** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 8:06 am

Hashi wrote:Michael: don't know if you missed my earlier question about Kisses, is it NTSC->PAL transfer or not?

I'll dig the disc out when I get home tonight.

Fan-of-Kurosawa · #39 Post by **Fan-of-Kurosawa** » Fri May 30, 2008 11:25 am

It's actually funny. Two days ago I praised the Yume dvds Tokyo Drifter and Branded to kill which are really quite good. (a lot better from the Criterions).

So yesterday, wanting to save some money and instead of buying the expensive Criterion version of Fighting Elegy, I bought the Yume disc.

To my utter horror I discovered that the transfer is horrible. The contrast is unbelievably bad. The white is blinding you, the black is non-existent, and there is no detail. During a few wide shots you can not even recognize who is speaking.

The contrast here is worse than in Animeigo's Samurai Assassin. And I think that you all know how horrible that one is.

But it is strange because the transfer does not have other significant problems. It is clean. There are no specks, no noise, no missing frames. So they must have used a relatively new transfer. But from looking at the screenshots in dvdbeaver I am certain they did not use the Criterion one. From looking at the screens at dvdrama I am also certain they did not use the French one either. So what did they use? I can't believe that the Japanese one is so bad.

Anyway, has anyone else seen the Yume Fighting Elegy?

Edit: Since my last post in this thread I have bought Masumura's Kisses and Irezumi from Yume. I am happy to report that both transfers are quite good, especially the transfer of Kisses. It is so good that it approaches Criterion levels. Irezumi's transfer is not that good (neither is the quality of the film) but it is certainly satisfying and acceptable.

At the same time, because I was so pissed with Yume's transfer of Suzuki's Fighting Elegy, I went and bought the Criterion disc (something I should have done in the first place). Well now that I have both discs at hand I can say with certainty that Criterion's transfer is at least 10 times better. One only has to see Kiroku's "white fantasy" to understand what I mean. In the Yume disc you can't see anything. The whole screen is white and you can't see what is happening. In the Criterion disc it is still very white (because that is how Suzuki wanted the scene) but you can clearly see what is happening.

So, if anyone is still undecided about which version to buy, the whole thing is a no brainer. Buy the Criterion without a second thought.

htdm · #40 Post by **htdm** » Fri May 30, 2008 11:30 am

Thanks for your thoughts on the Kisses disc, I'd been holding off on it given what I'd heard about Yume's poor QA more generally.

MichaelB · #41 Post by **MichaelB** » Fri May 30, 2008 11:45 am

htdm wrote:Thanks for your thoughts on the Kisses disc, I'd been holding off on it given what I'd heard about Yume's poor QA more generally.

Actually, I praised the Kisses transfer earlier in this thread (on January 11, to be precise).

Perkins Cobb · #42 Post by **Perkins Cobb** » Fri May 30, 2008 1:17 pm

But Michael, aren't the Kisses and Irezumi discs NTSC -> PAL conversions? (I ask because before buying them I, er, <cough> stumbled across bootlegged copies in a US rental outlet, so I can't vouch for what sort of translation those underwent, but I'd guess it was just a straight data rip -- the Yume menu screens & pre-menu material were intact.)

In any case, the copies I saw did indeed have a nice image, but also a flutter effect (which I've read is typical of NTSC->PAL, although, being in the US, I haven't had much experience with it myself) that made them quite unpleasant to watch.

htdm · #43 Post by **htdm** » Fri May 30, 2008 1:50 pm

MichaelB wrote:Actually, I praised the Kisses transfer earlier in this thread (on January 11, to be precise).

Must've missed it - sorry.

Hashi · #44 Post by **Hashi** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 3:01 am

Perkins Cobb wrote:But Michael, aren't the Kisses and Irezumi discs NTSC -> PAL conversions?

This is something I've been trying to get a confirmation out of Michael for two times on this thread

ltfontaine · #45 Post by **ltfontaine** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 11:50 am

Perkins Cobb wrote:In any case, the copies I saw did indeed have a nice image, but also a flutter effect (which I've read is typical of NTSC->PAL, although, being in the US, I haven't had much experience with it myself) that made them quite unpleasant to watch.

Huh. I'd love to pick a Masumura title or two, but can't decipher whether the image is "nice" or "unpleasant to watch." Any additional evaluative descriptions would be appreciated.

Scharphedin2 · #46 Post by **Scharphedin2** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 2:49 pm

ltfontaine wrote:
Perkins Cobb wrote:In any case, the copies I saw did indeed have a nice image, but also a flutter effect (which I've read is typical of NTSC->PAL, although, being in the US, I haven't had much experience with it myself) that made them quite unpleasant to watch.
Huh. I'd love to pick a Masumura title or two, but can't decipher whether the image is "nice" or "unpleasant to watch." Any additional evaluative descriptions would be appreciated.

I have not yet picked up either of these releases, so cannot comment on the technicalities of the transfers, but I did see MichaelB pass positive comment on Kisses in the past, and with respect to quality of transfers he is nothing if not discerning, so I think this title should be a safe buy.

Should this be a matter of simply sampling Masumura's work, a safer route may be the series of his films that Fantoma released in R1 some years back. In my memory they all looked very good, and with the DD sale going on, they can probably be had for a song.

ltfontaine · #47 Post by **ltfontaine** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 3:41 pm

Thanks, Scharphedin2, I have the Fantoma Masumura discs and they are indeed excellent. I had noted MichaelB's recommendation of the Yume disc earlier, but read conflicting reports since, including the recent one from Perkins Cobb. I'm not overly fussy about transfers, but conversion flutter may be a bridge too far.

otis · #48 Post by **otis** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 4:20 pm

Afraid I can't answer the conversion question, but both Kisses and Irezumi looked fine to me. And I strongly recommend Kisses. It's a charming movie about two teenagers who meet cute visiting their respective fathers in prison, go to the cycle track together, then borrow a motorbike and head off to the beach for a spot of bathing-suited rollerskating. Things get darker as the film progresses. Rosenbaum references Nicholas Ray in his article on Masumura, and the couple here are up there with Farley Granger and Cathy O'Donnell in the teenage heartbreak stakes.

Rufus T. Firefly · #49 Post by **Rufus T. Firefly** » Tue Jun 10, 2008 6:25 pm

The running times of the two discs are the same as the running times listed on IMDb. They also have that slightly fuzzy look. Both these things indicate a standards conversion. However they are not nearly as bad looking as some conversions I have seen.

Andrian Film Revival · #50 Post by **Andrian Film Revival** » Wed Jun 11, 2008 1:54 pm

Has anyone yet seen the Yume Madadayo? I am reluctant to buy it blindly based on the poor quality of the previous dvd editions?

Many thanks!

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