Highly Defined

And now for a little change of pace this week, here’s a list of my Top Ten War Movies in honor of Memorial Day. Everyone should never forget…with the inclusion of these into your collection.

I figured what the hell, let me attempt to dive into my own list, and attempt to do some justice to a hotly debated movie genre…war movies. The ability of fighting forces across the world to hurt people and break things has evolved over the years, and so have the war movies, as many have done with the dramatic death in ... friend’s arms, and a lot of them usually get killed by snipers, with gore splattered on nearby troops with CGI precision. I don’t mean for it to sound too peacenik or anything, but if you take a look at the early movies and contrast with what we see in a big budget armed forces movie now, there’s a helluva more realism to it than in the past. From Lee Marvin’s The Big Red One to Letters From Iwo Jima, war movies have changed considerably in even just that 20 year span.

Hopefully the next generation format’s week to put in Thunderdome can bear some real fruit.

Well for the sake of relevance, Tuesday is THE week to be a supporter of the next generation formats. On the HD-DVD side, the Matrix films see their debut from Warner, with the extras from the Ultimate Matrix Collection for those who want them, and IMEs on each of the films. Meanwhile, Blu-ray buyers get to see both Pirates of the Caribbean films on two-disc editions, with Blu-ray exclusive content, and...there’s also the underrated Mel Gibson film Apocalypto. All of these films have TrueHD and PCM for their respective formats, and both are at least currently exclusive to their respective formats. Here’s hoping that there’s some winner among sales this week so this format war crap can come to an end soonest.

This space here for rent for a small fee.

Not to harp on one particular subject, but it appears that any real substantiated news of the week focuses more on the hardware that the software. Onkyo is starting to roll out their new receivers, the ones that support HDMI 1.3. And late last week, Pioneer said that their Elite Models for this year will carry it as well, so to finally get a taste of things to come will be a welcome one. The other news turned out to be nothing more than an unsubstantiated rumor, as ...niversal was reported on a German site as dropping to format neutal later this year, a rumor quickly shot down by the studio. This comes hot on the heels of the Chinese $300 HD-DVD players not being actual fact either. When it comes to all this nonsense, can’t we all just get along?

And the number of Canadian teams left in the playoffs for Canada’s title is down to one.

Well what can I say, things are in their summer quietness, with very little to discuss. As this particular writer will be joining everyone else on vacation in several weeks, I can tell you it’ll be nice to go to Hawaii and tear myself away from the TV and high def players. General news doesn’t offer too much, other than Universal finally responding to their issues with Children of Men and The Good Shepherd...and playback problems on the 360. Feel free to reach them via email to look into options for exchanges.

And how did you spend YOUR NFL Draft weekend?

This seems to be a week where things just aren’t happening news wise (granted, the $299 HD-DVD player remark was clarified to be a little vaguer this week, but that’s about it), but there’s some fun things on the disc release front, most of it for Blu-Ray fans. Sony pimps out The Patriot, Wild Things and Flatliners on 7/3. Lion’s Gate puts Season Two of Weeds out on 7/24, and Waiting comes out one week prior. Warner will be rel...asing Music and Lyrics to both formats on 6/12, while Magnolia does the same thing for The Host on 7/24 and Paramount doing it for Ghost on the same day. On the bad news though, Sony has delayed the release of Meatballs, which was due to be released on 6/5, to a date to be announced.

Apologies to all last week for the postponement of last week’s column. As one who has a personal interest in the activities surrounding Virginia Tech, I had a lot more on my plate to digest. Anyway, onward and upward in the next generation news and opinion.

Several big things have happened over the course of the last couple of weeks, the first being Samsung’s announcement of their own hybrid player. Like the current LG player, it will play both formats, unlike the LG player, it will support HDi, which is go...d news for HD-DVD owners. The BD-UP5000 is scheduled to come out sometime in the fourth quarter, and let’s all hope it supports everything and the friggin’ kitchen sink. The BD-P1200 quietly started appearing on store shelves this week at a $799 MSRP, I guess so much for that player. On the HD side of things, the Chinese are saying that they’ll have 2 million $300 HD players in American store shelves. How (or which platform) they’ll be able to do that on remains to be seen, but I’d guess that Walmart will roll out both platforms in their stores for mass consumption rather than alientate one side or another. The story is far from substantiated, but it does raise some interesting questions. Last, but not least, the latest Panasonic firmware upgrade finally allows for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD audio formats, so for those of you who’ve got them, go download this already!

Sorry guys, in between starting a new job today and the news ongoing at Virginia Tech, I'm busy trying to find out what's going on at a school I'm very familiar with. Back with more news and updates next week.

Happy Easter, with eggs, and bunnies, and Jesus, and all that.

OK, so your friendly neighborhood format neutral buyer decided to pick up a title he already had on HD-DVD just to do some comparisons, but also to cover my bases in the event that one format suddenly tanks. So when I got Superman Returns, aside from not having a lossless track, the picture seems a little bit on the blandish side. In the interest of full disclosure, I haven’t seen the HD version in awhile, but seriously, I hope that there...are some better dinners to the table, you know?

And another week remains quiet on the western next-gen front.

Well, HD-DVD seems to be firing back when it comes to their lack of releases in the first quarter of the year. The problem seems to be though that not many releases are new, and the equipment price cuts that have been previously reported elsewhere were rehashed here. So on the impressive scale, it’s a light rock in the ocean. But still, it’s nice to see them doing SOMETHING. European buyers will be seeing a version of the Sony BDP coming out this...summer. Notable for it having HDMI 1.3, it’s another case of a device that you’ll have to wait and get a good receiver for down the road. Blu-ray has drown the proverbial line in the sand too, with the BDA expecting Java support by the end of October. It’s kind of funny how this announcement comes hot on the heels of the Matrix releases, but at least it gives a kick in the pants to Blu-Ray, so that Batman Begins and V for Vendetta can’t be HD exclusives. But hey, Dreamworks CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg says it’s a niche market anyway, so screw it, right?

Breaking the Blu cherry and all still remains well. I hope you’ve enjoyed my first two Blu reviews for the site. Rest assured, everything is always a work in progress, and we’re coming along rather nicely, don’t you think?

The big news for the week has to be the announcement of The Matrix trilogy arriving to HD-DVD shelves on 5/22, with a BD release sometime down the road. The common assumption for the BD delay appears to be the lack of BD-J interactivity right now, which would also explain why Ba...man Begins, V for Vendetta and similar titles with a Warner In Movie Experience/Pop Up Function aren’t out for PS3 buyers right now, and probably why the Harry Potter series hasn’t come out yet either. Was this a not too subtle shot across Sony’s bow to get this functionality working? Only time will tell. Toshiba has announced price cuts on their HD-A2 and XA2 models, with the A2 retailing for $399, proving that the ever so elusive $300 and under price point isn’t that far away.