When I bought my husband a PS3 for his birthday, my sister (who has a blu-ray player) said that, in her opinion, the best things to watch in blu-ray were animated movies. (She’s got two little girls too, so there is that.)
I haven’t yet fired up Finding Nemo (or some such) to see if it’s true, but thought I’d pass it on.
And what audio format does Netflix streaming deliver? I seriously doubt it’s DTS-HD…hell, I bet it’s just 2.0 at 44khz mp3! Believe me, there is a HUGE, HUGE difference, and I am by no means an audiophile. Bluray is as much about the audio (assuming you have a setup that can handle it) as the video.
Netflix on the PS3 is able to put out 5.1, but I’m not sure at what rate. And that, of course, depends on your internet connection. (I always wait for good movies to arrive on disc - you’re absolutely right about audio being nearly as important as the video.)
I understand the desire for parents to buy media to have in the house, but upgrading to bluray got me to finally stop the constant consumption and “need” to build a movie library. It’s silly - Netflix has thousands and thousands and thousands of movies at my disposal. Even if I limit myself to only getting discs so as to maximize the audio/visual quality, there’s no need (for me) to be buying movies every week.
OK, not everyone’s cup of tea, but “Highlander” (the first one) is amazing on Blu-ray.
Colours are so bright, dark areas have actual definition and the detail is amazing.
It’s so good it’s like a new movie - really.
New films I’ve seen both on DVD and Blu-ray eg. “2012” are so similar it’s not worth the bother but properly mastered “old” movies look great.
Dark Knight- Many scenes that were filmed in IMAX are spectacular on Bluray.
Wall-E/Up/ToyStory3- The most current crop of Pixar films. Picture perfect.
Alien Anthology / Godfather Copolla Restoration / Apocolypse Now Full disclosure Edition - All redone for Bluray.
You can also go to Blu-Ray.com and type a title in to see how they rate the blu-ray version video/audio.
Thanks for the suggestions. If I have the best DVD versions of The Matrix (from the Ultimate Matrix Collection) and Blade Runner (Final Cut version) are those worth upgrading? I’m getting my new house prewired with 5.1 speakers, if that matters.
I don’t have a blue player yet, but I’ve been told that this,
is categorically untrue. That there have been some cheap, hasty blue reissues that are actually (on ideal equipment each way) worse than the best DVD of the same titles.
Even besides that, my best DVD titles are so good that, even with some margin of improvement in a blue edition, it seems like a waste to buy them again when I could get something entirely different.
Bluray.com gave Bladerunner 5 out of 5:
“Blade Runner has found its way to the Blu-ray format in pristine 1080P transferred from a newly minted 4K master. It’s clear that a huge effort was made in cleaning up the film as the source looks as though it was created recently as opposed to twenty-five years ago. The complex optical composites of the film have also been given a major scrubbing and none of the matte lines and optical cut outs that were so prevalent in previous versions are present here.”
This is where the blu-ray review sites mentioned up-thread come into play. If you’re subsequently still unconvinced, you may be able to rent the blu-ray from Netflix if you have the blu-ray option on your account. Try before you buy.
nevermind. quoted the dvd price accidentally.
Raise your hands if you have an Internet Service Provider who limits your bandwidth, like in my case, to 5 Gigs? If you live out in the country and rely on Wild Blue Satellite or Verizon Mobile or similar, you can raise your hands automatically.
I don’t get this. There are so many articles and exclamations that everything is moving to Cloud Computing yet at the same time Internet Service Providers are all slowly moving towards limiting your bandwidth and/or charging you an arm and a leg for anything over 5-10 Gigs.
You may be ahead of the game but behind in paying your bills before long.
I collect all the better cartoons, they do look better in Blu Ray.
An aside; we have a Sony blu-ray player and a Sony HDTV; if you insert a DVD into the player without turning on the tv first, the player will turn it on for you, but do a bad job of it. You need to turn on the tv first or you get nothing but a flashing screen of static for dvds. Blu-ray discs start up perfectly. Just an FYI if you run into something weird. 
I was thinking about going with Netflix, but they have no decent library in Canada yet. Maybe some years from now they’ll have a proper library and I’ll re-visit them, but until then, movies will remain the one thing that we do collect even a little seriously.
Of course. But I’d bet that for the OP, depending on the size of his TV and viewing distance, a good up-scaling Blu-Ray player using HDMI will make his DVDs close enough to a BD. I’ve only bought two BDs, the new Star Trek and The Dark Knight. Both look good, but with the viewing distance of 6 to 8 feet on an old 32" 720p LCD, I’m pretty sure I could have gone with the DVDs instead and been happy.
I plan on getting a 50-60" 1080i to be viewed from 10’ away.
Weird. I have Sony HDTV and a Samsung Blue-Ray/Receiver and they work great together. Turn on the player and put in a disk and the TV changes input and turns off its speakers. Turn on the TV, the player/receiver turns on an switches to Digital In.
I agree that good animation, especially new Pixar look great in Blue Ray. I bought the combo pack of some and BR has better depth. The depth was also really noticeable in Inception (from Netflix). I really only buy kids movies that will be watched again and again and that I think benefit from Blue-Ray. Most of the rest we can get from Netflix. I have about 200 DVD disks right now and I barely ever break them out. Streaming netflix keeps the kids happy and BD by mail keeps the wife and I happy.
The Band of Brothers blu-ray set is fantastic, as has been mentioned. It has some blu-ray only features that are more than worth the cost of admission for me.
I also will throw my voice into the chorus for any of the Pixar movies. They look spectacular in HD.
Not likely. I have Comcast Internet. Yeah…blech. I know, but at least they don’t limit my bandwidth. I now get 100 percent of my entertainment programming from online sources. I canceled my cable TV service last year and, as I said upthread, I don’t buy DVDs anymore. I recently signed up for Netflix, which is only $8 per month. So yeah, I think I’m way ahead, especially since my in-home entertainment budget is now less than half what it was, while my options and convenience have increased.
Here it is at Amazon UK for $30. And yes - the features that are bluray only are absolutely amazing. For those unfamiliar, you can turn on a very unassuming timeline that appears at the bottom of the screen, and every time the action on the screen reaches a particular noteworthy event (you meet a new character, a battle is referred to, military slang is used for the first time, etc.) you get the option to learn about it in a picture-in-picture that appears (backstory on the actual historical person, real newsreel footage of the events, explanation of military terms, etc.). It’s really an amazing feature.
2001 was the first blu-ray movie I bought. Definitely worth it.