Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: THE BIBLE (1966) coming on Blu-Ray

This is topic THE BIBLE (1966) coming on Blu-Ray in forum The Afterlife at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Claude S. Ayakawa (Member # 1401) on 01-27-2011, 05:13 PM:

The Varsity in Honolulu for many years was a neighborhood theatre but in 1966, it was converted to be Honolulu's 3rd Road Show venue with 70mm , six track mag stereo and a new screen. The opening attraction was John Huston's "THE BIBLE-In The Beginning" in 70mm. The movie was the first of two movies Fox shot in Dimension 150. The 2nd one was PATTON. Unfortunately, the Varsity's new screen was not a D150 screen but a larger one than before with a 70mm aspect ratio. THE BIBLE featured a large cast of celebrated film stars including George C. Scott, Richard Harris, Ava Gardner, Stephen Boyd, Peter O Toole and many more. Beside directing the film John Huston played the part of Noah and did the narration as well as the voice of God.

I enjoyed the movie at the Varsity in 70mm and was looking forward to the DVD when it was announced for release many years ago but when it came out, it was one of the worst DVD I had ever seen. It was not as bad as OUTLAND but pretty close. Fox just announced they will be releasing THE BIBLE on Blu-Ray in March and I hope it will be comparable to the theatrical presentation. There were a lot of grumbling about the picture quality of PATTON on Blu-Ray but I loved it and if the image quality of THE BIBLE could look better than PATTON by not doing any DNR on it, I will be very happy. By the way the image looked on PATTON, it does appear like the 65mm negative or a 70mm print was used for the Blu-Ray. Lets hope Fox will also work with the large format original negative or print of THE BIBLE when they create the Blu-Ray.

-Claude