From the DVD thread...



Well, I moved my ass and the GPS said I should arrive at exactly 8:02PM! Despite all the SLOWASSES on the road! Unfortunately I didn't arrive until more like 8:20PM cuz apparently I plugged in the wrong town name! Same road, wrong town! At least I knew how it started.

This'll be short cuz I'm in extreme pain, and have been since around 8:30PM when my tooth started acting up, along with my neck and shoulder. Must've gotten a piece of hotdog in there or something, and it's the worse throbbing pain I've ever experienced. Right now it's mostly in the base of my skull. Great.

It was great seeing the film again on the big screen -- it'd been since 2006 when EA showed it to us in California, and before that, the 25th Anniversary (1997) in Manhattan (where I saw all 3, once a week for three weeks). The EA viewing was really good quality, but in '97 they had the shittiest prints I'd ever seen! The restored print was very clean, without the rips and shorthairs that somehow end up on film reels.

To me, the film looked just like the SD-DVD. I'm still unsure how I feel about it. It's clean, sure, but I think the original DVDs looked pretty damn good as well. I still need to compare them side-by-side. The restoration looks brighter, if not a bit washed out in spots. Perhaps that's intentional. It's still grainy, which I am sure is intentional, and really, how much can you do with a film that's been deteriorating for 35 years? It's not going to look like a recent release no matter what's done to it.

In any event, despite my physical pain -- and being told to shut up only once during it (Joel and I were sharing trivia ) -- it was enjoyable to see again in all its glory! If Francis is pleased with how it turned out, then I can only assume this is how it was intended to be seen.

If you get the chance to see it in a theater, go for it!