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Starman (1984)
Starman (1984) poster
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Starman (1984)

Science Fiction, Romance, Drama • 1h 55m

Director: John Carpenter

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IMDbThe Movie Database (TMDB)

Best English-friendly & video release

Sony Columbia Classics Vol 4 4K Blu-ray

Video notes:

Sony Columbia Classics Vol 4 4K Blu-ray (review)

Updated 5 months ago


UHD tiers

Excellent
Sony:

Columbia Classics Vol 4 UHD (review)


About the film

When an alien takes the form of a young widow's husband and asks her to drive him from Wisconsin to Arizona, the government tries to stop them.

Alternative Titles
John Carpenter's Starman

More from John Carpenter

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Director: John Carpenter

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony 4K Blu-ray or Carlotta 4K Blu-ray (FiM encode)

Video Notes:

Sony 4K Blu-ray and France Carlotta 4K Blu-ray (FiM encode) are similar

Director: John Carpenter

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Universal 4K Blu-ray

Sources: blog.sporv.com (opens in a new tab)

Best Audio:
Audio Notes:
  • the only track on Universal 4K, which is in DTS:X, has a mixing error of around 6dB too low on side channels, otherwise very similar to other 5.1 mixes.

Director: John Carpenter

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Australia Imprint 4K Blu-ray

Upcoming Release:

UK Arrow 4K Blu-ray possibly teased?

Best Audio:

1994 Criterion LaserDisc

Director: John Carpenter

Video format: UHD Blu-ray

Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)

Best Video:

Fabulous Films 4K Blu-ray, some caps

Additional Info:

disc info

Director: John Carpenter

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Italy Koch Media Blu-ray

Video Notes:

Italy Koch Media Blu-ray is not stretched compared to US Shout! Factory and UK Arrow Blu-rays

As for the color grade, unsure whether the Italy or US/UK Blu-ray is more accurate to the theatrical colors.

Best Audio:

Arrow Blu-ray

Audio Notes:

Arrow Blu-ray has lossless original stereo

Additional Info:

Shout! Factory Blu-ray has the most extras with a lossless isolated score

Director: John Carpenter

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly:

Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray

Best Audio:

2.0: Shout! Factory

Audio Notes:

2.0: Shout! Factory > StudioCanal. Italy Eagle Pictures doesn't have it.

Director: John Carpenter

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Arrow 4K Blu-ray

Audio Notes:

Shout! Factory Blu-ray has slightly less rolloff of the higher frequencies

Director: John Carpenter

Video format: UHD Blu-ray

Director: John Carpenter

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray

Video Notes:

Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray is a strong upgrade in PQ compared to a poor old Blu-ray

Audio Notes:

Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray sound was improved compared to the old mixes.

Director: John Carpenter

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Scream Factory 4K Blu-ray

Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)

Video Notes:

Caps by cinemaniac, which look great but the old Sony master doesn’t look too bad and Indicator has a Fidelity encode

More from Sony

See more →

Director: Frank Oz

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony 4K Blu-ray

Director: Dennis Hopper

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony UK 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)

Director: Roland Emmerich

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

Sony 4K Blu-ray

Director: David Lean

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)

Additional Info:

The 5.1 on Sony 4K Blu-ray is from the 1989 70mm mix. The original is 4-track. not on the disc.

Director: John G. Avildsen

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony 4K Blu-ray

Best Audio:

Original Stereo mix: Columbia Pictures LaserDisc, Sony 4K Blu-ray 

5.1 remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray, Sony Blu-ray 

Dolby Atmos remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray 

Director: John G. Avildsen

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony 4K Blu-ray

Best Audio:

Original Stereo mix: Columbia Pictures LaserDisc, Sony 4K Blu-ray 

5.1 remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray, Sony Blu-ray 

Dolby Atmos remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray 

Director: Satoshi Kon

4K · Disappointing
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)

Video Notes:

Sony 4K Blu-ray is very smeary with the upscaling but has correct aspect ratio and very good HDR grade.
UK Blu-ray has wrong colors, and Sony 2007 Blu-ray is the worst (encoding and AR)
See professorwho's review

Director: Ben Stiller

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

Sony 4K Blu-ray

Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)

Video Notes:

Comparisons

Audio Notes:

Spectrograms

Director: Luc Besson

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly:

StudioCanal UK 4K Blu-ray

Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab) · fanrestore.com (opens in a new tab) · Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)

Best Video:

2020 StudioCanal 4K Blu-ray vs 2017 Sony 4K Blu-ray (20th annivesary) vs 2025 Sony 4K Blu-ray (Luc Besson Box Set). The first two have totally different texture.

  • StudioCanal: More natural looking. Better defined grain. The white balance is rather yellow/orange. Some say it is closer to the original theatrical release.

  • 2017 Sony: More vibrant and impactful. The white balance is rather neutral. While color noise and grain can look busy because it had been sharpened and had micro-contrast boosted.

  • 2025 Sony: Supposedly an improved version of the 2017 release? Shows around 20mbps-higher overall video bitrate. caps

Audio Notes:

The Atmos on the Sony release is reportedly better than StudioCanal's.

Additional Info:

Disc info of the box set discs. This film have recieved multiple encode/versions in different regions over the years. The 2017 Germany4K Blu-ray is encoded differently than the 2017 Sony but not better. Also, the same can be said to 2024 France Gaumont 4K Blu-ray while comparing to the 2020 StudioCanal 4K Blu-ray. The StudioCanal 4K Blu-ray omits all the extras from previous releases, being barebones.

Director: Frank Capra

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony Frank Capra Boxset Blu-ray

More Science Fiction on Blu-ray

Director: James Gray

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

Fox 4K Blu-ray

Director: George Lucas

Video format: UHD Blu-ray

Best English-Friendly & Video:

OG: "4K77" or "D+77" on high seas.

Special Edition: "4K97_IV" or "D+97_IV" on high seas.

Upcoming Release:

2027 Original Trilogy restoration/50th anniversary rerelease clips leaked plus release confirmed

Best Audio:

OG: LaserDisc audio is the best option for the Dolby Stereo mixes (and usually included in fan restorations). There are 16mm/TV rips of the mono mixes.

Special Edition: Cinema DTS or 1997 LaserDisc for the Special Edition.

Director: Steven Spielberg

Video format: UHD Blu-ray

Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

Universal 4K

Video Notes:

Dolby Vision grading looks identical to a cinema DCP, which is the highest compliment that could be given. Encode is perfectly solid in motion.

Director: Michael Anderson

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Warner Bros Blu-ray

Upcoming Release:

Arrow 4K Blu-ray scheduled for Dec 2026 release

Director: Mamoru Oshii

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

Bandai JP 4K Blu-ray

Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)

Video Notes:

All 4K releases are sourced from the same mediocre transfer provided by Bandai, with various amounts of tweaks. Japanese disc presents it with the least tinkering.

The best attempt at improving it comes from the German/French releases from KSM/All the Anime, both of which use the same master with HDR regrading (original grade is SDR in HDR container), tasteful regraining and sharpening, in an attempt to breathe some life into the middling transfer, making for an arguably more pleasing viewing experience.

All earlier releases are from an even worse transfer, with significant black crush, with the exception of a Japanese TV airing, which doesn't suffer from that issue, but instead is heavily sharpened and suffers from poor encoding.

Comparisons: JPN UHD, USA UHD, FRA/GER UHD, ITA UHD (tonemapped), JPN UHD, USA UHD, FRA/GER UHD, ITA UHD, ESP UHD (PQ), All 1080p BDs, HDTV, HDTV filtered

Audio Notes:

Original matrixed stereo mix: Bandai JP 4K Blu-ray
Most discs include this track with comparable fidelity (which is excellent).

Dolby Atmos remix: Lionsgate US 4K / All the Anime FR 4K
6.1 remix (from Ghost in the Shell 2.0): KSM DE 4K / All the Anime FR 4K

All tracks on the Lionsgate US 4K replace the original ending song with the one heard on the English dub. As the Atmos track on the FR 4K is just a port, it also has this song replaced.

Additional Info:

Japanese 4K includes English dub and subtitles.
French/German 4Ks are not English friendly, with no dub or subtitles.
French disc includes the Atmos track, but the German disc does not.

Director: Stanley Kubrick

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Criterion 4K Blu-ray

Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)

Video Notes:

Included in the Complete Kubrick box set with FiM encode of the same master from the WB release without the filtering Comparison between the Criterion and WB.

Best Audio:

5.1: WB 4K Blu-ray, a remix but has higher fidelity

Mono: Criterion 4K Blu-ray (restored for the box set)

Director: Stanley Kubrick

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Criterion 4K Blu-ray

Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)

Video Notes:

Included in the Complete Kubrick box set with FiM encode of the same master from the WB release without the filtering; WB 4K early pressing has errors of a shot, later pressings fixed. Comparison between Criterion and WB.

Best Audio:

6-Track 70mm mix: Criterion 4K Blu-ray (restored for the box set), 1997 MGM LaserDisc, 1998 MGM DVD
35mm Mono Mix: Criterion 4K Blu-ray

Matrixed Stereo Remix: MGM Japan LaserDisc (1985) [G158F5509]
5.1 Remix: Criterion 4K Blu-ray

Director: Steve De Jarnatt

Best English-Friendly & Video:

2024 Kino Lorber Blu-ray

Upcoming Release:

UK Transmission 4K Blu-ray in January 2027

Best Audio:

Either the 2015 Kino Lorber Blu-ray or the Arrow Blu-ray

Audio Notes:

The 2024 Kino Lorber Blu-ray is botched.

Director: Steven Spielberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

US Paramount Blu-ray

Upcoming Release:

Paramount 4K Blu-ray Dec 15th

Video Notes:

US Paramount Blu-ray > International WB Blu-ray

Director: John Milius

Best English-Friendly & Video:

US Shout! Factory or Germany/UK Capelight 4K Blu-ray?

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Researched and maintained by

vanshadyAdamA

· last reviewed 5 months ago

Every recommendation follows the same method — how these calls are made.