Mystery Men (1999)
Adventure, Fantasy, Action, Comedy, Science Fiction • 2h 1m
Director: Kinka Usher
Cast: Ben Stiller, Hank Azaria, William H. Macy, Greg Kinnear, Kel Mitchell, Paul Reubens, Janeane Garofalo, Wes Studi, Claire Forlani, Geoffrey Rush, Lena Olin, Eddie Izzard, Tom Waits, Artie Lange, Louise Lasser, Ricky Jay, Jenifer Lewis, Pras Michel, Ned Bellamy, Joel McCrary, Ernie Lee Banks, Gerry Becker, Corbin Bleu, Philip Bolden, Jake Cross, Emmy Laybourne, Mason Lucero, Monet Mazur, Christopher Mugglebee, Olivia Lauren Todd, Frederick Usher, Kinka Usher, Gayle Vance, Adrian Armas, Gichi Gamba, Thomas Lake, Robert Musselman, Solo Scott, Erik Michael Tristan, James Duke, Angelica Bridges, Ungela Brockman, Kimberly James, Andreea Radutoiu, Michael Bay, Noah Blake, Riki Rachtman, T-Mo, Cee Lo Green, Big Gipp, Khujo, Michael Chieffo, Gil Christner, Carl Strand, Robert Chow, John Brantley Cole, Steven Jang, Sung Kang, Sasha Bray, Sunny Görg, Shane J. Bobb, Jennifer Lee Keyes, Marie Matiko, Jody Watley, Margaret Wheeler, Billy Beck, Robert P. Lieb, Florence Stone Fevergeon, Sarah Kane, Ed Denette, Nori T. Gehr, Kiko Kiko, Kiyoko Yamaguchi, Mark Mothersbaugh, Nancye Ferguson, Katie Adams, Shirley Bowden, Helen Etting, Lu Gay, Valerie Gitter, Mac Greenstein, C. Elane Innes, Irene Kamsler, Miriam R. Lawless, Teresa MacLean, Joanne McDermott, Crystal Gaer White, Joann Richter, Stacey Travis, Larkin Campbell, Oliver Clark, Jack Plotnick, Dane Cook, Vince Melocchi, Doug Jones, Vincent Bowman, Vylette Fagerholm, Dana Gould, Branden Williams, Aaron Priest, Robert B. Martin Jr., Gabrielle Conforti, Jeff Z. Danziger, Wilbert Sampson, Kenneth W. Watts, Elliot Durant III, Anthony Marinelli, Drinda E. Shaneyfelt, Félix Castro, Michael Craig, Ronald Lasky, David Still, Jonathan Khan, Jerry Farmer, Stephanie D'Abruzzo, Lucas Meyers, Eiko Nijo
Best English-friendly & video release · updated 1 year ago
UHD tiers
Overview
When Champion City's hero Captain Amazing is kidnapped by the recently paroled supervillain Casanova Frankenstein, a trio of average, everyday superheroes -- Mr. Furious, the Shoveler and the Blue Raja -- assemble a new super team to save him.
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Criterion Box Set coming October 20th with FiM encode
Director: Paul Leni
Theatrical/Original A negative: MoC Blu-ray
European C/D negative but better picture quality: Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
From DVDBeaver: The MoC Blu-ray is scanned from the American A negative, as opposed to the European C or D negatives used by Photoplay and others (Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray), so it is identical with the film US audiences saw in 1927
See caps for comparison
In addition, the Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray has sepia tinting throughout while the MoC Blu-ray has yellow for normal scenes, blue for night scenes, and some even green tintings.
Director: Lewis Teague
Video format: UHD Blu-ray
Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray disappointing
R1 DVD
R1 DVD sounds best and has the original mono and a Dolby Stereo remix
Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray has excellent master in SDR and a good encode. BD caps here.
Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray has poor audio: The 2.0 is fine but unremarkable, the 5.1 is presumably an upmix with a botched, strongly raised LFE channel which makes the entire track unlistenable on well-tuned equipment. Audio graphs here.
Kino Lorber Blu-ray or Germany Blu-ray but no comparison available
Germany Blu-ray doesn’t have good encoding, with visible blocking and banding etc.
Germany Blu-ray lacks English subtitles. Kino Lorber Blu-ray has English subtitles but is OOP
Kino Lorber Blu-ray retains both the French and German dialogue in their native languages.
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)
Criterion Box Set
Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray worse than Blu-ray with poor encoding (review)
Sources: YouTube (opens in a new tab) · Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
More Adventure on Blu-ray
Criterion Box Set coming October 20th with FiM encode, work done to un-Nolan the 4K master, the first ever appearance of the 35mm mono track on physical media and a new restoration/remastering of the 70mm 6-track mix.
(early pressing has errors of a shot, later pressings fixed)
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Criterion Box Set coming on October 20th with FiM encode
DTS:X mix most closely approximates original surround mix
Criterion DVD has additional features not found on the 4K Blu-ray
Director: Terence Young
WB 4K Blu-ray despite frozen grain
Director: James Cameron
Sources: movie-censorship.com (opens in a new tab)
Fox Blu-ray for original cuts without the extra scene added in the re-release and AI upscaling
Newer Blu-ray/4K has the extra scene, but is poor and has excessive AI upscaling
An additional scene was added to the ending of the movie in the 2022 re-release: https://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=493908
Director: Sidney Lumet
Criterion 4K Blu-ray replacement disc for fixed audio (there were some dialogues missing)
While the video on the replacement disc is exactly the same as the original release, the Atmos with missing lines has been corrected as it was also corrected on the Criterion commentary. Criterion also included the 6-track which is almost identical to the PAL track; It’s 4.0 in a 5.1 container. This 6-track is slightly better than the PAL DVD track as the PAL has some flutter on some parts that Criterion doesn’t have.
The Atmos on the replacement is identical to the Imprint AUS Blu-ray track which also has all the lines. The compatibility track is also the same,
It is worth mentioning the Imprint only has the Atmos and no 6-track. The 5.1 surround is with LFE and split surrounds and it’s just a downmix of the Atmos. Ditto for the LPCM 2.0 on said Blu-ray.
Director: Michael Arias
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
GKIDS 4K Blu-ray is a sharpened upscale. Caps
GKIDS 4K Blu-ray has a true lossless English dub and correct volume levels for the Japanese audio
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