Thursday 21 April 2022

The Wizard of Oz (1939)

1988 Criterion LaserDisc [CC1159L]: Heavy noise reduction. The most muffled and distorted rendition of the mono by far. The channel in the analogue track with the soundtrack uses the same mastering.

1989 MGM LaserDisc [ML101656]: The digital channel with the film's soundtrack sounds excellent and is easily my favourite among these. While I don't think it's completely free of manipulation (frequencies above 8 kHz are de-emphasised), it runs circles around every later release. At 1:39:20 (equivalent UHD timecode), the first word in Dorothy's "There's no place like home" is truncated. The analogue track shares the same mastering. 

1989 MGM Hi-Fi VHS: Like the 1989 LaserDisc, but more brightly EQed. Not pictured below.

1991 MGM LaserDisc [ML101656]: Identical to the 1989 LaserDisc.

1993 MGM LaserDisc [ML103990] - Ultimate Oz: Less noise removal than the Criterion, but significantly more than the 1989 LaserDisc. Some bass removal too.

1997 R1 MGM DVD: Like the Ultimate Oz LaserDisc but with some limiting.

2005 R1 Warner DVD - Special Edition: Based on the fluctuations in hiss visible on top of ~every utterance of dialogue, I think this is a new mono mixdown created from 'restored' (NRed, de-crackled, de-essed, EQed) dialogue and music/effects stems. Normally I'd arrive at this conclusion by finding sync discrepancies between the dialogue and music/effects, but I can't find any here - which just means that someone did a competent job syncing the dialogue and music/effects to match the theatrical mix. At 9:50 (UHD timecode), Dorothy says (what sounds to me like), "Oh don't!" The take itself isn't different, but the first two words are edited; in every previous release she says (again, what sounds to me like), "Oh To, oh don't!" Some of the background effects as she fiddles with the basket in the next 1.5 seconds are also subtly different. Fidelity-wise, this track sometimes sounds better than the Ultimate Oz mastering and sometimes worse - it varies from scene to scene, but I think they're grossly similar.

2009 Warner Blu-ray: Like the 2005 Warner DVD.

So much fuss has been made online (usually by the same people) about the edited Toto line. I think it's completely inconsequential relative to the horrendous amount of hiss and bass reduction on every modern release. (I encounter small editing mistakes like this in so many tracks that I usually don't even bother mentioning them here.) The 5.1 mix sounds the same across all releases and has the Toto error, but more importantly it has even more noise reduction than every mono track above other than perhaps the Criterion. 







7 comments:

  1. How's the mono on the UHD disc? I assume not good seeing how you didn't mention it, but I figured I'd ask anyway since you included 2009 B-R too.

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    1. That’s the UHDs biggest issue. It has no original audio at all! The second disc included is the 2009 bd master with the lossy mono but is the version from the 3D reissue where they put the new documentary on the 2009 disc.

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  2. To be honest the Toto line issue people talk about sounds like another Warner audio issue that drives me nuts: how in their remastering of the Fleischer Superman cartoons the iconic opening narration frequently is cut down from “a never ending battle for truth and justice” to the jump cut “never ending battle for truth-justice.”

    The heavy noise reduction on a big catalog title doesn’t surprise me at all. What is surprising is that the criterion is bested by the MGM-but then again maybe not so much since the MGM was using a higher quality source to begin with.

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  3. I actually saw a video with a sample of the unrestored audio track and it sounded marvelous minus the pops and such, so much high end detail compared to the 5.1 mix

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    1. An edition released before the 1989 restoration?

      I'm curious how that compares. A few of the Hi-Fi tapes released in the mid-'80s have electronically-reprocessed-to-stereo audio tracks.

      Can you find that video?

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    2. I didn't say it was an "edition", this restoration video was made I'm guessing whenever the 2005 DVD was released and they happened to play a sample of the unrestored audio element they used, it's brief but it tells the whole story, especially soon after whenever they play a sample of the 5.1 track

      https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qKFZ8qxmjF4

      Go to 9:28

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  4. Oh, I guess I was mistaken then. I saw a mono track with the UHD in someplace, but I guess it's from the 2009 disc, shame!

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