The Impossible Quest for a Proper Tabloid (DVD/ Blu-ray Comparison)

Collecting DVDs shouldn't be this hard.  Tabloid is a fairly recent Errol Morris documentary that first debuted on DVD in 2011 from IFC Films.  It's super entertaining.  But here's the thing: the DVD itself?  It's not so great.  So I decided to try my hand at importing, and it turns out - with this title at least - you just can't win.

But you can at least do better than the US DVD.

It goes without saying that an Errol Morris documentary is a great documentary; but in recent years, he's been doing a lot of very serious, sometimes rather depressing, war films.  However, as Morris put it in his director's statement, "Tabloid is a return to my favorite genre - sick, sad and funny."  It's a completely crazy story about a beauty queen who fell in love with a Mormon, hired a pilot and a couple of heavies to sneak into the UK, kidnap him at gunpoint for a weekend of love-making and then smuggle him out of the country.  And there's no way you'd guess all the crazy turns this true story takes.  I certainly won't spoil it for you here, but it's a real "you can't make these things up" kind of show.

The only release we have of this film in the US is that 2011 IFC Films DVD.  I had it pre-ordered well before it came out, but after being disappointed by the disc, I figured there had to be something better in another region.  2012 saw new DVDs in the UK and Australia, so I went with Dogwoof's UK disc, because it promised a unique set of extras.  It was an improvement but still a disappointment, so later on I put out the feelers for another search.  Surely a recent film this good has to be available in HD, right?  And sure enough, there was a 2013 blu-ray released in the Netherlands from Remains In Light (yes, that's the company's name) that even seemed to include the UK special features.  Perfect, right?  Third time's the charm?  Nope.  Here's why.

2011 US DVD top; 2012 UK DVD mid; 2013 NL blu bottom.

Gah!  Look at the interlacing in that first pic!  How does that happen on a modern day release from a legit, mainstream studio?  The answer, of course: it doesn't.  Clearly the devil had to have been involved.  Moving down to Dogwoof's UK disc and thankfully that's fixed.  It's decidedly darker (look at the "Manacled Mormon" block in the second shots), with some slightly crushed blacks; but otherwise it's not too bad. But that's alright, the blu-ray should be the best of both worlds and take care of all of those issues, plus boost us up to a crisper HD image, right?  And it does.  It's pretty great, except... what?  It's in the completely wrong aspect ratio.  The DVDs are in their original, very wide 2.40:1 ratio, but the blu-ray, well, it claims to be 1.85:1 on the case, but is even wrong about that, coming in at 1.78:1.  It's a bit of a split, partially opening up the mattes to give us more vertical information, yet also cutting off some of the sides.

Audio-wise, the US DVD comes through alright, giving us a solid 5.1 mix with optional English and Spanish subs.  Dogwoof gives us the same, minus any subtitle option.  Remains In Light gives us two audio tracks, Dolby 5.1 and DTS-HD 5.1, both in English, so that's nice.  Their only subtitle options are Dutch and French, though.

So let's talk special features.  The US DVD has nothing but the trailer, which is another reason why I was so keen to search elsewhere.  The UK DVD promises multiple things, as you can still see on the label's official page and the back of the case, including:

* Trailer
* Director Statement
* Deleted Scenes
* Extended Interviews
* Additional Trailers

But that's pretty misleading.  The director's statement is just a short bit of text written on the inside of the case, not an on-disc extra of any kind, and the deleted scenes and extended interviews are both referring to the same brief things.  There are four (total) deleted scenes, which are extra little clips from the interviews. The DVD packaging says the extras are "15 min. approx," but they must be including all the bonus trailers and ads, because it really totals five and a half minutes, generously eight including the film's trailer.  I prefer to assume that the DVD was originally going to have more extras that got pulled at the last minute, and just wound up in the disc's notes, rather than Dogwoof deliberately trying to trick buyers into thinking they had more substantial features than they actually did, but either way it's kind of a bummer.

deleted scene

With that said, though, a few extras beat no extras; and I'm always happy to see deleted scenes from Errol Morris films.  The ones included on Standard Operating Procedure and the First Person solo episode DVD were amazing.  These, well, one is quite compelling, but the other three don't add much at all.  I'm glad to have them, though.  And yes, these four extra scenes are also included on the blu, as is the trailer and some more bonus trailers.  I should also point out that the Dogwoof DVD comes in a slim case made entirely of recycled materials.  The design's alright, but it doesn't look too pretty spine-out on a shelf.

Remain In Light's disc is the only blu-ray release of Tabloid in the world, so basically you have to choose.  Which one is going to bother you less: watching this film in SD instead of HD, or watching it in the wrong aspect ratio?  Whatever your answer to that question is will determine whether the Dogwoof or Remain In Light disc is the right one for you.  Whatever you do, though, don't get the US DVD from IFC Films.  That's the worst.

Werner Herzog's Lo and Behold, Now a Special Edition Blu-Ray In the UK

So one of Werner Herzog's latest documentaries (Netflix has put out his volcano movie at almost the exact same time), Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World, has only been available as an almost barebones DVD for the last three weeks here in the United States.  That's better than nothing (I'm looking at you, volcano Netflix movie), but still pretty underwhelming.  Fortunately, things are much better in the UK, thanks to a neat little label on the rise known as Dogwoof.  Just this week, they've given us a nice, special edition blu-ray!

Update 7/12/18: I've added the US DVD edition for comparison.

Now, a documentary about the internet probably doesn't sound too thrilling, but Herzog's name should be a clear signal to any cinephile to expect something different.  The film's subtitle tells us all we need to know.  This isn't a long, academic recount of the web's history or predictions for its future, although we get some of both.  This is a collection of reveries about the internet; a loose series of documentary vignettes, some interconnected more than others, about our new, connected world.  Sure, we get our scientists and professors talking to us about the first internet message sent all the way back in the late 60s and how the technology is advancing.  We see self-driving cars and burgeoning robotics striving to develop artificial intelligence.

We basically explore what the internet is to everyone.  That means everything from scientists working out how to settle colonies on the moon to a commune of people living "off the grid" to avoid cellphone induced illness, looking very much like the non-fiction version of Todd Haynes' Safe.  We visit the family of the infamous Porsche Girl (if you're not already familiar, do yourself a favor and don't google it) who've been so cruelly tormented online that they explain their very earnest theory that, "I have always believed that the internet is a manifestation of the anti-Christ, of evil itself.  It is the spirit of evil.  And I feel like it's running through everybody on Earth, and it's claiming its victories in those people that are also evil."  But then it's back to amusing images of monks Tweeting and little robots training for The Robocup (go ahead and google it).  We meet internet addicts, hackers, cyber security agents and online universities.  And just about every scientist we meet is forced to struggle with Herzog's question, "could it be that the internet dreams of itself?"

2016 US Magnolia DVD on top; 2016 UK Dogwoof blu-ray bottom.

Unsurprisingly, we're looking at virtually identical transfers, clearly struck from the same master, except the Magnolia DVD is compressed to standard definition.  The blu looks predictably great, and very detailed.  Both releases are framed identically to full widescreen at 1.78:1.  This is a brand new digital film delivering its DCP straight to the label, so there's not much for Magnolia or Dogwoof to get wrong short of trying to screw with and alter the presentation, which thankfully they seem not to have done.  There's a softness to the DVD that's naturally crisp on the blu.  You'll appreciate it on a really large TV.

The original English 5.1 audio mix is presented in Dolby Digital on the DVD and proper lossless DTS-HD on the blu, which also has a second audio descriptive track for the visually impaired.  The blu has the advantage in subtitles, too, in that it has them in English, while the US DVD only has Spanish sub.

All reports of this blu pointed to it being a barebones disc right up to its release.  So you can imagine what a nice surprise it was to see an "OVER 2 HOURS OF SPECIAL FEATURES" sticker on the cover when my copy arrived.  And speaking of barebones discs, I called the US DVD "almost barebones" earlier, but to be fair, it does have one, quite respectable special feature: a roughly 20-minute on-camera interview with Werner Herzog, where he answers a lot of the fundamental questions that will arise when viewing this film, as well as a few cute questions about his relationship to the internet.  It's definitely a nice addition.

And yes, they've ported that over to their release as the + in their 2+ hours of special features.  The rest is made up of two very long Herzog interviews/ Q&As.  The first is from a screening of Lo and Behold, where he gets more in depth about the film, taking questions from the interviewer, the audience and Twitter.  Then the next is a similar on-stage interview, but this time acting as a retrospective of his career, going into his past work like Aguirre, Little Dieter Needs To Fly and Grizzly Man.  He only gets into Lo and Behold a little bit at the end when he takes questions from the audience, but that's fine, because that's been pretty thoroughly covered into the other two interviews.  Dogwoof's blu also includes the theatrical trailer and a small booklet with notes about the production.

People looking for a generic, instructional look at the internet may be put off by this collection of reveries, but Herzog fans will be delighted by yet another of his terrific documentaries.  And there's no question the Dogwoof release is the one to own, as it's the only HD version and has substantially more special features to boot.  And if this does well, make me we can compel Dogwoof to acquire the home video rights for Into the Inferno next.