Sherlock Holmes with Jeremy Brett (Granada Series) - Appreciation Thread

They actually went to 35mm for The Sign of Four. All others remained in 16mm.

The series actually looks like someone had an anachronistic 16mm camera in the 19th century and filmed these episodes. To me, that adds immeasurably to its authentic look. And the actors actually act like they are from the 19th century. (Or at least seem to be, since I obviously was not living back then.) Compare this to the Robert Downey films -- to me it looks like 21st century actors exported back in time over a hundred years.

 

Agreed; the production itself (sets, lighting, sound effects, photography) really places you in the period. And of course the performances are outstanding. As other have stated, Brett IS Holmes, and I enjoy both the Burke and Hardwicke takes on Watson.

 

As you may know, Brett and Hardwicke appeared on stage in the U.K. as those characters. There was a rumour that they were to appear on Broadway, where I definitely would have attended. But alas, it never happened.

 

Esteemed film restorer/historian Robert A. Harris received a preview set of MPI's upcoming 12-disc blu-ray release of the complete Granada TV series and has viewed most of it...and has given it a rave review of 5 out of 5 for both picture and sound quality...Sept. 30th can't come soon enough for me... Review (A Few Words from Robert Harris)is available at www.hometheaterforum.com

 

I wonder how the new blu-ray set compares to the Spanish one I own?

 

I have the Spanish blu-rays too and am equally curious, Todd...we'll both get to find out on the 30th...

 

How does the new set look?

 

::bump::

 

Well I own the Spanish blu-ray set and just got the US MPI blu-ray set. From what I can see so far, and I did an A/B comparison with the first discs, the Spanish set has a bit more digital noise reduction applied, not much, but a bit. The US set shows a small bit of grain, which is probably truer to the original 16mm film. In dark scenes, the grain goes a bit wild on the US set...it's a little cleaner on the Spanish set, but in doing this, some of the sharpness is decreased. Again, I'm being really fussy here, studying them hard. Popping either one in your BD player, you'd love either of them compared to the standard DVDs. By the way, I have the US MPI DVD set and the British ITV DVDs as well. Another obvious difference between the two BD sets is the US one is 12 discs, the Spanish one is 10. The first two series, "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" and "The Return of Sherlock Holmes" are on three discs each on the US set, 2 discs each on the Spanish set. The other three "series" are the same, 2 discs each. And yes, the bitrate is a little higher on the US set (on the first disc anyway) I haven't compared any other discs yet. The Spanish set averages about 16mbps on the first disc, and the US set about 24mbps. But you really wouldn't know it to look at them. Some might prefer the Spanish set, it looks a bit "smoother" so on a plasma TV it may look better. Another difference is the sound, the US set has a stereo lossless PCM soundtrack, the Spanish set has a Dolby Digital (lossy) soundtrack. The US set is louder, by comparison. I paid about $79 for the Spanish set, got a good deal on Amazon UK at the time. I just paid about $160 for all 5 sets of the US version, I didn't want to get the complete series set because everyone says the packaging is lousy, and I hate sets that have the discs nested over each other in the trays, so I opted for the separate sets in normal blu-ray Amaray boxes.

 

Thanks for the review!