Hey all, my sister will be getting married this weekend so we will have a lot of people over at my house. After the wedding people will be hanging out over here and I'll need some great movies to show off the theater. Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated.
I don't want anything real gory like Saving Private Ryan, but something that has great surround effects and bass... I guess a plot wouldn't hurt anything either
. Also, there was a web site that showed a list of current 6.1 movies but I can't remember what it is... I have not googled it yet, but if anyone knows off the top of their head I would love to look at it again.
I was thinking about Batman Begins, what do y'all (thats how we talk down here in Georgia
) think?
Here is my theory on showing off a home theater:
To impress people you have a limited amount of time to make a quick impact. So you have the option of starting with a movie, like Saving Private Ryan as you mentioned, that starts off with a bang. That will give them the wow factor you are after. The other option is to pick a movie where you can jump to a scene with good sound and visual effect. The problem is then you have to cut to the middle of a movie which may spoil the overall experience. What to do? How do you make a big impact in a short amount of time?
What does every movie theater start with, apart from commercials? They start with a preview/trailer. A trailer has only 60 seconds to convince the audience to lay down $10 the next time they want to see a movie. They often start out with "that narrator guy's" voice introducing the movie. I am sure you know who I am talking about. Then it is 45 seconds of that movies best sound effects, visual effects and hopefully some dialog as well. My favorite for this is Lost in Space. The trailer has all the elements I mentioned as well as full 5.1 sound, some good orchestral music and high quality MPEG 2 encoding for the video. Many DVD's have trailers with 2 channel stereo and grainy video. This one is good. Also, the title is family oriented so you don't need to worry about offending anyone.
After that put in a movie and you are good to go. I will also often demo the Dolby Digital trailers that came on DVD Spectacular but they are 4:3 ratio.
Good luck.
Greg
You could always plug in some good concert DVDs.
Everybody loves The Incredibles!
Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring is the best beginning I know of. It's so good in fact, I struggle to turn the darn movie off once I start it!
I picked up some demo DVDs off of eBay in the past. The most recent is chocked full of just movie trailers. ALl are in Dolby Digital 5.1. The first demo DVD I got last year was some trailers, but mainly clips from movies in both Dobly Digital 5.1 and DTS. They both include Dolby, DTS, and THX trailers. All have great sound and good picture. I know that it may be too late for an eBay purchase, but maybe someone closer to you has one.
Otherwise, I like the "Tumbler" sequence in Batman Begins, or the Lexus car factory scene in Minority Report (great bass). Saving Private Ryan has unbelievable effects in the opening 30 minutes, but it is hard for some people to watch.
Here are some favorite movies from people here (did a quick search)...
Jurassic Park (DTS)
Indiana Jones DVDs (did any awesome pan job with the surrounds)
Master and Commander (hated the movie, loved the surround)
Lord of the Rings Extended (DTS-ES)
Gladiator (DTS)
Neon Genesis Evangelion Platinum Series
The Eagle's Hell Freezes Over (wow...wow)
Saving Private Ryan (DTS)
Finding Nemo
S.W.A.T. opening scene
Jurassic Park (DTS)
Indiana Jones DVDs (did any awesome pan job with the surrounds)
Master and Commander (hated the movie, loved the surround)
Lord of the Rings Extended (DTS-ES)
Gladiator (DTS)
Neon Genesis Evangelion Platinum Series (coming to US fans this summer, I hear it is awesome!)
The Eagle's Hell Freezes Over (wow...wow)
Saving Private Ryan (DTS)
Finding Nemo
Star Wars 1,2,3 (light sabers are cool)
Titan AE
The Last Samaurai
The Italian Job - intro music was made for Axioms
The Time Machine - Dream Works version
Kill Bill - plummy tube amped electric guitar.
T3
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - Quidditch match
Any of the Lord of the Rings movies
Black Hawk Down
Blue Crush
Bourne Identity
The Haunting - Bass
Independence Day
Last of the Mohicans
Mission to Mars
Open Range
The Patriot
Seabiscuit
U-571 - Depth charges
We Were Soldiers
Good luck!
Thanks for the response all those are great suggestions. The Incredibles is a great idea, a whole spectrum of ages would like that one.
BrotherBob: I do have "Hell freezes over - Eagles" DVD
Craig: LOTR, that could work as well. I guess I'll select a few and give them the choice.
Nick: Thanks for the DVD list. On the preview DVD side.... I know some people buy special DVD's that have their personal message, trivia and intro's on them. How do you smoothly transition from the trivia dvd to the actual movie like the theaters? Trivia ends, lights dim... movie starts, that kind of thing. Going up to the DVD player kinda destroys the effect you were going for in the first place.
Finding Nemo is something everyone will like as well!
Dazed and Confused
ok I'm kidding
Or you can do what I do....
"I'm playing this. If you don't like it, there's the (
'ing ) door!"
J/K ... BrotherBob really couldn't be like that.
The Incredibles race scene is pretty er... incredible.
Really shows off that sub.
oz
I was actually talking about demo DVDs, you are talking about intro DVDs. Sirquack has one I believe... I have heard different ways of showing them. Some people have 2 DVD players. A nice one for the movie, and a cheap one to play the intro, and then they just time it with a couple of button pushes on the DVD remotes. Most systems will automatically switch inputs if done right.
Other people are using media center PCs (or HTPCs) and they put the whole intro image on the PC and load it up first with the movie DVD al ready to go and switch from the image file to the actual DVD. Others probably have even better ideas as well.
I'll add one more recommendation. Top Gun.
Some people complain about too much bass, and older versions are not enhanced for 16:9 playback, but everyone knows this movie and the sound of the F-14 in afterburner in the beginning of the movie will make anyone smile.
Greg
i always use DTS/THX demo dvd's such as SURROUND 9, or the THX Demo..i KNOW you guys don't like downloading, but...you can download the THX demo dvd on any torrent site. and since i OWN every one of the movies on there, i don't feel too bad about it.
also, try HERO, or HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS....great visuals and sound effects
If you want to show off your QS-8s, put on the Revenge of the Sith DVD! This morning I watched the first 30 minutes of the movie about three friggin' times! From the new THX intro until Greivous' ship crashes is absolutely amazing for the bass and surround effects.
I just watched the Episode III DVD but unfortunately had to do it with the surround system off as everyone is sleeping (picked it up and watched it after midnight).
Another awesome one is Twister (DTS).......WOW!
I have a DTS demo disc that I received free from buying some Belkin cables. Actually, I had two coupons and sent the other to Jack.
It has 2~3 minute scenes from maybe 8 movies on it that are all demo material. It might be available from their website??
I Just watched Star Wars Episoide 3 last night and I would have to say that would be a great referance disk. The one other than that I would suggest would be Lord of the Rings the Return of the King Extended Edition. Star Wars Episode 1 and 2 or the other LOTR discs are great as well.
The DTS demo disks from DTS themselves are for "resellers" only. You can email them and your mileage will vary (depending on if you are a reseller, or "pretend" to be)... I am not encouraging anyone to lie about it, but mearly pointing out the obvious.
marketinginfo@dts.com
Speaking of DTS, they have a new trailer out too called Sparks, but you need to be a "professional DVD author" to get it. Hmmm.... content@dts.com I wonder what it takes to become a professional DVD author....
Thanks for all the replies, if y'all think of anymore just let me know. I found the DTS 6.1 movie list page, it's:
http://www.dts.com/consumer/hometheater/dvd-titles.php. I also checked out
http://www.imdb.com/chart/top. The bottom 100 is pretty interesting as well... I know what not to show for sure.
i must say, i am suprised to find that Episode III does NOT have 6.1 on it. wtf is that all about? only 5.1 ??? i know lucas owns THX, but don't they have a 6.1 out yet?
It has Dolby Digital EX, which is 5.1 discrete channels and a 6th surround channel matrixed in with the other data. At least that is how I understand it. This is essentially considered 6.1. It's just not called 6.1 on the packaging because it is not truley a discrete channel, like DTS ES 6.1 is.
This is the same as all the current Star Wars films, or Pixar's Nemo or Incredibles. And this is about as good as there is anywhere for now, except for DTS ES.
You got it. The 6th channel is derived from the two surround channels. While there might be some issues with sound "bleeding" into the rear speaker from the other two surround channels, totally discrete separation is less of a concern in the back of the room, where sometimes it is better for the sound to "blend." That said, matrixing technology is no hard task these days, and the decoders are fairly sophisticated, especially when they only have to derive a rear surround channel from the two surround channels (whcih they do using phase-shifting). The thing that is really complex is de-matrixing a 2 channel, stereo signal into 7.1 discrete channels. going 2 to 8 channels makes going from 2 to 3 channels look like child's play.
Anyway - I also find it interesting that Lucas' loyalty to THX has limited him to Dolby technology, which is considerably more "lossy" than DTS, which his good pal Speilberg is a big supporter of. I guess it goes to show that profits and integrity are not always the best bed-mates.
you guys need these ...
I have 3,4,5,7,8,9 myself.
http://www.die-nussbaums.de/demodvds.php
the minority report version in these DTS demo is better than what's on the DVD movie itself (because this one is DTS-ES, while the movie is just DTS) you owe it to yourself to try this on a good sub.