Police Story 2 HKL R2 vs Dragon Dynasty R1 vs IVL

[luckystars]

Christ, that HKL disc was a disaster. We sure put up with a lot from HKL in 2002 - not even Fortune Star would pull those kind of monkey shines these days.

Its still a solid release of the theatrical cut

[grim_tales]

Really? Even back then it looked poor, didnt it lose about 20% of the picture?
Just a shame theres no other release of Jackie's cut out there.

[Markgway]

Yeah, it was cropped to about 2.00 (from 2.35) and sported the usual muffled remix.

The Detlamac DVD was sadly letterboxed, but OAR and with original mono.

[Killer Meteor]

The HKL release also had the nerve to actually state it was 2.25:1 on the box (usually they just listed 16:9)!

It's funny how in 2002 I never noticed the stretching that leaves the actors with rugby-bull like heads!

[grim_tales]

I had a look at the ADC DVD and it looked pretty nice to me.
Where did they get the video from? I thought the HK BD uses the Japanese version of the film but the DVD definitely used the theatrical cut. The sound and subs seemed fine.

[Markgway]

I believe that they used the extended cut and then edited it down to replicate the theatrical cut.

What source did they use for the end credits? HKL?

[grim_tales]

Doesnt look like it to me, theres picture info in the frame than I remember at the end and the transfer is better. Looks like DD but not sure

[Markgway]

Looks like DD but not sure

Didn't DD use the Extended Cut's alt. outtakes and reprise of the original's theme?

Here's the original outtakes/theme song (but with English credits as that's all I could find...)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpT7jhLnCEM

[grim_tales]

Maybe they used that as the source and put Chinese credits on?
I had another quick look and the custom DVD is definitely not cropped compared to the HKL. (I can tell mostly because some of the copyright warning at the end - is chopped off on the right on HKL's version). On the ADC disc you can see whats going on clearly. On the HKL everything is too dark, muddy looking and green.
The ADC disc must have been from a PAL source
Though, weirdly - HKL have an outtake montage on their DVD (same outtakes) which feature no cropping at all

[saltysam]

uploaders comments for this

"I have recreated the original 105 minute Hong Kong version of this film, using the Fortune Star transfer of the extended cut (sourced from the HK Blu-ray) with the missing shots pulled from an old French DVD. I sourced the original mono mix from a VHS that I found. There were some glitches in the audio. I tried to fix most of them, but a few remain. I've also included the audio tracks and English subtitles from the Hong Kong Legends DVD. The Mandarin track was sourced from the Deltamac DVD."

Audio Tracks:

#1 Cantonese Original Mono
#2 Cantonese 5.1 Remix
#3 English Dub
#4 Mandarin
#5 Audio Commentary by Miles Wood and Jude Poyer

Subtitles:

English

[grim_tales]

Thanks Salty, interesting The French DVD must have been where they got the outtakes from I guess.