Saturday Night Fever Blu-ray

Saturday Night Fever

 (1977)

Drama | Musical | Romance



Tony is an uneducated Brooklyn teenager. The highlight of his week is going to the local disco, where he is the king of the dancefloor. Tony meets Stephanie at the disco and they agree to dance together in a competition. Stephanie resists Tony's attempts to romance her, as she aspires to greater things; she is moving across the river to Manhattan. Gradually, Tony also becomes disillusioned with the life he is leading and he and Stephanie decide to help one another to start afresh.

For more details about Saturday Night Fever on Blu-ray, see the Saturday Night Fever Blu-ray Review

Starring: John Travolta, Karen Gorney, Barry Miller, Joseph Cali, Paul Pape
Director: John Badham

Saturday Night Fever Blu-ray, Video Quality

 


Saturday Night Fever dances onto the Blu-ray format in a 1080p/AVC encode, framed in a 1:85:1 aspect ratio. I was completely taken by surprise at how good this 31 year old flick looks. I have seen this movie in so many incarnations, on television, DVD, and even at the theater in its 20th anniversary presentation, and it never looked this good. This is truly a 70's flick complete with diffusion filters, soft light, and dull colors. Filmed in spherical Panavision the source is clean, dirt and blemish free, with grain that is well managed and never obtrusive. Colors are well balanced with well saturated primaries and no bleeding. Flesh tones are realistic, have excellent texture, and without the push toward too much red. Detail is excellent in facial features and clothing, and close ups are particularly impressive. Wide angle shots are variable in the level of detail rendered, but they are always clean and clear. I found the details in interior shots of the club to be fuzzy in the background, but clean and clear in the foreground. I would attribute that to the low lighting and the diffusive filtering applied to the images. Blacks are noise free and deep without being crushed. Contrast is excellent which helps colors pop during bright scenes. The movie looks very good for its age, and Paramount should be congratulated for their fine work on this film.

Saturday Night Fever Blu-ray, Audio Quality

 


Presented in Dolby TrueHD 5.1 surround at a 24/48 kHz bit and sample rate, Saturday Night Fever sounds impressive for a 70's movie production. The music really benefits from this encoding as the Bee Gee's music sounds terrific, and really sparkles in remixed 5.1 surround sound. It has more midrange weight, high frequency detail, and clean punchy low bass than I have heard in past releases. I found dynamics to be a bit constrained, dialog a bit canned and lacking weight, but always intelligible. The sound field opens up during the musical numbers, as they benefit from the use of the surround channels. The frontal soundstage has good lateral separation and excellent clarity. To be fair, this is a 70's sound track, and it will never sound as good as sound track recently mixed. Overall I thought this sound track sounded pretty darn good for its age.

Saturday Night Fever Blu-ray, News and Updates

• Paramount Announces Catalog Titles for May - February 10, 2009

Saturday Night Fever Blu-ray, Forum Discussions

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