Alfred Hitchcock Presents DVD Set

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Eric Paddon · #1 Post by **Eric Paddon** » Mon Oct 10, 2005 12:00 pm

It's becoming increasingly evident that Universal has been sacrificing quality for quantity since they started opening up their vault of classic TV shows on DVD. While it's been nice to see so many titles, what hasn't been nice is how all of them have been barebones releases with minimal to no extras, and how many suffer from inferior elements utilized, or from pressing problems.

The release of Season 1 of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" last week shows more signs of this alas. The episode "Breakdown" one of the several first season episodes directed by Hitchcock himself, and starring Joseph Cotten, looks dreadful, with the kind of drop-outs in the image that one would expect to see on a deteriorating VHS tape, that you almost wonder if it was transferred from that kind of source. Other episodes seem to look fine but the further shoddiness of this set comes when one bypasses the "Play All" feature to look at individual episodes and then finds one has to look at an "episode summary" that pretty much manage to give away the entire episode from the outset!

It's too bad that Universal isn't putting the kind of extra care into these TV releases that these shows need. And it seems to me that Universal isn't committed to putting many of the shows that have gotten their first season released out for the rest of their runs. THey almost seem to be throwing out a mass number of titles and will then only release subsequent years for those that they think are selling better. This no doubt explains why "Night Gallery" is still stuck on Season 1 after more than a year.

AndyDursin · #2 Post by **AndyDursin** » Mon Oct 10, 2005 9:47 pm

I'm hoping to get a review copy of this Eric, but it doesn't sound good. I haven't had many problems myself with the "DVD 18" format which Universal uses -- the Hammer Legacy set looks great to my eyes and I haven't had an issue with them. Bad transfers, though, are something altogether else...I'm disappointed to hear that.

Eric Paddon · #3 Post by **Eric Paddon** » Tue Oct 11, 2005 1:39 pm

Some more bad news to report on this set courtesy of the early reviews at Amazon.com. Not only are many customers again having the problem with defective pressings (I've been lucky so far but I have to admit I'm worried particularly after my nasty experience with the Adam-12 and Emergency sets. Universal has got to stop this DVD-18 practice) but many episodes appear to be cut. Not in terms of story content but in terms of Hitchcock's closing segments. SOP was always for Hitchcock coming back to give one of his reassuring bits about how the murderer didn't get away with his crime, then another sarcastic comment about the commercial and then coming back for the final goodnight. But many episodes are missing the first part of these closing segments entirely from the look of things.

Universal's cheapness is beyond belief on their TV sets and the only thing I've left to say is, thank God the original Battlestar Galactica was practically the only show put out by the old Universal management and in the process got a spectacular first-class treatment that no other Universal show has gotten since.

AndyDursin · #4 Post by **AndyDursin** » Tue Oct 11, 2005 2:14 pm

Eric Paddon wrote:Some more bad news to report on this set courtesy of the early reviews at Amazon.com. Not only are many customers again having the problem with defective pressings (I've been lucky so far but I have to admit I'm worried particularly after my nasty experience with the Adam-12 and Emergency sets. Universal has got to stop this DVD-18 practice) but many episodes appear to be cut. Not in terms of story content but in terms of Hitchcock's closing segments. SOP was always for Hitchcock coming back to give one of his reassuring bits about how the murderer didn't get away with his crime, then another sarcastic comment about the commercial and then coming back for the final goodnight. But many episodes are missing the first part of these closing segments entirely from the look of things.

Universal's cheapness is beyond belief on their TV sets and the only thing I've left to say is, thank God the original Battlestar Galactica was practically the only show put out by the old Universal management and in the process got a spectacular first-class treatment that no other Universal show has gotten since.

You're right Eric, BATTLESTAR did turn out OK, as did BUCK ROGERS, but a lot of these older sets (which frankly I haven't seen) have been hammered by a lot of fans.

As far as the DVD-18 goes, I have a number of their discs and haven't had one problem -- whether it was those Universal Legacy Collection Monsters sets, or the Hammer Franchise Collection (which is outstanding), or the 2-pack of FIRESTARTER and DRAGONHEART.

I'm almost wondering if the problem has something to do re: consumers with older DVD players, which weren't produced to be fully compatable with that kind of media. Occasional defects are not totally out of the realm of possibility, but someone who keeps having the same issues with DVD-18 (like a few people over on the Home Theater Forum) might have a player-compatability issue.

Eric Paddon · #5 Post by **Eric Paddon** » Tue Oct 11, 2005 2:31 pm

Well, I've had problems with some of these Universal sets. On "Adam-12" the final side wouldn't load on my main player, which is a relatively new Sony DVD/VHS combo player, and "Emergency" would freeze up repeatedly on it, but both played fine on an older combo machine. It just seems like that it's bound to be a hit and miss proposition whenever you buy a Universal set and if you have more DVD players at your disposal, the better off you are.

mkaroly · #6 Post by **mkaroly** » Tue Oct 18, 2005 7:46 pm

Wow- based on these reviews I'm glad I didn't get the set! Thanks for the head's up....

AndyDursin · #7 Post by **AndyDursin** » Wed Oct 19, 2005 1:45 am

I'm STILL waiting for my review copy to come in. Universal TV....very slow.

On the other hand, they were very kind to send me a review copy of the 15-disc ALFRED HITCHCOCK: MASTERPIECE COLLECTION set.

What a bargain! You get the deluxe DVDs of all of Universal's 14 Hitchcock features (REAR WINDOW, PSYCHO, VERTIGO, FRENZY, MARNIE, MAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH, etc.) with the added bonus of Vertigo's 16:9 new transfer (not crazy about that movie especially but I know fans who love it), a bonus DVD and booklet...and better yet, it's between $80-$90 depending on where you look.

That's roughly $6.50 (or less) a film! All the discs are on their own dual-layer platter as well (no DVD-18 Eric), so if you didn't buy the respective, original Universal Collector's Edition releases (or only own a few of them), this is a must-have package!

Eric Paddon · #8 Post by **Eric Paddon** » Sun Oct 30, 2005 1:19 am

The episode that suffers most from truncation in terms of Hitchcock wraparounds appears to be "Baby Sitter" with Thelma Ritter. On that episode, there is no Hitch intro at all, it just goes straight from opening music to episode title!