All Quiet on the Western Front (Blu-ray) (1979) UPDATED

[Brent_Reid]

The Australian BD is the one to be avoided, not the winner. The film was originally made in widescreen for worldwide theatrical exhibition, but ultimately distribution was only secured outside of the US. The Oz BD has an incorrect open matte transfer, while the others, at 1.78:1, are close to its intended 1.75:1. The Oz disc is a port of the unlisted UK ITV BD.

The German BD is also available on its own (ASIN B00A8C8FG6). It's also been released on legit BD by Divisa in Spain (ASIN B01LZ7ZK4G), in addition to their Resen bootleg.

[James-Masaki_Ryan]

Updated Germany as the winner.
Do you have the ITV Blu-ray to confirm the specs are identical?

[Brent_Reid]

I don't own the ITV. The rear sleeve says 16:9 but could be wrong (I hope it isn't). The only informed source I can find is the MichaelDVD review (see second paragraph in "R4 vs R1" section). Could be another candidate for a shout out to other members?

[James-Masaki_Ryan]

I think that review is enough to go by, and added the UK release. Thanks!

[Brent_Reid]

Cheers James. Some of the current edit descriptions are mixed up and they're all a little misleading. The two versions are:

- Original full length version (aka "TV" version, "director's cut", etc.)
- Edited theatrical version (simply has scenes excised: no alternate footage or takes, etc.)

For clarity I'd recommmend using these descriptions only; there is no "director's cut" or anything else. On that basis, personally I'd put the US ahead for its minor extras. If the German BD truly contained the theatrical edit it might have been worth placing it equally for the curiosity value. However, according to Movie-Censorship.com* the German BD's edit is a roughly done approximation for BD and not the true theatrical version: https://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=306903.

*Which again uses the wrong titles but at least acknowledges they're wrong!

[James-Masaki_Ryan]

Updated the versions.

[Brent_Reid]

Nearly there: it still says "director's cut" in the footnotes and the version names for the German BD's timings are wrongly swapped. It might be worth adding the Movie-Censorship link too.

[James-Masaki_Ryan]

Done. Time to call it a day...

[Brent_Reid]

I agree!