Hong Kong Rescue #1: Hard Boiled

[LucasGodzilla]

"The transfer was made from a newly-struck 35mm interpositive. The sound was mastered from the original 3-track magnetic mono master."

Ive got to say Ive always thought the quality of the original Cantonese mono track for Hard Boiled sounded awful!
On all releases.
The English dub track in comparison sounds great, so I have no idea what happened.

Could be a few reasons why that is I imagine. One could simply be that it's just a rather rubbish audio track from the start that upgraded overseas (like in the case of The Beyond which went from Italian mono to English Dolby Stereo under the 7 Doors Of Death cut). Another reason could be that the track was just poorly captured for the first release and it's just sort of carried over to other releases since. Makes me wonder if the optical audio on a print would be any better.

[CSchmidlapp]

Another reason could be that the track was just poorly captured for the first release and it's just sort of carried over to other releases since. Makes me wonder if the optical audio on a print would be any better.

The print I saw sounded the same, but the bass was pumped up.
I say pumped up because I came to the conclusion that it was most probably done by the theater, due to me pumping the bass up on my DVD and its sounding much the same.

[Serums]

One thing I've been curious about is if HKR used msp1518's colour correction. I know msp1518 worked with HKR on some of their early releases, in terms of the audio. I remember him saying that he put a ton of work into colour correcting the Japanese print shot by shot.

[LucasGodzilla]

One thing I've been curious about is if HKR used msp1518's colour correction. I know msp1518 worked with HKR on some of their early releases, in terms of the audio. I remember him saying that he put a ton of work into colour correcting the Japanese print shot by shot.

Admittedly that sounds a little concerning admittedly if I read that right since I can just imagine him screwing with the shot-to-shot color relationship rather than trying to match up the reels color-wise.

Anyways, now that SWT is back up, I was able to check for any details about the 35mm print of the movie available and it is listed as "HARD-BOILED (1992)- LPP, Excellent, 6rls*#". Too bad there doesn't seem to be any mentioning as to whether or not it's in English or Cantonese. I may honestly make a thread here on FanRes soon since Big Trouble In Little China's not really going anywhere atm and I recall seeing a bit of interest in seeing this being done over on SWT (with the highest donator benefactor for The Keep having this on the top of his list).

[Serums]

One thing I've been curious about is if HKR used msp1518's colour correction. I know msp1518 worked with HKR on some of their early releases, in terms of the audio. I remember him saying that he put a ton of work into colour correcting the Japanese print shot by shot.

Admittedly that sounds a little concerning admittedly if I read that right since I can just imagine him screwing with the shot-to-shot color relationship rather than trying to match up the reels color-wise.

Anyways, now that SWT is back up, I was able to check for any details about the 35mm print of the movie available and it is listed as "HARD-BOILED (1992)- LPP, Excellent, 6rls*#". Too bad there doesn't seem to be any mentioning as to whether or not it's in English or Cantonese. I may honestly make a thread here on FanRes soon since Big Trouble In Little China's not really going anywhere atm and I recall seeing a bit of interest in seeing this being done over on SWT (with the highest donator benefactor for The Keep having this on the top of his list).

I do have msp's own release of Hard Boiled, and would be happy to provide some screencaps if it'd give you an idea of how it looks? Since he originally tried to post it on ADC and eventually did so on a certain well known public tracker that I no longer have access to, I no longer have any reference for what he posted about it.

That 35mm print does sound like an interesting prospect...

[LucasGodzilla]

I do have msp's own release of Hard Boiled, and would be happy to provide some screencaps if it'd give you an idea of how it looks? Since he originally tried to post it on ADC and eventually did so on a certain well known site that I no longer have access to, I no longer have any reference for what he posted about it.

Do you mind posting some of those caps here? I'm quite curious to hear about this now.

[Serums]

I do have msp's own release of Hard Boiled, and would be happy to provide some screencaps if it'd give you an idea of how it looks? Since he originally tried to post it on ADC and eventually did so on a certain well known site that I no longer have access to, I no longer have any reference for what he posted about it.

Do you mind posting some of those caps here? I'm quite curious to hear about this now.

Certainly. I've taken some random screencaps, please let me know if you'd like to see any from a specific point in the film.

[LucasGodzilla]

Certainly. I've taken some random screencaps, please let me know if you'd like to see any from a specific point in the film.

It seems to be the same master as the HKR release.

[CSchmidlapp]

One thing I've been curious about is if HKR used msp1518's colour correction. I know msp1518 worked with HKR on some of their early releases, in terms of the audio. I remember him saying that he put a ton of work into colour correcting the Japanese print shot by shot.

Admittedly that sounds a little concerning admittedly if I read that right since I can just imagine him screwing with the shot-to-shot color relationship rather than trying to match up the reels color-wise.

Anyways, now that SWT is back up, I was able to check for any details about the 35mm print of the movie available and it is listed as "HARD-BOILED (1992)- LPP, Excellent, 6rls*#". Too bad there doesn't seem to be any mentioning as to whether or not it's in English or Cantonese. I may honestly make a thread here on FanRes soon since Big Trouble In Little China's not really going anywhere atm and I recall seeing a bit of interest in seeing this being done over on SWT (with the highest donator benefactor for The Keep having this on the top of his list).

Certainly. I've taken some random screencaps, please let me know if you'd like to see any from a specific point in the film.

It seems to be the same master as the HKR release.

Wow, keep me updated on the 35mm print project bud!
Anymore Woo gems on there?
Both Bullet in the Head and The Killer have been on my radar for a while.

So....I'm kind of connected to this release through msp1518.
I was working on a Hard Boiled and The Killer restoration project on OT that I shared 'works in progress' versions and conversations with him.
Id done alot of research and accumulated alot of material.
He did his own Hard Boiled project when the Japanese Bluray came out and used my custom subs I ripped and adapted / corrected from the U.K Tartan releases (although adapted further, as msp1518 considered mine to British lol)
He spent along time syncing the original mono (it ended up being a better sync than the original mix) and EQing it so the gun shots ect we're not the same level as the voices.
msp1518 did indeed work on the picture, but I believe it was just Contrast and Brightness adjustments.

It was not allowed on ADC (R.I.P) because they had a rule about only allowing untouched sources.
The HKR releases caused quite a stir in the forums there due to as most we're not allowed.
Although the HKR release did appear.
I'm pretty sure it was his release that was on the HKR disc, as he was working with HKR on a few projects at the time.

To be honest, I'm pretty sure alot of the material on this release came from me originally.

I also ended up seeing clips from my The Killer project in the 'HKR Trailer'!
Sadly there was no acknowledgement by the group for any of the above, and (after a few more controversies which I will not get into here) Ill be honest it left a bad taste in my mouth.

Excellent release though (as all of them are) and the work put into them is truly exceptional.
There Wheels on Meals (which msp1518 did the sound work on also) restoration was above and beyond.


I'm a 'credit's due where credits due' kind of guy so I'm going to also give a shout out to singhcr who supplied the 1.1 rip of the Japanese Blu he imported at great costs to himself (and sent to me as a BDR copy via traditional mail I might add. Legend ). without him this project would not of started when it did.

[LucasGodzilla]

Wow, keep me updated on the 35mm print project bud!
Anymore Woo gems on there?
Both Bullet in the Head and The Killer have been on my radar for a while.

So....I'm kind of connected to this release through msp1518.
I was working on a Hard Boiled and The Killer restoration project on OT that I shared 'works in progress' versions and conversations with him.
Id done alot of research and accumulated alot of material.
He did his own Hard Boiled project when the Japanese Bluray came out and used my custom subs I ripped and adapted / corrected from the U.K Tartan releases (although adapted further, as msp1518 considered mine to British lol)
He spent along time syncing the original mono (it ended up being a better sync than the original mix) and EQing it so the gun shots ect we're not the same level as the voices.
msp1518 did indeed work on the picture, but I believe it was just Contrast and Brightness adjustments.

It was not allowed on ADC (R.I.P) because they had a rule about only allowing untouched sources.
The HKR releases caused quite a stir in the forums there due to as most we're not allowed.
Although the HKR release did appear.
I'm pretty sure it was his release that was on the HKR disc, as he was working with HKR on a few projects at the time.

To be honest, I'm pretty sure alot of the material on this release came from me originally.

I also ended up seeing clips from my The Killer project in the 'HKR Trailer'!
Sadly there was no acknowledgement by the group for any of the above, and (after a few more controversies which I will not get into here) Ill be honest it left a bad taste in my mouth.

Excellent release though (as all of them are) and the work put into them is truly exceptional.
There Wheels on Meals (which msp1518 did the sound work on also) restoration was above and beyond.


I'm a 'credit's due where credits due' kind of guy so I'm going to also give a shout out to singhcr who supplied the 1.1 rip of the Japanese Blu he imported at great costs to himself (and sent to me as a BDR copy via traditional mail I might add. Legend ). without him this project would not of started when it did.

Well, I am very sorry to hear that you've had such a troubled past with HKR. Also thanks for the info about what corrections were made; Makes sense why the colors are wrong despite being boasted to have been worked extensively on.

Anyways, over on SWT, Hard Boiled got $50 overnight so that's certainly a start at least. I've yet to make a proper thread for it here nor Original Trilogy yet though so I wonder how that'll go once I do that.

Anyways, I also checked the inventory to see if either of the other two movies are there and uh, well, good news and bad news! Bad news: No print for The Killer. Good news: There is a print for Bullet In The Head ("BULLET IN THE HEAD (1991)- LPP, 6rls, Mint, English dubbed*"), though I don't plan on looking into it any time soon.

Though that being said, you are welcome to start a preservation thread for it yourself (after all, you seem to have experience working with getting these movies restored, it'd be fitting lol). Supposing it's the theatrical runtime, the total funds that'd need to be raised would end up being around $1075 (5*Minutes + 425)?