Octopussy: Ultimate Edition (1983) |
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Octopussy: Ultimate Edition (1983) |
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| BUY IT |
| General | Extras | ||
| Category | Action |
Main Menu Audio & Animation Audio Commentary-Director - John Glen Audio Commentary-Cast - Roger Moore Featurette-Behind The Scenes-James Bond In India Featurette-James Brolin And Maud Adams Screentest Featurette-James Brolin Intro Featurette-James Brolin Intro: Vijay Featurette-Ken Burns On Set Movies Featurette-Behind The Scenes-James Brolin Screentest: Stuntmen Featurette-Location Scouting With Peter Lamont Featurette-Behind The Scenes-Shooting Stunts:Part 1 Crashing Jeeps Featurette-Behind The Scenes-Shooting Stunts Part 2 The Airplane Crash Featurette-Making Of-Testing The Limits Featurette-Making Of-Inside Octopussy: An Original Documentary Film Factoids-Designing Bond - Peter Lamond Music Video-"All Time High" Storyboards-The Taxi Chase Storyboards-Bond Rescues Octopussy Theatrical Trailer-Archive Gallery-Photo-Experience The World Of Bond In 1983 |
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| Rating | ? | ||
| Year Of Production | 1983 | ||
| Running Time | 125:22 | ||
| RSDL / Flipper |
RSDL (66:37) Dual Disc Set |
Cast & Crew | |
| Start Up | Ads Then Menu | ||
| Region Coding | 2,4 | Directed By | John Glen |
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Studio
Distributor |
 Sony Pictures Home Entertain |
Starring |
Roger Moore Maud Adams Louis Jourdan Kristina Wayborn Kabir Bedi Steven Berkoff David Meyer Tony Meyer Desmond Llewelyn Robert Brown Lois Maxwell Michaela Clavell Walter Gotell |
| Case | ? | ||
| RPI | $19.95 | Music | John Barry |
| Video | Audio | ||
| Pan & Scan/Full Frame | None |
English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English dts 5.1 (768Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) |
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| Widescreen Aspect Ratio | 2.35:1 | ||
| 16x9 Enhancement |
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| Video Format | 576i (PAL) | ||
| Original Aspect Ratio | 2.35:1 | Miscellaneous | |
| Jacket Pictures | No | ||
| Subtitles |
English English for the Hearing Impaired Dutch Swedish Finnish Norwegian Danish Greek Hindi English Audio Commentary Dutch Audio Commentary English Audio Commentary Dutch Audio Commentary |
Smoking | Yes |
| Annoying Product Placement | Yes | ||
| Action In or After Credits | Yes | ||
Octopussy is certainly one of the best Roger Moore Bond films and one of the better ones in the series. It has previously been released on DVD in Region 4 as a Special Edition in 2001. The review of the previous version can be found here and contains an excellent plot summary. This new version is significantly different. The main differences can be summarised as follows:
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| Original Special Edition | New Ultimate Edition |
| Video Transfer | Decent but afflicted by bad aliasing and some grain | Significant improvement with aliasing virtually eliminated and little or no grain. |
| Audio Transfer | Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround | Remastered Dolby Digital 5.1 and DTS 5.1 |
| Commentaries | One | Two, including a new one by Roger Moore |
| Other extras | Reasonable selection of making of, featurettes, music videos etc | Everything from the previous edition plus many new extras on a separate disc |
I would say the differences were worth the cost of upgrading, however at this time you would have to be prepared to shell out for the entire box set as there is no plan to release these discs separately.
The film itself is one which I have not seen for some time but has always stuck in my memory because it included a chase scene involving an Alfa GTV6, a type of car which I used to own (and love). I enjoyed watching it again, finding it entertaining and amusing, despite the occasional lapse into campiness. There were a few lame jokes offset with some good ones, quality stunts and action scenes such as the rickshaw chase and the pre-credits sequence and a couple of dodgy bits such as Bond's crocodile submarine.
In the Bond series, this film is notable due to the first appearance of Robert Brown as 'M' replacing the unfortunately deceased Bernard Lee. Robert Brown was later replaced by Dame Judi Dench in the Brosnan era. It is also the second of five Bond films directed by John Glen. Additionally it includes the second appearance of Maud Adams as a Bond leading lady, after her role in The Man With The Golden Gun. To my knowledge, she is the only actress to appear as the leading lady twice in Bond films. She also appeared briefly in A View to A Kill. One other thing which stood out for me in this film was the bad acting of Kristina Wayborn although that may have been a perception due to the poor ADR work for many of her lines. Louis Jourdan and Stephen Berkoff (in full scenery chewing mode) make for a nice baddy combination along with Kabir Bedi as the more physical baddy. Moore is pretty good in this film but never seems entirely comfortable in the fight scenes. I have also been watching his older television series The Saint recently and he appears much more comfortable fighting in that, probably due to his younger age.
This is the Bond film which went head to head with the non-official remake of Thunderball starring Sean Connery, Never Say Never Again.
This Ultimate Edition is highly recommended.
The video quality is excellent for a film of this age but not without some minor issues.
The feature is presented in a 2.35:1 aspect ratio 16x9 enhanced which is the original aspect ratio.
The Lowry restoration process has certainly resulted in a very clean and clear image throughout and this is undoubtedly the best this film will look from that perspective. However, having said that the sharpness although mostly very good did lapse sometimes into slight softness such as in long shots and most noticeably at 10:15 when some grain/minor macro-blocking appeared on a wall. The bitrate which was generally quite high dipped at this point. You should probably consider this point to be a nitpick as generally the picture was very sharp for a film of this age. The shadow detail was excellent for a film of this age.
The colour was very good and, to my eyes, natural throughout. I did not note any issues with skin tones as mentioned by other reviewers.
Film artefacts are now completely non-existent which is an improvement from the previous release. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for film-to-video artefacts with some minor aliasing, jagged edges and camera pan shimmer (eg 24:30) to be seen. Based on the previous review this has been significantly improved from the previous version, however is still present on this transfer. Examples included a door at 48:45 and a car grille at 104:56. Jagged edges can be seen on a jeep at 0:43, the umbrellas at 26:52 and occasionally elsewhere. In the grand scheme of things these incidences are minor.
There are 13 subtitle streams including English & English for the hearing impaired. The English subtitles were clear and easy to read but somewhat summarised. Four of the other streams are commentary subtitles, two sets for each commentary.
The layer change occurs at 66:37 and caused a slight jump on my player.
| Sharpness |   |
| Shadow Detail | |
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| Grain/Pixelization | |
| Film-To-Video Artefacts | |
| Film Artefacts | |
| Overall | |
The audio quality is excellent and based on the previous review a huge leap forward from the previous version.
This DVD contains an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack encoded at 448 Kb/s and an English DTS 5.1 soundtrack encoded at 768 Kb/s. There are also two commentaries encoded in Dolby Digital 2.0 surround, one at 224 Kb/s and one at 192 Kb/s. I watched the entire film in DTS and compared the Dolby Digital in a number of key scenes. Both are excellent, however I felt the DTS was more dynamic. There is excellent stereo separation with many right to left effects in addition to the excellent surround usage (see below). The clarity of the sound here highlights a few things such as the sloppy lip smacking sounds at 72:14 during a kiss and the chickens running from a crashing jeep during the pre-credits sequence.
Dialogue was clear and easy to understand at all times and there was no problem with audio sync, except for some sloppy ADR work, especially on Kristina Wayborn. There is one line where I am certain she is saying something very different to the actual line heard.
The score of this film is by John Barry who was responsible for many Bond scores. This one uses the theme from All Time High (the theme song) quite a bit and is generally quite a good addition to the film without being spectacular.
The surround speakers are put to excellent use throughout this film, obviously a huge step forward from the previous DVD release. I was really surprised how aggressive some of the sound was from the rear speakers considering the age and stereo origins of this film. The pre-credits sequence was especially obvious in this regard such as the plane, missiles and explosions. There were also other excellent passages such as the train at 98:00 and a gun fight at 59:15. Great stuff considering the original film was not designed with surround sound in mind like some many films are today.
The subwoofer was also surprisingly well used, although not to the extent of the surround speakers. The explosion at 6:35 and the creaking boat at 45:10 showed good LFE and bass was also regularly added to the music.
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| Audio Sync | |
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| Overall | |
There are copious extras spread over two discs. I will mark extras which did not appear on the previous release as **NEW**
The menu was very nicely designed, reminiscent of the Bond movie opening credits style. I did find them slightly non-obvious in terms of finding all the extras.
This commentary appeared on the previous version of the disc and is quite a decent commentary without setting the house on fire.
This is an excellent new commentary and one of the most entertaining ones I have heard recently. He starts the commentary by saying it won't really be a commentary as he does not plan to be very scene specific. He tells lots of interesting and funny anecdotes and makes some droll side remarks. He covers such diverse topics as the fall of the Berlin Wall, UNICEF, falling dress standards, Sean Connery and the non-official Bond film which came out at the same time. Definitely worth a listen.
DVD Production Credits
A behind the scenes featurette made at the time the movie was shot. This is truly one of the most boring featurettes I have ever had the misfortune to sit through. It is presented by a very serious voiceover man who sounds like he commentating on a nature doco. Presented in 1.33:1.
Original screen test footage of James Brolin testing for the role of James Bond in this film. They started testing other actors when Roger Moore was proving a difficult man to sign up to an agreement. He is teamed with Maud Adams who was also testing for the role of Octopussy. They perform some material from an older James Bond film. Presented in non 16x9 enhanced widescreen.
An interesting short interview with James Brolin about his experience screen testing for the movie. Presented in 1.33:1.
A quick interview with Brolin followed by screen test material of him, Vijay Armitraj and a cobra.
This is a really interesting and different featurette which consists of film taken by an on-set extra who was 16 years old at the time. He played a border guard and does commentary over his footage which has obviously been recorded recently. Presented in 1.33:1.
A portion of screentest doing action scenes with a stuntman.
Another interesting extra which consists of film taken by production designer Peter Lamont as he scouts locations in Berlin. It accompanied by his commentary.
This consists of footage of stunts from various angles and takes accompanied by commentary by the director. Includes commentary on injuries and issues.
This consists of footage of stunts from various angles and takes accompanied by commentary by the director. Fascinating the problems which an explosive laden plane can cause!
This one is footage of the aerial stunt team practicing the fight on top of the aeroplane accompanied by the director's commentary.
This fairly pointless set of extras consists of highlights from the film separated into small segments and categorised into 007, Opening Titles, Spy in Disguise, Women, Allies, Villains, Mission Combat Manual, Q Branch & Exotic Locations. The only thing I noticed that wasn't in the film was a version of the title sequence without text.
This sub-menu includes a number of quality featurettes which all appeared on the previous edition. Specifically they are:
This sub-menu includes four trailers for the film all of which were included on the previous release.
This is a large selection of image galleries on various topics. The photos included are stills from the film, publicity material and behind-the-scenes shots. The galleries are presented with one text page each describing the topic and are timed rather than requiring you to click through each photo. The segments are Roger Moore, Maud Adams, Louis Jourdan, Kristina Wayborn, Vijay Armitraj, Other Cast X 2, Aerostar, Octopussy's Circus, The Most Dangerous Games, Q's Tricks, Russian War Room, India, The Train, At the Circus, Final Battle, The Producer & Marketing.
NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.
This new Ultimate edition is the same globally except for colour system differences and subtitles. Draw.
The video quality is excellent for a film of this age, but has some minor issues.
The audio quality is excellent.
There are a huge array of high quality extras on this 2 disc set.
| Video | |
| Audio | |
| Extras | |
| Plot | |
| Overall | |
| Review Equipment | |
| DVD | Pioneer DV667A DVD-V DVD-A SACD, using Component output |
| Display | Sony FD Trinitron Wega KV-AR34M36 80cm. Calibrated with Digital Video Essentials (PAL). This display device is 16x9 capable. This display device has a maximum native resolution of 576i (PAL)/480i (NTSC). |
| Audio Decoder | Built in to amplifier/receiver. Calibrated with Video Essentials. |
| Amplification | Pioneer VSX-511 |
| Speakers | Monitor Audio Bronze 2 (Front), Bronze Centre & Bronze FX (Rears) + Yamaha YST SW90 subwoofer |