I'm no authority on how films are re-mastered for blu-ray but something looks very wrong here. My guess is that the film has been artifically sharpened. The result is awful halos around the characters anytime they stand against a blue sky (which is often in this film). It gives the film the appearance of something shot against a blue-screen on a sound stage rather than on location. A real travesty.
I purchased Carnet De Voyage purely on the basis of how much I'd enjoyed Craig Thompson's Blankets. I didn't realize it was a travelogue until it arrived and that initially dampened my enthusiasm for it. Ultimately it was a pleasing read that I read at a more leisurely pace than I would a narrative driven comic. It is nicely illustrated and Thompson's candid self-portrayal keeps it more interesting than most people describing their travels.
These Soundtrack albums are quite good but are not quite definitive. . There are a number of cues from the score that are absent. I'd much rather have these cues than the soundbites and dialogue snippets that are included. If I wanted to hear dialogue I'd pop in the DVDs and watch an episode. When I listen to a soundtrack, I want to hear it clean of dialogue and sound effects.
It may be that the original audio recordings of the score are no longer available so that the albums could only be culled from the mixed sound as heard in the series. If that's the case than it is fortuitous that the show's storytelling often employed long scenes without dialogue that played out with… Read more
