Greetings and salutations, Dear Reader. It is late morning here in Lithia, Florida, on Wednesday, June 1, 2022. It is a hot first day of (meteorological) summer in the Tampa Bay area. As I write this, the temperature is 83°F (28°C) under mostly sunny skies. With the wind blowing from the east-northeast at 11 MPH (17 KM/H) and humidity at 70%, the heat index is 86°F (30°C). Today’s forecast is typical for the wet season: thunderstorms are expected to move through the area, and the high will be 93°F (34°C). Tonight, scattered rain showers will continue to hang around. The low will be 70°F (21°C).
Luckily, the section of Hillsborough County that I’ve called home for six years – a huge subdivision called Fish Hawk – was not affected by thunderstorm activity yesterday. The forecast then was identical to today’s, but we had a mostly sunny afternoon and I stayed online till I decided to shut down my computer around 9:30 PM to go to the family room TV and watch Denial (2016), a drama based on Holocaust denier David Irving’s (Timothy Spall) libel suit against Penguin Books and historian Deborah Lipstadt (Rachel Weisz) for allegedly defaming Irving, a “revisionist” who is sympathetic to Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, in her book, Denying the Holocaust.
From the looks of it, I doubt that Fish Hawk will be spared from the occasional thunderstorm. It’s getting a bit dark near the house, and my Weather app’s radar display shows a ragged line of green “rain shower” blips heading toward Hillsborough County from the east-southeast.
Well, my steelbook with the 4K UHD Blu-ray reissue of The Untouchables arrived yesterday afternoon. Happily, it arrived without a dent or scratch on the metal container – a common complaint that I’ve seen from other Blu-ray collectors on the fora in Blu-ray.com. I don’t often buy Blu-rays (either 2K or 4K) in steelbook editions – I currently have 12[1], including The Untouchables – because they’re usually a tad more expensive and they’re often exclusive to specific retailers, usually Best Buy or Target. But I make exceptions if I love a certain movie or franchise, or if I can afford to splurge on steelbooks.
I was pleased to note that even though Paramount did not include a high-def Blu-ray (2K or “regular” Blu-ray) in the steelbook – which probably explains why its MSRP was reasonably affordable – it did include extras on the 4K UHD disc, as well as an insert with the code for a digital copy redeemable at Vudu or other Paramount streaming partners. Most of the 4K discs in my collection do not have extras beyond an audio commentary track, and often not even that. I’m guessing that since Paramount Home Media Distribution is easing off on the bundling thing of including a regular Blu-ray along with the 4K disc, it now either creates new extras or ports them from earlier releases to the 4K disc.
The Untouchables does not include any new 35th Anniversary extras for the 2022 4K disc. Instead, it ported over the extras from the inferior 2007 Blu-ray.
For those of you who are interested in such things, here are the basic specifications and extras offered in the 4K UHD disc:
- NEW 4K RESTORATION OF THE FILM
- DOLBY VISION/HDR PRESENTATION OF THE FILM
- NEW DOLBY ATMOS AUDIO TRACK
- The Script, The Cast
- Production Stories
- Re-Inventing the Genre
- The Classic
- Original Featurette: “The Men”
- Theatrical Trailer
- Optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature
As I said earlier, I watched Denial (via Amazon Prime Video) on the family room TV set last night, so I did not watch the main feature last night. I did watch a few of the extras to check out the video quality of my disc; it looks great on my 4K TV. Can’t say much about the sound, since no one has connected my set to my ONN soundbar.
If it is not stormy later in the afternoon, I will head out to the family room and watch the third episode of Obi-Wan Kenobi on the big TV, which has a Roku app, which in turn provides subtitles/closed captions on Disney+. I could, of course, watch it on my TV, but it would be sans subtitles or CCs. As a guy who has subpar hearing, you can understand why I prefer media that offers captions so I can understand what I can’t hear too well.
If it is storming, well, there’s always a book to read, so I can probably survive for a couple of hours with no TV or computer.
Well, it’s noon now – fast typist, I am not – so I better wrap this blog post up and publish it on WordPress. So, until next time, stay safe, stay healthy, and I’ll catch you on the less stormy side of things.
P.S. Since it’s a new month and I always try to get at least one new movie per month, tomorrow I’ll be getting the 4K UHD Blu-ray of Joe Dante’s Gremlins (1984). I saw it twice when it was in theaters, but for some reason I had never bought a home media release, not even the VHS one from 1985. I ordered it on a whim after checking my bank account and saw that I can afford it.
[1] Or, if you include the large tin containers that the first releases of Band of Brothers and The Pacific came in when HBO Home Entertainment released those miniseries on DVD and Blu-ray, 14. But if you only count the standard-sized packaging, I own 12:
- Star Wars: The Phantom Menace
- Star Wars: Attack of the Clones
- Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
- Star Wars; A New Hope
- Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
- Star Wars: Return of the Jedi
- Star Wars: The Force Awakens
- Star Wars: The Last Jedi
- Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker
- Star Trek: Lower Decks (Season One)
- West Side Story (2021)
- The Untouchables
I wish I’d bought Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and Solo: A Star Wars Story when they were released in steelbook, but they were only sold by Target or Best Buy, and I was afraid of receiving them with dented or scratched cases. If Santa existed, I’d ask him for those this Christmas. Just sayin’….
A Certain Point of View, Too 
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