Indiana Jones Swings Onto Blu-Ray This September
Boy, the folks at Lucasfilm and Paramount sure know how to stretch out an announcement, don’t they? Way back in February we heard the news that all four Indiana Jones movies would be coming to Blu-ray “this fall” (Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is the only one to have already received a Blu-ray release). Then we saw an actual trailer for the collection, but still without a firm release date, which was really just rubbing salt in the wound. Now, several months later, we finally have more information: Indiana Jones: The Complete Collection will hit shelves on Tuesday, September 18th.
The set will include all four Indy flicks: Raiders of the Lost Ark, Temple of Doom, Last Crusade, and the one we all tried to forget about, Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Finally getting the films on Blu-ray would be exciting enough, but they’ve also been meticulously cleaned up by Steven Spielberg and sound designer Ben Burtt. According to the press release, “the original negative was first scanned at 4K and then examined frame-by-frame so that any damage could be repaired.” For the sound restoration, they went back to Burtt’s original master mix:
New stereo surrounds were created using the original music tracks and original effects recorded in stereo but used previously only in mono. In addition, the sub bass was redone entirely up to modern specifications and care was taken to improve dialogue and correct small technical flaws to create the most complete and highest quality version of the sound possible while retaining the director’s vision.
Finally, the films will be accompanied by a stellar array of bonus features which we will outli–what’s that? We still don’t have details about the bonus features? See what I mean about doling stuff out slowly? They’re just toying with us now! Alas, all we know is that the set will include “a collection of documentaries, interviews, featurettes and new bonus features.” Does it even matter? We’re all going to buy it anyway!!