Well, I finally went all out and bought my "Baker's Dozen" group of James Bond favorites on Blu-ray earlier this week. And I only paid $7.99 for each one which is really a great price, eh! But when I starting watching Goldfinger I discovered that the DTS track was missing a sound effect from the pre-credits sequence: when Bond closes the door right before the opening notes of the 'Goldfinger' theme song, we're supposed to hear it close -- but not on this Blu-ray edition! This sound effect is there when you switch to the mono track, but I don't want to do that while I watch the film, eh. To make this matter even worse is the fact that the Ultimate Edition DVD of Goldfinger has this sound effect intact on its DTS track! What's the story here!??!
![Confused :?](./images/smilies/icon_confused.gif)
So it's nice that the DTS track on the Thunderball Blu-ray has that stupid freight elevator sound removed when Largo opens that secret door panel that leads into the S.P.E.C.T.R.E council room and the original sound effect has been completely restored. But what's up with that infamous bunch of film gate hairs on screen right when Bond and Domino approach the beach in Nassau after they first meet? On the UE DVD edition the first shot of Bond and Domino going up the beach has a very faint squiggle of hairs on screen right and the very next shot these same film gate hairs are very readily apparent. However on the Blu-ray editon, the film gate hairs are extremely apparent in both shots. Sure, the Blu-ray edition of Thunderball offers far more clarity than the standard UE DVDs, but I'm comparing both editions of Thundeball on a CRT monitor -- I don't even own a HDTV.
![Confused :?](./images/smilies/icon_confused.gif)
It is my conjecture that there was some slight digital "scrubbing" done on this first shot on the UE DVDs, but it would have looked very sloppy on the far more sharper Blu-ray edition of Thunderball so this fast and sloppy digital touch-up was completely removed. The overall difference that I notice on my CRT monitor between the Blu-rays and the standard DVDs of the Bond films is that the colors "pop" more on the BRs and that there isn't any more clarity offered here because my CRT is capable of only 500 lines of resolution. But I'm no techie so what do I know, eh?
![Bond... James Bond... :007:](./images/smilies/smiley_007.gif)