Eye of the ripper
A few quick words on the Another World Entertainment release of The New York Ripper, which arrived today:
First and foremost, the source for the transfer appears to be the same one that was used for the Australian release from Stomp Visual. Based on the screenshots posted with HorrorDVDs.com’s review, I had assumed that the source was different, primarily due to how much more saturated they appear, but I suspect that the person who captured them had his/her DVD playback software’s saturation set too high.
Having compared the Stomp Visual and Another World Entertainment transfers fairly thoroughly, I’d go so far as to say that there’s really nothing to call either way - both look identical, and I did 600% magnifications of several screen captures. AWE’s release does, however, gain several points in its favour for including the scene in which Dr. Davis plays a trick on his secretary, which was omitted from the Stomp release. On the AWE DVD, this scene is sourced from the Anchor Bay DVD and is NTSC-to-PAL standards converted, but it’s better than nothing (it could still have been handled better, though - a proper adjustment of the frame rate should have been carried out rather than a video standards conversion).
Another major boon for the AWE release is the fact that it ports over several of the bonus features from the 2-disc French Collector’s Edition, along with optional English subtitles. Not everything has made it over, but there is a decent amount of material here - enough to keep you occupied for a while.
Ultimately, the AWE release gets my thumbs-up. As far as I can tell, it’s the best release of the film to date. Perfect? No, certainly not. There’s certainly room for improvement as far as image quality is concerned (although detail-wise is very nice), and it’s a shame the extras package is incomplete. But AWE’s efforts to port over some of the material, and to assemble a complete cut of the film (even if the added footage could have been handled better) is appreciated.
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