Film at 11 Podcast: Episode 2 | Gremlins (1984)

For the second episode of our new Film at 11 podcast series, I’ve both chosen a new movie and switched 11-year-olds! This week, I introduce my son Thomas to director Joe Dante’s delightfully wicked dark comedy Gremlins. The kid was actually a little nervous going into this one.

I first saw Gremlins when I was 10-years-old and have loved it ever since. Thomas, however, had gotten the impression that it was a terrifying horror movie. (He says that’s my fault, but I blame his mother.) Don’t worry, he survived the experience and was ready to talk about it afterward.

Gremlins (1984) - Gizmo
Title:Gremlins
Year of Release: 1984
Director: Joe Dante
Watched On: 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray
Also Available On: Blu-ray
Various VOD rental and purchase platforms

The 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray

Gremlins was first released on Blu-ray for the film’s 25th anniversary back in 2009. That disc was reissued a bunch of times, including in a two-pack with its sequel, Gremlins 2: The New Batch. In 2019, Warner Bros. upgraded Gremlins (just the original) to 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray, but the regular Blu-ray that accompanies it in the case is just a copy of the old 2009 disc, which annoyingly auto-plays the movie at startup without going to a menu.

For its part, the 4K disc looks better than the Blu-ray, but I’m pretty sure it’s based on the same underlying video master, just authored at a higher resolution and with a new HDR grade applied. Whether the film source was ever actually scanned in 4K, or if the disc was upconverted from a prior 2K scan, I’m not entirely certain.

I say this because, for one thing, the video measures a full-screen 16:9 aspect ratio, opened up slightly on the top and bottom from the theatrical 1.85:1. For its newer 4K film scans (Batman, for instance), Warner Bros. is typically better about preserving 1.85:1 movies in their original aspect ratio with mild letterboxing. The image is clear and detailed enough to expose how fake the snow looks in outdoor scenes, but is only mildly sharp in general. The picture also has a lot of noisy grain and colors that bleed a fair amount.

Perhaps those issues could all be inherent to the original photography, but they might also point to this being an older scan coming from a film element somewhere downstream of the camera negative.

As I said, the 4K disc does look better than the Blu-ray. The HDR improves contrast, which looked flat and milky in the old transfer. Highlights in bright colors such as Christmas lights also look more vivid. Given the options, this is the best copy of Gremlins currently available.

Gremlins (1984) 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray

The DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 soundtrack, on the other hand, sounds sterile and flat, with muddy dialogue. The only explosion in the film comes across very weak.

The 4K disc has two audio commentaries. The first is a Filmmakers track with director Joe Dante, producer Michael Finnell, and special effects artist Chris Walas. Dante also contributes to the Cast commentary with Zach Galligan, Phoebe Cates, Dick Miller, and Howie Mandel (who did the voice for Gizmo). Other bonus features are found on the Blu-ray: some deleted scenes with optional commentary, a brief vintage making-of featurette, a photo gallery, and trailers for both this movie and the sequel.

Related

Note: All screenshots on this page were taken from the standard Blu-ray edition of the film and are used for illustration purposes only.

3 thoughts on “Film at 11 Podcast: Episode 2 | Gremlins (1984)”

  1. Hell yeah man! Our generation needs to pass on the joy of film to our kids. So many of them only wanna watch Tik Tok and YouTube. Way to lead the charge. Are you taking requests for this project? I can’t wait for the Monster Squad and Army of Darkness episodes.🤟

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      1. Man that’s so weird, I’ve thought for the longest time AOD was PG-13. I read up and Raimi even cut 6 minutes to try and get the PG-13 and it still received an “R”. Probably the reason it’s relatively tame as far as R-rated movies go. I asked my wife if she was ok with me showing it to our 7-year-old. “Uhhhhh definitely not”😂.

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