Processing on Eolomea (1972) was so bad that it deserved its own post. See here.
The Silent Star (1960)
I found a tiny bit of interpolated cloning while looking for a sample, but it’s minor. Looks good overall. The only feature in the set that didn’t have any jarring repairs.
Clipped directly from the BD.
Signals (1970)
Filtering leaves residue from previous frames:
Bad splice handling that uses Interpolation, microloops, and appalling pixelation. How is this better than visible cement splices (which are mostly masked out during film projection)?
Frame numbers in yellow.
General interpolation and misalignment:
In the Dust of the Stars (1976)
There’s some weird masking and screen tearing going on, but I can’t tell if it’s original. Overall ok.
Edit: Turns out, some of the weirdness I was noticing is AI upscaling dreck. Lots of examples in this thread at Blu-ray.com. Deaf Crocodile’s disc apparently is better. Maybe I’ll get it. Still…
Sloppy repairs are few, but present:
Frame numbers in yellow.
Love 2002 (1972)
Very rough, but natural.
Edit: Or is this also an AI upscale? I initially thought the source was 16mm, but those edges and the dull color is very suspicious.
Clipped directly from the BD.
The Robot (1968)
The best looking film in the set.
Clipped directly from the BD.
Pleasingly, the features aren’t overly scrubbed, which makes the repairs all the more frustrating. There are enough remaining flaws that no one would have noticed their presence had they been allowed to remain.
And a pet peeve: these features don’t have end credits, but DEFA added new end screens immediately upon fadeout, destroying what I consider a cool effect, akin to seeing a play without a curtain call. How often do you see movies without end credits?
EDIT 11/17/25 – I just got the Deaf Crocodile release and did a quick spot check. Signals actually looks like 70mm this time, as opposed to Eureka’s grainy 2.35:1. In the Dust of the Stars is the same bad restoration. Grain is poor, looking like video noise. De-graining is frequent.
There’s typical frozen temporal cloning. The bigger problem is that there are about 100 freeze frames. Some have negligible clone repairs, but usually the picture simply freezes.
Frozen picture. Yellow number indicates frame number.Picture is mostly frozen, with some misaligned cloning.
The shorts got worse processing, especially at splices.
Let Us Get a Dog (1974)
Freeze frame:
Interpolation:
Frozen cloning, screen tearing, misalignment:
Can you spot it?
Where is the Limit? (1975)
Frozen cloning:
Screen tearing:
Interpolation:
This interpolated frame includes a microloop.
Restoration processing by Hungary National Film Institute Filmlab.
Samm Deighan’s irritating uptalk-filled commentary approaches the movie with the assumption that animation is for children. It sounds like a dry book-report academic lecture, instead of someone who is an expert in Hungarian cinema. Skip it.
For a 2013 movie, I expected this to look better. My guess is an inadequate camera. Look at that aliasing!
Clipped directly from the BD.
The running time is 141 minutes, not the 134 stated on the box.
Invasion (2017)
The first movie in the set that looks good.
Clipped directly from the BD.
However, the subtitles are horrible. There are typos throughout the set, but those for Invasion are the worst.
Later spelled “Daniel.”Plus inconsistent placement of quotation marks.
Careless Crime (2020)
Another nice transfer.
Clipped directly from the BD.
These are probably fascinating in Farsi, but I was bored, and not having any of it by the time I got to Careless Crime. All the walking, monotonous dialog, and reading was just too taxing. I would be very interested to see Invasion, maybe even Fish & Cat, dubbed in English.
