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Posted: 06 Jun 2014, 22:43 

@laserking....you deserve your name well my friend ....astonishing....where did you get all these hk releases ?

Hi exinferis,

I got them from many different places over the last few years. Many of them came from a seller in Texas. A lot of the early ones I picked up from a seller in Chicago several years ago. I have also obtained quite a few of them at various times from several lesser sources in Hong Kong itself. When I joined this site in 2005, I had no Hong Kong releases whatsoever in my collection. In fact, I had almost no imports at all, but I was well on my way to having all of the U.S. releases I wanted to own. Then, I encountered the seller in Chicago, which was a pivotal moment in my collecting experience. This guy was a serious collector like myself, and he liked a lot of the same types of movies I liked, namely horror, sci-fi, action, and mysteries/thrillers. Also, like me, he had a love for low-budget movies, especially in the aforementioned genres. His collection was about the same size as mine, roughly 3000 titles at that time. The biggest difference was that, unlike my collection, his was loaded with imports. He started listing things for sale that I never knew existed :o ! My collection began growing by leaps and bounds again, after I had gone through a period of dormancy during the early new millennium. My interest was renewed again in my collection! It was like a doorway to another world had opened up, and I had discovered this hidden place full of treasures I never even dreamed of before! It was an adrenaline rush of excitement like you can't imagine!

I had several telephone conversations with this guy, and during one of them, he told me that he liked Hong Kong discs better than Japanese ones. I was confused by this, as I knew the well-deserved great reputation that the Japanese releases have long had among serious collectors. I asked him why he liked the Hong Kong discs better, and why he had so many in his collection. He told me that there were two reasons. First, unlike the Japanese discs, almost all of the Hong Kong ones were either in English, or had English subtitles. This was due to the fact that Hong Kong had long been a part of the British Empire. Second, he told me that he believed that Hong Kong releases were among the very rarest discs ever made. He told me that there were many Hong Kong discs in his collection of which he had never seen another copy in 20+ years of collecting! :o This guy had been very much a world traveler, which I most decidedly am not. He went on vacations to Hong Kong, and many other places in that part of the world. Many of his discs were personally bought by him at video stores while he was vacationing there. He had begun collecting DVDs instead, and decided to sell off his laserdisc collection. I started buying everything I could afford out of his collection as he made it available for purchase. After a year or two, sadly, it became all too obvious that his vast collection was dwindling away to only a shell of its' former self :( . The best titles he had were all gone. The good news is that most of it was now part of my collection :thumbup: ! In fact, my collection has now, I believe, far surpassed what his was in its' prime.

Dealing with that seller was a valuable experience for me, not only because of all the marvelous treasures I got from his collection. I also gained a wealth of knowledge from him as well. I always remembered what he had told me about Hong Kong laserdiscs. As my collection continued to grow, I found that what he had said to me was absolutely true. My experience with Hong Kong laserdiscs was exactly the same as his had been! I can also say the same for Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, and China. Every time I acquired a new piece from one of these Asian countries, I came to this site and checked for a listing of it. Almost without exception, I found that there was no record of it here at all :shock: ! It was obvious that these discs were quite rare indeed, and no one here in the hardcore laserdisc community even knew about them :shock: ! I remembered another thing that the Chicago collector had told me, and I believe that it is probably true. He told me that at some point in the late 90's or early new millennium, a large number of Hong Kong laserdiscs were destroyed :o ! He said that they were shipped back to Mainland China, where they were recycled for the raw materials from which they were made :thumbdown: ! If this is true, what a tragedy that so many wonderful treasures were lost forever :thumbdown: :thumbdown: :thumbdown: ! It became my mission to obtain as many of these rare discs as I could, and to document the existence of them here. I want to preserve information about these rare releases on this site, including pictures of what they looked like, so all collectors will be able to see and enjoy them. To me, this is a vital part of preserving the history of this grand old format for future generations. It's a little like archaeology, preserving the fossil record of the dinosaur bones that remain, so that people will remember that these rare animals once walked upon this earth! So, for now, I am trying to do my part to keep history alive here for the future. I encourage you to do your part as well, by submitting information about any such rare discs that you might encounter in your travels. :thumbup:

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 02 Apr 2017, 21:23 

Personally, I love the disc reviews, I've probably read all of them.

I recently joined the Laserdisc Forever Facebook group due to the void here, they are a very entertaining bunch. They do need some help from the "Old Guard" though.

Even for them "Facebook Forever" with over 5000 followers recently did a "who's out there" post, received less than 200 replies.

With the price of Blu-rays coming down and finding them along with hddvds in the used market, I find myself spending less time with my LDs, may be that's true for the rest of us.

The problem with LD is that the more time passes the more limited the entire LD catalogue becomes. When I started collecting LDs in 2001, most known movies at that time were
available on LD including Fight Club or Star Wars Episode I. Even in 2005 or 2007 that was the case but today it is different.
That's why I think that people like us start using their LD players less and less. And I also think disclord's early demise most certainly had an impact on the forum as a whole.
His expertise will forever be missed. His posts were simply awesome.
I still love my HLD-XO and I am still interested in it but the truth is it is becoming more and more difficult to find appealing titles for it. I have already watched the
majority of titles from the 20th century that I would be interested in it.
I love the reviews, too. They are awesome. That's one of the best things about this forum.
If it wasn't for this site I think my interested in LD as a format would have long vanished.

Hi guys,

I couldn't agree more with many of the comments already made here, particularly those of giannis, audioboyz1973, and confederate. I haven't been too involved recently in many discussions on the forum, because it does seem to me that the tone here has become increasingly nasty and confrontational. I try my best not to be a part of those types of situations. I'd rather say nothing at all than to spread anger and malice among those who should be friends, my fellow collectors. With regard to confederate's comment, this is truly THE website for anyone who is a serious collector of this great old format. True, the LD catalog is a finite list, and may be very limited from the viewpoint of some among us. However, we are rapidly closing in on 57000 titles documented here on the format! Anyone who can't find something to like on a list that extensive must be EXTREMELY picky, or only likes new movies. In any case, they certainly don't belong here. From my perspective, I think there is a wealth of worthwhile programming available on this format to last me for many years to come! Furthermore, I'm convinced that there are still many more titles not yet listed here, and I believe that 60000 is a readily attainable number that we will reach in the near future, if we all keep sharing information and adding new titles to the database as we come across them. Let's all keep helping Julien to add to this great site, and preserve the history of this wonderful format for future generations of collectors! Don't give in to the hate! :thumbup:

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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 Post subject: Re: Suspiria [FY082-25TT]
Posted: 19 Sep 2017, 01:39 

Is this rot? I have rotted discs, but the speckling is more multi colored. I've seen rot on the copies of Heavy Metal that I had to go through to get a good copy, and they were also more multi-colored. I've never seen rot on a Japanese disc, however, and I'm wondering if this horrible video is so because it was a transfer from a VHS tape? It just seems to be a VHS-sort of video-noise.

Hi yazorin,

Does this disc have any "helicoptering" (distortion) in the sound? If so, it is almost certainly laser rot. I suspect this is the case, as the reference number indicates that this is a very old release. Although not as common on Japanese releases as on U.S. ones, laser rot does occur on them too. This is most often seen on the very old Japanese releases, particularly ones with reference numbers like this one, with the "FY" prefix. I have seen it on a few myself. Most of these are pressings from the very early 80's. Also, watch out for reference numbers with the "G78F", "G88F", and "G98F" prefixes. These are also prone to rot, as they are older Japanese releases too. I hope this is helpful.

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 03 Oct 2017, 22:00 

I found what I believe is a bootleg of Heat (1995) in Hong Kong recently. No bar code, reference number and the inside of the gatefold is literally the same as the front and back cover! I'm gonna add it to the DB but just wondered if anyone has seen this before...

Hi brmanuk,

From the picture of the label, I suspect what you have may be a bootleg, possibly Taiwanese. The label looks very similar to some of those released by the Taiwanese publisher Jei Wea. However, I don't see any reference number on the label, so it may indeed be a bootleg of some sort. It's definitely not the official Hong Kong release, which was done by ERA Home Video with the reference number ERA-35-96. I have a copy of it, and the label looks nothing like the one you have. I'll be interested to see what your jacket looks like.

Best Regards,
David

Hi David,

I've updated the photo links so hopefully they work now.

Yeah, I'm convinced it's a bootleg. Funnily enough, the picture is subtitled however it's actually in widescreen (unlike the ERA release) and isn't the same print as the U.S. release; the black bars are even on the screen whereas the U.S. release is shifted up slightly. According to my colleague, the Chinese used is Traditional which means it's either a HK release or (as you said) most likely a Taiwanese release.

ps. thanks for all your hard work updating the database, 9 times out of 10 when I search for a HK disc your name is attached :)

Hi brmanuk,

Yes, I have done quite a bit of work to help out Julien with the database on these releases. About 10 years ago, I was buying a lot of discs from a brother and sister team in Chicago. The brother was a serious laserdisc collector like myself, and he owned a collection which at the time was about the same size as mine. However, whereas my collection was then almost entirely U.S. releases, his was full of Asian imports. They were selling off his collection, and most of the best that he had is now in my collection. Prior to dealing with them, I had absolutely no Hong Kong or Taiwanese discs whatsoever. When I saw what he had from those countries, I fell in love with them completely. I started buying as many of them as I could afford, and did so for probably 2 or 3 years. At that point, it became obvious that his collection was running out, and they were "scraping the bottom of the barrel". Believe me, that was a sad day indeed. :cry: During the period when I was dealing with them, I noticed very quickly that almost everything I was buying from them from Hong Kong and Taiwan was not listed here on LDDb! :o I decided that would be the best way that I could contribute to the global laserdisc community here. By submitting as much information as possible to Julien to update the database, a permanent record could be created of what was available in the "lesser Asian markets". You see, there was much better documentation of what was released in Japan, which was obviously the "big" Asian market. However, very little reference material was available on the other Asian countries. Although it is still far from complete, what we have here on LDDb is the best and most accurate record of what was released on the format in that part of the world. To this day, I still consider every newly discovered release from these countries to be a rare and exciting treasure! By documenting them here, we can share this information with collectors throughout the world, and preserve this sometimes strange and fascinating part of the history of the format. Keep watching the "newly added" section on the homepage for the latest discoveries!

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 13 Oct 2017, 01:39 

I have this LD and theres no option to add it to my collection. Whats going on?

Hi ssg402,

It looks like somebody submitted this in error, under the wrong reference number. There is already a listing in the database for what appears to be this release, it just has "LD" and a space before the 82997-2WS. Look again and you will find it listed that way. In other words, I think this is a duplicate listing that someone submitted, and they just forgot to include the "LD" and the space at the beginning of the reference number. That probably explains why Julien hasn't validated it yet, and it's still in the "pending submissions" section of the site. Julien does a fantastic job of watching out for this type of erroneous submission. If he didn't stay on top of this sort of thing like he does, the site would be a f*&#ing mess by now! It takes someone like him with an eye for the finer details to maintain the integrity of the information here. Trust me, it's for the good of all of us in the global laserdisc community. Let's give a big round of applause for our great administrator! :clap: :clap: :clap: Quite frankly, I don't know how he does it sometimes!

Best Regards,
David

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Posted: 18 Feb 2018, 21:56 

I was watching Glimmer Man on my R7G.
Player did play the disc perfectly without problems but on random occasions I could hear a slight knocking sound from inside the player from this disc.
I have never heard this sound on playback before and it made me a little worried.
What could it be?

Is it dust on disc surface causing random knocking sound?
I could hear knock on both sides during playback.

I have to play some more discs to see if the same phenomenon occurs?

Hi van-dammage,

It's strictly a guess on my part, but the first thing that comes to mind is slight warping of the disc. Did you notice any herringbone patterns in the picture during the time you heard the sound? I would recommend checking the disc to see if it appears to be totally flat or not. I have encountered this type of sound on a few discs from time to time, and that seemed to be the cause. Check a few other discs, and if you don't notice it on any others, I think that may be what you're dealing with. If so, it may be repairable using the methods discussed here in some of the threads about warped discs. It's worth a try, as I have had some luck in the past fixing them if they are not too badly warped. If this seems to be the problem, and you are unable to correct it by weighing it down for a while, at least Glimmer Man is not a rare title, and you should be able to replace it with another copy without too much searching or expense. :thumbup:

Best Regards,
David

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Posted: 01 May 2018, 01:38 

Hi makmak16,

That's very interesting! It sounds like you come from a good laserdisc family! You must have gotten the laserdisc genes from your father's side of your family, although he forgot to tell you about it until recently! :lol: Sadly, I have never seen a copy of the disc you are looking for. In fact, I didn't know that it existed. I have several discs from the publisher Videodiscovery in my collection, but not that one. Among the ones I have are the similarly themed "Science Sleuths" discs, which you will find listed here. I will have to keep an eye open for the math one , and I'll let you know if I see a copy of it around.

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 11 Jun 2018, 22:57 

I did put a link to an image, is it not showing up? Here's another one: https://imgur.com/a/OJt3OyT The disc is ID7313IV, 1990. Sorry I could have done a better job with the original post.

VERY early DADC/Sony USA. Back when their stuff didn't rot.

Is that so, I didn't realize they started having problems later on. I'm not overly familiar with DADC USA as I've largely managed to avoid them aside from a few discs I picked up very early on and some IMAX titles. I realize disc rot is not well understood but I'd be interested to know exactly what they were doing that gave them such a high defect rate. My understanding is that rot has different causes as with DADC discs the disc itself almost always looks fine but with PDO UK and some 3M, Mitsubishi and Discovision discs you can clearly see degradation of the reflective layer.

Hi kid_dynamo,

Yes, it's true. When all of the other manufacturing plants were getting better, Sony DADC USA was actually getting worse :crazy: ! This seems to have happened sometime in 1995. The best way to tell which ones to avoid is to watch the "LDVS-" numbers in the mint markings. The higher the number, the more likely that the disc will have rot. I have heard that a good rule of thumb is any disc with a number of 2700 or higher in the mint markings is a high risk for laser rot. The ones with very low numbers, from 1992, 1993, etc. very rarely have rot problems. I don't know exactly what happened at the Sony DADC USA plant, but I have a theory. The problems seem to have gotten much worse there after they got the big contract to mass produce discs for Columbia Tristar. I believe they simply got in over their heads during this period and let their quality control procedures fall by the wayside. Columbia Tristar was sending them so much work that they just couldn't keep up and they got very sloppy. They probably let the "clean room" production standards slip really badly in order to keep up with the massive workload, and it showed in their finished products. Only someone who actually worked in the plant during that time could say for certain, but that's my theory. It's possible that they also could have changed something in the glue and/or other raw materials they were using during that time.

Best Regards,
David

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 Post subject: Re: Delights of selling LDs
Posted: 31 Aug 2018, 21:37 

Whenever I complete a happy transction with a collector it reminds me of why I turned my hobby into a little side business. As a movie collector I remember the dark pit that opened in my stomach when I realized the title I wanted was not in any store on Earth, and was often not available on line either. After going from collector to collector looking for a title I wanted, it became my goal to stock my shop with all the offbeat connoisseur stuff that is so hard to acquire.

Thanks to all of you who have used my shop as I hoped. It's so much more rewarding to sell on LDDb than anywhere else.

I'd like to hear from other sellers about why they opened a shop here, and any suggestions from collectors on how the shops can be improved.

John

G and J Rarities

Hi John,

I wanted to jump in here to give my vote of confidence for you folks as dealers. In case you don't recall, I am the one who bought the copy of "Looking For Mr. Goodbar" from you some time ago. Once again, I truly appreciate your kind help to me in locating a "clean" copy for my collection of this sometimes elusive and troublesome title. Recently, there was someone else here on the forum posting that he/she was looking for a copy of this title. Perhaps they should be turning to you folks to fill that request. You certainly took care of my need and handled the transaction in first-rate fashion. You run a thoroughly professional shop here, and I wouldn't hesitate to trade with you again if I saw something I was looking for in your inventory. You've got my very highest recommendation, my friend! :thumbup:

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 06 Feb 2020, 02:23 

Following discs that I owned had laser rot:

Men in black
Air Force one
Double team
American President
Barb wire

After that I simply check Lddb to see if any discs suffer LD rot and simply
Stay away from them.

Perhaps being a bit assumptive here but looking at the titles are they all the US releases?

If they are then they are all the SONY DADC US pressings & sadly they are really bad.

Can't off the top of my head remember what it is but there is an issue number that after whatever it is (someone else here can perhaps pop it on) the discs are very poor, most are rot hell.

I don't think I have ever had an issue with SONY DADC Japanese or SONY DADC Austrian pressed LDs but had lots of their US plant pressed discs that have been a total let down.

The SONY DADC US pressed discs are always worth checking before buying & more often than not best avoided.

.

Someone on here advised that Sony DADC US issue number fairly recently although I can't seem to locate the post, from memory I think they said it was up to LDVS 2000 were generally all good then after that quality control seemed to go down the pan. I recently tried to run Jim Carreys- Ace Ventura When Nature Calls numbered in the higher 2000s and thats certainly a rotter, like yourself my experience of anything pressed at Sony DADC Austria or Japan has always been perfect. Surely Europe with PDO UK had the worst pressing plant of anywhere, is there actually any reliable list of their non rotting discs or is it just potluck with everything they ever produced?


Hi,

The DADC mint mark number I have been told to avoid is anything 2700 or higher. This mint mark number was reached sometime in mid-1995. That was when whatever went wrong at that manufacturing plant happened. Basically, the higher the mint mark number, the higher the risk of rot. I have seen very few with lower numbers than 2700 which have rot. However, copies can be found of titles with much higher numbers which have no trace of rot. For example, I have rot-free copies of the following in my collection: Alien Chaser (3315), Batman & Robin (3522), The Colony (3306), Dark Planet (3466), Jack Frost (3548), Foxfire (3227), Legend of the Lost Tomb (3423), The Limbic Region (3389), Mars Needs Women (3249), and Not Like Us (3322). My advice would be, if you are considering a DADC title with a mint mark number higher than 2700, ask the seller to check it first. If they are unwilling/unable to do so, I would avoid it, unless it's dirt cheap. The only one of the previously listed titles I did that with was Foxfire, of which I had seen one rotted copy previously. The seller checked it for me, and verified it as "clean". I am pretty sure all of the others I listed here only took one copy to find a "clean" one, but maybe I was just incredibly lucky on those. With persistence, you can usually find most titles rot-free, but it may take multiple copies to do so. Anyway, that's my experience with them.

David :)

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Posted: 06 Aug 2020, 20:33 

Hi Everyone,

Thanks to Julien and all of you folks here in the Forum for your concern and all of the kind words you posted here during my absence! Please believe me when I say it is greatly appreciated! :angel: You guys are truly the greatest, and I'm honored to keep company with you all here! It's true that recent months have been very trying indeed for all of us. These are certainly strange and troubling times we are going through all over the world. Rest assured that I have remained quite safe and well throughout the coronavirus pandemic, only with very limited access to the internet. I think the situation is sloooowwwwlllly improving, and will hopefully continue to do so as time passes. I made a large laserdisc purchase right before all of this happened, and only a few days ago was finally able to add the titles to my collection listing. They were a number of music titles I had been seeking for quite some time, and I just submitted a correction update for one of them a moment ago. I'll continue to do more as time, and my access to the internet will permit. I hope that this finds each and every one of you safe and healthy along with all of your families. I will continue to keep all of you in my thoughts and prayers that you will remain so until this troubling season in our lives is finally behind us. I hope to return to more regular participation here in the near future. Thanks again to all of you!

God Bless,
David (aka laserking) :wave:

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Posted: 29 Oct 2020, 21:45 

Hi Everyone,

I'm afraid I can't shed any light on the differences between the U.S. and Hong Kong releases of this title, as I don't own a copy of the U.S. one. However, I do have a copy of a Taiwan release of this title, which is under reference number JWL-122. After seeing your discussion here, I recalled that I did a comparison study of this with the Hong Kong version. I never did an update to either of the listings, but I looked around and did locate my notes from the study. I will try to do updates in the near future to document what I found. What I can tell you off the top of my head is that there are numerous differences between the two, and I mean a LOT!

David :wave:

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Posted: 08 Nov 2021, 00:07 

There does appear to be one World Series film on LD: 1986 (a classic! (if you're not from Boston)). Seems they tried it once and the sales didn't convince them to try it again.

The best World Series since 1969. #LFGM :clap: :thumbup:

I would love that 1986 Laserdisc. It's been on my wishlist forever. I have a couple of NPB discs though, those are great. Inject as much baseball in to my soul as possible. I'll watch it all!

Ken Burn's Baseball is an incredible piece of work by the way. I watched that all on PBS in HD via their streaming service a while back. It's brilliant even if you don't like baseball so much.

Does anyone know if there are any Knicks Laserdiscs? I'd love some 80's Ewing era stuff. God bless the Knicks for getting a good start this season too by the way.

Side note; anyone but the cheating Astro's tonight please. I shall be banging my trashcan for the Braves tonight from across the Atlantic! Braves representing the NL East hooray!

Hi teddanson,

You asked about New York Knicks titles on laserdisc. As far as I can determine, there's only one title ever released on the format. It is NBA: New York's Game - History of the Knicks (1989) [SRLM 882]. There are many NBA titles which were released, but only a few were in the USA, mostly the Michael Jordan titles, and a couple on Magic Johnson. The rest are Japan only releases, including the one I referenced on the Knicks. I was fortunate enough to acquire it quite a few years ago, along with a dozen or more of the others, all from a single seller. I updated all of them here soon after I received them, as most of them were missing much of the information from the listing pages, and a few were not listed here at all. I've been trying to get all of the Japan only titles one by one as they appear for sale, which is not very often. I'm not sure how rare the New York Knicks title is, but it appears that I am the only one here who owns it, which seems quite remarkable! At any rate, if you're looking for Knicks titles on laserdisc, that would be the only one to look for!

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 10 Nov 2021, 02:38 

Is that Ewing-era Knicks? Ewing is a legend!

Hi teddanson,

The Knicks disc I mentioned previously is a program from 1989, so it would only touch on the beginning of Patrick Ewing's NBA career. However, you'll be happy to know that there is also a Japan only release which is specifically about Patrick Ewing :clap: , not just the Knicks in general! The title is NBA: Patrick Ewing - Standing Tall (1993) [SRLM 881]. Since it is a later program from 1993, it would go further into some later years of his career. Oddly enough, I seem to be also the only one here who owns that title! I didn't get it from the same seller I got the Knicks title and many of the others from years ago. I got it much more recently, probably a couple of years ago, from a seller in Singapore, believe it or not! What he was doing with a Japanese NBA disc on Patrick Ewing, I have no idea. I was just glad that he had it for sale, as I have never seen anyone else offer it, before or since! Well, I suppose that gives you one more to start looking for!

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 20 Dec 2021, 01:28 

https://i.postimg.cc/bzcht5c5/f899ebcf-3851-4736-85ae-1d37c5d482e9.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/52WR6ZYq/1350d70f-22a0-481f-958d-9896c9a78720.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/3xjbpn2M/0b57d7f1-389b-44ef-97c5-1292be43e633.jpg

LDDB URL: NBA: New York's Game - History of the Knicks (1989) [SRLM 882]

Growing up I wasn't ever really interested much in basketball. It was alright I suppose. You'd play a bit in P.E. at school and hear scraps of information from a friend of a friend who's dad came back from a business trip to America, happened to go to a game and maybe gave their children a Lakers jacket and a signed photo of Kareem Abdul-Jabaar or something that was then brought in to school to show off to the other children. Oh and I had a Lakers jacket at some point as a kid. It wasn't from America though. It was off the back of a lorry along with a tub of moody TAG's and Harry Vitton wallets (Harry was Louis's brother apparently). That was about it though.

In my school circles if you were going to follow any American sports it was American Football (aka "rugby for wimps") and Baseball (aka "silly boys rounders"). You randomly picked a couple of teams and that was it. For me it was the Giants, the Rams and the Mets. When EA's hockey games made their way to the Super Nintendo I would throw the Sabres and Leafs in to the mix. But basketball? Nah, not for me. I think it was around the time that White Men Can't Jump and NBA Jam became really popular, the basketball craze that followed was when I started to watch the game a bit more. Back then it was all about the Chicago Bulls and the Los Angeles Lakers. Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippin, Shaq and so on. For me though, I went back to the Big Apple for my NBA team of choice. And there was only one main dude with the 'tude that I thought was an utter legend. A man who was the real deal but amazingly never won an NBA Championship.

A defensive colossus in the NBA for the New York Knicks and Hall Of Fame inductee in 2008! That man was Patrick Ewing!!

If I was going to support an NBA team, it was going to be a team with a player who could not only score a swish but could also crush your head like a paper cup and shell your testicles like a couple of holiday peanuts!

Since the turn of the 1990's to today I've always followed the New York Knicks (even had tickets to see them once at the Garden but for one reason or another didn't get to go) and have been keen to learn a bit more about their history and some of their star players, titles and awards. It's great to have been given a pointer from a fellow LDDB member that a Knicks title exists on Laserdisc. Even better is a title that isn't just a clip show but a history of the team up until 1994. That's what you get with this 58 minute, 4:3 ratio, stereo documentary.

The documentary itself is somewhat briskly paced for it's 58 minutes considering it covers the history of the New York Knickerbockers from 1946 through to 1994. It's shot in one of the 'talking heads' styles that are popular today on many networks, not just sports coverage. The bonus here though is you get some great interview footage with some of the greatest players ever to have worn the blue and orange shirt, including the great man Mr. Ewing himself. I particularly enjoyed hearing from coaches and players like Red Holtzman, Willis Reed, Nat Clifton and the Maguire brothers and so on. There's some real greats interviewed here and it's really interesting to hear their stories. I also enjoyed hearing views of what it was like to play at the old Madison Square Garden and what it was like attending a basketball game back in the 1940's and 50's.

Archive footage featured throughout the documentary is a mix of colour and black and white and from both film and video sources. It's not just just tedious clips of past games though. You get a mix of broadcast material, behind the scenes moments and some great coaching videos during more high pressure moments in the team's history. Picture quality on this disc overall is remarkably good. I expected it to be much softer as it appears to be a video transfer, the same likely used for any VHS retail release that there may have been. Imaging is fairly crisp and sharp, especially the older film footage from the 1960's and 70's. Audio isn't anything stellar but is just a nice stereo track with decent separation and minimal noise, even on the oldest footage. Nothing to write home about in terms of audio, it's just what you'd expect from a quality broadcast.

I learned a lot about the history of the Knicks from watching this documentary. Heck, you've probably already seen it years ago on ESPN or something. The only thing I was slightly disappointed with is that the main man only appears for about 7 minutes towards the end. Of course back then he was only around midway through his career but I do wish he was featured just a little more in this documentary. Regardless, this is a great watch for any basketball fan keen to dig in to the history of a team and see some great archive footage. Well worth picking up if you can find a copy cheap. :thumbup:

https://i.postimg.cc/Y2YD8Ns8/u-https-66-media-tumblr-com-0709c8ad8f56dad64a8d07da0ca9698f-tumblr-oupn90-Gr-Le1sdydefo1-400.gif

Hi teddanson,

That's great to see that you located a copy of this one! :thumbup: It looks like you are now the proud second owner of it registered here! I'm surprised that one showed up that quickly and you were able to snare it. Well done, my friend! I'm glad that I was able to point you in the right direction for something you will enjoy and treasure in your collection for many years to come. Merry Christmas to you! :thumbup:

Best Regards,
David (laserking) :wave:

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Posted: 28 Feb 2022, 00:10 

Hi Everyone,

I know this is a long belated reply to this topic, but I felt compelled to post it, in the event that anyone still cares about it. I felt I finally had something of greater substance to offer on it, as I just recently acquired a copy of the U.S. release of this title from one of the local Half Price Books locations for about $3! Although I have not done a direct side-by-side comparison with the Hong Kong release, there are a couple of things I can say for certain. First, the U.S. release has an incorrect running time listed on the disc labels (there is no time shown on the jacket itself). The labels state 101 minutes, but the actual running time is 91 minutes, which would make it the unrated cut of the film. Second, my recollection on the Hong Kong release is that one thing missing from it was a short scene with a brief flash of nudity. It is a scene fairly early in the film, in which Jeff Speakman is in bed. He wakes up, gets out of bed, and walks over to the window, and you see a shot of him naked from the rear. That is missing from the Hong Kong release, but it is definitely included on the U.S. release. The odd thing is that is is also included on the Taiwan release, which is noticeably shorter, mostly due to numerous cuts in various scenes to remove bad language and violence. I got my copy of the Taiwanese release several years ago from a seller in Singapore. They evidently have a very strict censorship code there, and are not at all tolerant when it comes to certain curse words and extreme violence. Although released by a Taiwanese publisher, this disc was obviously distributed in Singapore as well, as it spent a portion of its' lifetime as an active rental disc there. It obviously had to conform to the stringent censorship standards there, hence the numerous cuts in various scenes. It is surprising, however that it does include the aforementioned scene with the brief bit of male nudity by Jeff Speakman. Apparently they didn't mind that in Singapore! :lol: Well, I hope that clears things up somewhat regarding the various releases of this title.

David :wave:

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Posted: 02 Mar 2022, 00:59 

The Pit and the Pendulum is a pretty good looking release. When I get the time I'll capture it with Hauppauge PVR and post some screenshots of it. Full Moon always has great laserdisc releases. Wait was Dolls a Full Moon movie? That is not a great laserdisc release but would be an exception to the rule. My copy of Pit and the Pendulum, Demonic Toys, and Dollman vs Demonic toys all look great Video Quality wise.

Hi jesuslovesgood,

Dolls was an Empire Pictures film released on laserdisc by Image Entertainment. It was not a Full Moon release like the others you mentioned. Although my copy of Dolls looks good, yours might very well not. It was an earlier Image release, pressed at 3M, so your copy might be one of the unfortunate ones which could suffer from rot, as some 3M pressings from a certain time period do. I agree with you that the Full Moon releases as a general rule look outstanding. They wisely chose to have all of their releases pressed at Pioneer, which means excellent transfer quality and virtually zero occurrence of rot! :clap: If only the other publishers had chosen as wisely! Alas, many of them did not. :( That's why the publishers who chose poorly (like Columbia Tristar) suffered astronomical failure rate of many of their titles. :cry: If I had been in charge of production at one of the publishers, I would have sent everything to Pioneer for pressing. However, I'm sure many of the other plants offered cheaper prices than Pioneer. Well, as they say, you get what you pay for. Good work isn't cheap, and cheap work isn't good!

Best Regards,
David :wave:

p.s. You shouldn't have any problem with that copy of Lifeforce either. It's an MGM/UA release, and they, like Full Moon, also chose very wisely to have virtually everything they released pressed at Pioneer. I think you will find yourself to be in great shape on that disc, my friend! :D

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Posted: 22 May 2022, 21:24 

How are manufacturer details determined for LDs? I have two Lupin III boxsets (TV Perfection BOX and Theater Box) that don't have information on many aspects on the DB and wanted to contribute a bit

Hi crashoveride,

All you need to do is do an update from the dedicated page for the release in the database. When you are looking at the page for the release you have, click on "update" in the "user controls" section in the lower left part of the screen. That will take you to the update screen. Just enter the mint markings from your discs in the space on that screen. In most cases, the "Mint-o-Matic" device that Julien has programmed into the database will then automatically tell you which facility manufactured the disc. Usually, the manufacturing plant will appear on the screen next to the mint markings after you enter them in the space provided. The format of the mint markings you enter will allow the Mint-o-Matic to determine where the disc was made. You see, each manufacturing plant used their own unique combination of characters in the mint markings that they etched into the discs. Often, it may be something as simple as one specific character in a specific position in the markings which determines where that disc was pressed. For example, Pioneer Japan normally has a "-P" suffix at the end of the batch number in the mint markings. This is the case with all of their discs, except for the early ones which have hand-scratched mint markings. The Mint-o-matic sometimes has a difficult time deciphering those. Similarly, Kuraray discs normally have a "-K" suffix at the end of the batch numbers. Likewise, the other manufacturing plants each had their own unique "signature" characteristics in their mint markings which enable the Mint-o-Matic to detect their products as well. The only time it doesn't work is when you enter mint markings which don't include any of the "signature" characteristics that Julien has programmed into the device. This usually means that either you didn't enter the markings correctly, or the disc came from an unknown manufacturing plant (i.e. not one of the recognized facilities on the established manufacturers list). Just make sure that you enter all of the correct characters (both numbers and letters) in the correct order from the discs that you own. As long as you carefully enter all of the characters, the Mint-o-Matic will tell you where the disc was made the vast majority of the time. I hope this is helpful to you, and thanks for your interest in contributing information to the database! :thumbup: It's only with the participation of collectors like yourself that the database will continue to grow with more accurate and complete information for the benefit of all in the global LD community!

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 22 May 2022, 23:42 

Just submitted marks for those two boxes, thank you!

Hi crashoveride,

Glad I was able to help! :) By the way, welcome to LDDb! It looks like you just joined recently. We're happy to have you among us here! You'll find this to be, for the most part, a very friendly place indeed, full of like-minded collectors such as yourself, who are passionate about this wonderful old format. You'll also find a lot of valuable and useful information about laserdisc releases archived here, of which you have just become an active participant by submitting two updates! :thumbup: Well done, my friend! Please don't hesitate to submit more information in the future about any other releases you may happen to have in your collection. Now that you are a registered member here, you can interact fully with the database, as you just did, by doing updates to any of the listing pages. Basically, anything that is missing (any field where you see the three question marks) you are now able to fill in, just as you did with the mint markings. Also, you can submit from scratch any title you might own which is not presently in the database. I don't know how large your collection is, but if you own any unusual, rare titles, they may not be catalogued here yet. If you own anything that you can't find listed here, I would encourage you to submit as much information as you can about it, so that it can be added to the database, and become part of the permanent historical record of this archival format. It's for the benefit of everyone here now, as well as for those who may start collecting in the future. You'll notice that your updates of the mint markings do not immediately appear on the listing pages. This is because they first go into the "pending" section of the website. They will be kept there awaiting validation by Julien, our webmaster/administrator of this site. You see, he wants to be certain to maintain the accuracy of the information archived here, so that it doesn't become like the Wild Wild West, with people adding inaccurate/bogus information at will. In order to keep the information on this site accurate, Julien reviews each of the updates and new title submissions to see if everything looks correct and legitimate. If everything looks okay, he validates the update/submission, and it becomes a permanent part of the site. Please be patient with Julien. :angel: All of this takes time, and along with all of his other duties of maintaining this site, sometimes it takes awhile to get all of the submissions through the validation process. Julien is very good at what he does, and quite passionate about doing it right. Just trust that it will get handled properly, with a little time. Thanks for making your first contributions to the database! You'll see them appear on the listing pages in the near future.

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 14 Sep 2022, 00:43 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/123389887780

Appear to be this release: Seven (1995) [SIL0044]

I noticed that a used copy sold on LDDb used for $44.99


Hi Mark,

I've noticed this listing several times in the past. The seller is living in a "fool's paradise", a fantasy world all his own! He may as well accept that he is never going to sell that disc and remove that listing. All he's doing is paying needless listing fees to eBay for an item he will never sell unless he makes a MASSIVE adjustment to his asking price first. Actually, I saw the $44.99 copy you are referring to and considered buying it, but didn't. There were simply too many other discs I wanted much more at the time - and much better ones, I might add! It never ceases to amaze me how many sellers there are out there like this one, who think like P.T. Barnum, that there is "a sucker born every minute". There are even a great number of such sellers right here in our midst on LDDb, although they are the outliers. The vast majority of sellers here are honest and reputable people who aren't trying to get rich by taking advantage of the simple-minded. No one in their right mind is going to pay that kind of money for a single laserdisc! For that matter, I don't think there is anyone NOT in their right mind who would do that! I know a lot of people probably think I'm totally insane because I own over 9000 laserdiscs, but even a fanatical collector like myself isn't going to do such a foolhardy thing. If I decided to spend 10 grand on laserdiscs in one fell swoop (which I never have, and never will), I would damn well expect to be getting a stack of at least 100 top shelf titles for that kind of money. The most I've spent in one purchase was about 2 grand on several occasions over the years. Most of those were big deals with our old friend, Nicolas Santini (n$a), but for that money, I got about 20 top-of-the-line Japanese imports in excellent condition. And I mean RARE ones! I also made one big deal years ago with a seller in Hong Kong for about 2 grand. On that one, I got about 35 truly RARE Hong Kong discs in great shape, most of which I have never seen another copy of in the years since then. $10000 for one disc? Absolute insanity! :crazy:

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 31 Jan 2023, 00:45 

You have to interpret what little rot data exists carefully. These are all unverified user submissions and there aren’t enough of them to be statistically accurate. Also all of this data was collected after LD died. What discs rotted in-period, for people who took care of them, honestly, is different than the question of what still hasn’t rotted decades later in the hands of collectards and Youtubbers.

Obviously a disc pressing plant in Japan will be cleaner than one in the US. However…people in the US are more likely to store their LDs in large stacks in a non-air conditioned garage in Alabama for 20 years too, which doesn’t help their condition one bit.

Rot is a boring topic, done to death. People are way way too obsessed with it.

Obsession is no good for health going ----> :crazy:
Wasting money on rotted discs could be very annoying if you ask me.


Hi noogie-man,

Yes, wasting money on rotted discs is very annoying. I'll do my best to break it down for you, and keep in mind, this is coming from someone with 35+ years of collecting experience. Pioneer USA is an extremely reliable manufacturing plant, not quite as good as Pioneer Japan or the other Japanese plants, but still very good indeed. In fact, Pioneer USA is the most reliable American plant, along with 3M, in my opinion. In very general terms, here is the breakdown of what you need to avoid/watch out for: 1.)Any disc manufactured before 1985 is suspect, REGARDLESS of manufacturing plant. Yes, this includes ALL Discovision titles, and even those from Japanese plants! If the seller is unable or unwilling to check the playback quality of a pre-1985 title, I would avoid it. Look for another seller who is able and willing to check it before you buy it, if you really want to own it. It is VERY rare to find a Pioneer USA disc made after 1985 with rot. 2.) Any 3M disc made during 1988-89 should be closely checked before purchase. During this period, 3M had a unique problem which no other plant had. Some copies of 3M titles pressed during this period have spots made into the data layer of the disc which you can actually see with the naked eye when looking at the disc in good lighting conditions. If you see any such spots on the disc, AVOID it like the plague! It is almost certain to be rotted and worthless! 3.) Any Technidisc title from the early period (1985-86) should be closely checked before purchase. These are the discs with the very bold looking mint markings, having the TV-shaped Hewlett Packard-type logo and a date from 1985 or 1986. Almost all of these are severely rotted. Those from the later periods of Technidisc's manufacturing cycle (those without the Technidisc name in the mint markings, and those with the very small font size mint markings) are normally very reliable, and have very low occurrence of rot. 4.) All DADC USA discs from 1995 on should be checked before purchase. These are the ones with batch numbers of 2700 or higher in the mint markings. These have VERY HIGH occurrence of rot. That's pretty much everything you need to know about what to avoid. I hope that helps.

David

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 Post subject: Re: Surfing stuff on LD...
Posted: 01 Mar 2023, 23:49 

I like surfing documentaries and I'm trying to put together a list of releases on LD. Does anyone see a title missing?

Bali High

Big Wave

Blazing Boards

Chrystal Eyes

Endless Summer

Endless Summer 2

Follow the Sun

Follow the Sun 2

Free Ride

How Zit Bradda

Rolling Thunder

Surfer Magazine

Tubular Swells

Wave of the Future

Not a subject on DiscoVision even though "Skateboarding" was. Not a documentary, but the movie Surf Ninjas was funny...

Hi hawkwind,

I'm not sure whether you wanted to include Japanese imports on your list or not. In the event that you do, have you considered "Wet Lips" (TE-D039)? It's a title that was not released in the U.S. I was fortunate enough to stumble upon a copy of it a number of years ago. I wasn't even sure exactly what it was at the time, but I just picked it up anyway, which I do on occasion when I think something might be rare and/or unusual. That certainly was the case with that particular piece! It turned out to be a short documentary on surfing. The cover picture on the LDDb listing page is from my copy, which oddly enough is a sample copy. I didn't notice this at the time I got it. I only discovered it after Julien had a discussion here about Japanese sample copies, and I spotted the small red label with the three sample Kanji characters in the upper right corner of the jacket. This does seem to be a pretty rare title, as I have never seen another copy of it in the years that have passed since I got it. Anyway, if you want to include Japanese releases, you might want to add that one to your list.

Best Regards,
David

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Posted: 29 Aug 2023, 22:13 

I see that as a problem to be honest. Hong Kong on Fire is such a title.

I have been to a couple of markets in Hong Kong and sometimes I could only find one part of a
title so it is possible that a collector only has half of a film.

Yes, I agree. That has been bugging me as well.

I started doing the opposite: if a title was sold with 2 individual prices for Part 1 and 2, I will split the 1~2 into to entries instead.

But even then, some like Day That Doesn't Exist, The (Er yue san shi) (1995) [ML 592~3] seem to come in a single cover for both discs?

Julien

Hi Julien,

Yes, you are correct. The Day That Doesn't Exist definitely comes with two discs in a single cover. I own that one and can confirm that is the case. In my opinion, the ones with two separate jackets for the two discs should probably be left as two separate entries in the database. I have seen several of these sold on eBay as only one of the halves of the movie. One example I remember seeing was called Iron Monkey. I can't recall if the seller was offering only Part 1 or only Part 2. Needless to say, I avoided it completely, as I'm not interested in owning only half of the film. I'm not sure if that was common practice in Hong Kong, to sell the two discs individually. Most of the titles I'm aware of packaged in this way have different artwork on the two jackets. It's obvious that they could have been sold separately, although I'm not sure if that was normally done there. The different artwork on the two jackets is the main reason I believe these should remain as separate entries in the database. Well, that's my opinion, for what it's worth.

Best Regards,
David :wave:

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Posted: 30 Aug 2023, 23:29 



Hi David,

it is always so good to hear / read from you!

I agree 100 % ! I do not know if you can open the link that I posted earlier this week in this thread but you can see
in the small pictures on that link that Hong Kong on Fire has two separate covers for each part and the artwork is very different ! in both cases even though it is part I and II of the exact same film.

Yours truly,
Marcin Wilk

Hi Marcin,

Yes, it's always great to read from you as well! :thumbup: Yes, I was able to open the link you posted about Hong Kong on Fire and see the two individual covers. I don't own that one, but I do own several similar ones. A few examples are Black Panther Warriors (ML 883 & ML 884), The Final Option (ML 479 & ML 480), and Fist of Legend (EL 059 & EL 060). The latter is one of the Cameron Entertainment titles, which seems to be a subsidiary of Mei Ah, hence the different reference number type. That one was a title I stumbled upon many years ago quite by accident. It was listed, along with three other Hong Kong titles by a seller on eBay. That seller turned out to be located right here in my own hometown of Lexington, Kentucky! :crazy: It was some type of consignment/resale shop which was about 3 miles from my house! Someone had brought those discs in and sold them to that shop, and they were re-selling them. I contacted them and arranged to pick them up instead of having them shipped to me. I had no idea that there was anyone else in my city who owned any Hong Kong laserdiscs, but obviously someone did. I don't know who they were, but I was the one who benefitted from their decision to sell the discs! :thumbup: That's the only time such a thing has ever happened to me. This area of the U.S. is basically a wasteland as far as laserdisc is concerned, and has been for many years now. From time to time, I find something interesting at one of the local Half Price Books stores, but certainly nothing that exciting. Finding Fist of Legend and three other HK titles was surely a rare occurrence indeed in this area! I have been quite careful over the years, and have never gotten stuck with only half of one of the HK titles which are the topic of discussion here. I have always been sure to steer away from any such pieces that appeared to be only half of a 2-disc set. None of those for me, thank you!

Best Regards,
David :wave:
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