SPOILERS:
Watched the new edit of Cannibal Holocaust last night at the Odeon in Covent Garden for Cine Excess V! There were a few other Labbers there so I look forward to hearing their opinions on the new cut.
I'm not an expert when it comes to AV analysis, but, as far as I can tell, the version we saw last night will be the version included on the Shameless BD so I thought I'd share my thoughts on that first.
The video looked great, I have a feeling it was screened from a BD which would explain why the image looked ever so slightly fuzzy, as the screen it was projected onto was enormous! The picture looked very nice, I could see a decent amount of grain, some scenes were grainer than others (particularly during Faye's decapitation at the end, the image got quite grainy). I noticed only one instance of possible print damage, can't remember the scene at the moment but it was for the first second upon opening a new scene, it appeared to almost fade from a brownish tint to proper colour. Not sure if I've noticed that before. Anyway, the video was practically flawless, and if it were being watched on a home TV or in a home cinema environment I imagine it would look incredible.
The sound was fine, I think they were playing a surround track as there were some scenes in the jungle and in the TV offices where you could hear things going on in the rear speakers. Some of the gunshots were a bit piercing, as was some of the dialogue, but that is expected. What really stood out for me was the soundtrack, in particular the piece that just has drums that we hear when we first see the cannibals at the beginning eating a human hand. It sounded amazingly thunderous in the cinema.
As for the new edit itself, I was aware that Deodato had trimmed some of the animal cruelty, but I was wondering if he would change anything else. The muskrat scene retains the audio but cuts to shots of monkeys scampering up trees in order to fill the gap, this works quite well, but possibly only if you've seen the uncut version and know what is supposed to be happening. I'm not sure what a newcomer would make of that scene. The turtle scene is about 65% there I'd say, but a lot of it is obscured by newly generated lens flares and 'print damage'. I noticed a slight jump in the soundtrack during this scene, but it was fairly discreet. The shot of the monkey's head being sliced has been replaced by a split second of print damage. I had to admit, I saw that coming and was a bit annoyed by it, seeing as the same technique had been used during the turtle scene. The pig cruelty is intact, as are the spider and snake killings.
I wasn't sure if any scenes other than those involving animal cruelty were altered, though I did feel that the death of Faye was a bit longer than before, but that could just be the illusion of seeing it in the cinema.
All in all I have to say this is the best I've ever seen the film looking, perhaps it was blown up just a tad too large for the screening but I'm confident it'll look great at home
