Over on the otrplus forum Mike (Hobart) pointed out that somebody had uploaded the TV movie Masks of Death to Youtube (YT). The film still hasn't received a DVD release.
It was promptly removed by Tyburn (copyright holders I assume), re-uploaded and re-removed again.
I downloaded the YT version using the Firefox add-on VideoDownloadHelper. This gave me a 74 minute mp4 file of 480x360 resolution. On reflection I realised that I didn't check to see if that was the highest resolution for the YT version. I downloaded it as I have a very good quality rip (avi) of this film from an Italian (IT) VHS release which clocks in at 4 minutes longer (78 mins) and I wanted to check why my IT version is 4 minutes longer. The IT version is 640x480 resolution.
I made some screengrabs from both versions. I'm hoping these don't get resized. First the Italian VHS avi rip followed by the mp4 version I got from Youtube.
As you can see the Italian VHS rip is about as good as it gets for a standard definition (640x480) video.
To be fair to the Youtube version maybe there was a higher resolution but even if there was it wouldn't be much better visually than the 480x360 version I downloaded.
So what's the catch? Not much. The Italian VHS has credits at the start in Italian and you can see the Iris Mediaset watermark bottom-right which is all the way through. But there's no Italian subtitles and the audio is English so no Italian dubbing. The avi file is larger than average at 1.1GB. I have split it into 3 parts with Winrar.
Here are the links to the 3 parts followed by links for 32 bit and below that the 64 bit Winrar installers for those without Winrar. Install Winrar with the default options which integrates with the Windows Explorer shell. Once you have all 3 parts, and in the same folder, you can right-click one of the parts, select 'Extract here' and hey presto Winrar will extract from all 3 parts and piece the film together itself.
Even if you own a copy of the original VHS release you might want to grab this. Those VCRs won't last forever!
Replies
Many thanks, Jake!
Thank you for sharing
Many thanks for this Jake. I have been looking for a decent copy for a long time. Again, many thanks. And another item to cross off my list..........
Very Nice,Thank You Jake!
Thomas
First file is wonderful quality so far. I'm sure this was a lot of trouble--thank you!
Have you determined where the extra length resides in the film?
I only ask because i have a good 74 minute AVI (NOT from YouTube) and I'm curious as to the difference.
Bob I'm not sure if I ever uploaded this to your FTP. If you have a Masks of Death which is around 1.1GB that could be it.
I've had it for some time actually. I remember thinking of putting it on the old Demonoid at one time.
I've not had a chance to see why it's 4 minutes longer. In my case I would have to have two 'setups' (2 x PC, TV) next to each other and start both versions (74 and 78 minute) together. It's possible but not at the top of my list of priorities.
Thanks