Film Credits

Written and Directed by: Steven Spielberg

Starring: Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Teri Garr, Melinda Dillon, Cary Guffey, Bob Balaban, Lance Henriksen

Review

Another recent Voyager CLV reissue that people have been clamoring about since its original CAV-only release a year ago (reviewed December 1990, issue #17) is Close Encounters of the Third Kind. The CAV disc was, and still is, an outstanding effort in every respect, featuring an exquisite transfer and a wealth of supplementary materials (one of their best). Viewers of the CAV version also had the option (by way of programming their players) to watch either the original 1977 edition of the film or a "complete" version which adds in scenes included for the 1980 Special Edition reissue. That is wherein lays the sole real fault of the CLV reissue - it contains ONLY the original 1977 edition of the film and none of the extra footage (the programming would be a pain to accomplish, if not impossible due to the amount of chapters), but I really don't mind that since I prefer the original version over Spielberg's Special Edition cut.

The actual CLV transfer is identical to that on the CAV disc. The original 2.35:1Panavision image has been letterboxed at an approx. 2.15:1 aspect ratio, it is sharply detailed, blacks are very black, and colors rich. The CX-encoded digital Dolby surround stereo soundtrack is superb in every respect, and watch that you don't blow your speakers during the "Mothership" finale. Voyager chose a somewhat poor side cut between side two and side three, which interrupts the beginning of the "Mothership" sequence; a perfect break occurred a mere half-minute earlier. Additionally, side three, which runs just over 23m, is in CLV, but I wholely understand Voyager's decision to leave it as such. This two-disc set comes in a single jacket, was pressed at Pioneer, and contains 43 listed chapter markers.