what's your fav...

Great Demos:
War of the Worlds (DTS)
Master and Commander
The Incredibles, Cars, ... all Pixar movies
Fantasia 2000 (DTS)
Serenity
U571
Gladiator (DTS-ES)
Saving Private Ryan (DTS)
Lord of the Rings (DD-EX)

Great Demos of sh**ty movies:
Underworld
Blade I, II, III ...
Hustle & Flow
and... Top Gun

My personal vote is for the Diva 's Opera scene in The Fifth Dimension, especially in 2 channel DVD audio mode.

My personal vote is for the Diva 's Opera scene in The Fifth Dimension, especially in 2 channel DVD audio mode.

I think you mean "The Fifth Element". That is one of my favorite movies.

If you think it sounds good in 2-channel DVD audio, you should hear it in uncompressed Dolby 5.1 on BluRay--ASTOUNDING...

And I agree with "Across the Universe", ESPECIALLY on BluRay with DTS.

Also, "Cutthroat Island. Geena Davis playing a female Pirate Captain, and the BEST pirate-movie soundtrack of ALL TIME. What's not to like?

--Richard

If you are a Lennon/McCartney fan try "Across The Universe" ,good musical soundtrack !!
gdb

One of my favorite DVDs? One of my frequently watched is Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, and Eric Johnson live in San Francisco. Does that qualify?

Shit....... I'm buying the DVD and bringing my 65" to CF now !!!!

I hope that's not a DLP or a Plasma--if it is, you'd better be sure to have you r extended warranty in place before you start driving. Te trip alone will most likely damage either of those kinds of TVs unless you pack it in about 2' of bubble wrap and foam...

But if you have a high-def big screen you are willing to bring to CF-08, let us know--I'll bring my Oppo and my Sony BDP-S1 BluRay player, and somebody else can bring a PS3, and we'll have a HiDef showdown...

--Richard

I have a 65" HDLP, and a 46" LCD, can bring either !!!

Like Rainman said, don't know if this counts but I really
enjoy watching and listening to
U2 - Go Home - Live from Slane Castle
Springsteen's - Live from Barcelona
The Who - Live from the Isle of White

Great pics guys!
Yes those music DVDs count too we really enjoy them, thanks we'll look into those as well.
Speaking of which the Eagles "Hell freezes Over" DVD is a good one very nice sound (only listened to the 2 ch).
David Gilmore's latest "Remember That Night" nice 5.1 mix mollower music than older stuff but very tasty.

Great pics guys!
Yes those music DVDs count too we really enjoy them, thanks we'll look into those as well.
Speaking of which the Eagles "Hell freezes Over" DVD is a good one very nice sound (only listened to the 2 ch).

Oh, it IS good in 2channel, but when you finally get a chance to hear it in DTS on a properly set-up 5.1 rig, it will BLOW YOUR MIND. This DVD is what ultimately convinced me to expand my rig to 5.1. It's THAT good in DTS 5.1.

I still listen to most music in stereo, but I'm REALLY glad I have those 4 other speakers when the opportunity presents itself, like this delightfully-mastered Eagles DVD...

--Richard

With the imminent arrival of my first sub, I decided that stocking up on the proper collection of DVDs to exploit it was a necessity.

So I went crazy on amazon.com.

I've got 16 movies on the way. I found what are considered the best movies for sound by searching through various threads such as this one, one of which was on SVS' web site.

I ordered the best version available for any of these movies. If there was a version with a remastered soundtrack I bought that.

Here's the list thus far:

Top Gun
Jaws (dunno, it's got a remastered soundtrack, so it might not be too bad on that count)
Master and Commander
Jurassic Park I & III (the second was so bad I can't see weathering that piece of crap for a soundtrack)
Jumanji
Backdraft
Godzilla
Apollo 13
Das Boot (Superbit)
Saving Private Ryan
Band of Brothers
Platoon
Hamburger Hill (one of this or Platoon are supposed to have a decent soundtrack, bought the other because I liked it)
War of the Worlds
Monsters Inc.
Finding Nemo

Now I know a few of these aren't especially good movies, but I was looking more for sound than anything else. I've already got The Incredibles, which even rattles the house when played through my L100s. I received Finding Nemo, which is a good movie, but I'm a bigger fan of The Incredibles than that one. There's a scene in it where Darla (IIRC) taps on the side of the fish tank that's gonna be pretty intense with a sub. Das Boot was delivered yesterday, and I have to say that I anticipate that will be a pretty intense movie too. The depth charges going off are not represented well by the L100s because they just can't drop to the hz level required. I own Ronin, which seemed to have a pretty decent soundtrack on it too. I saw mention of it where it doesn't go that low, but it's full of 50-80Hz action. There are some gunfight scenes in it that have some punch, and the car chase scenes are some of the best I can think of. It's not a particularly well known movie, but it's done by a great director in John Frankenheimer and has a great plot too.

But the sub is for music as well. Can't wait until it is here. I've felt like hell for a week and have watched more DVDs than imaginable, and wish I had it for this little experience.

John

movie mix? Hard for me to pin just one down.
I really enjoy the pixar stuff for foley like, Toy Story ...then there's Chicken Run.
Just listened to the last Harrry Potter last week-pretty great FX sounds.
This weekend we will watch -No Country For Old Men. That is suppose to be a great mix as it has no music in the whole thing.

"Black Hawk Down" followed closely by "Equilibrium."

"I'm coming" - Christian Bale, Equilibrium

A few of the movies I watch that have good soundtracks are: Heat, Men In Black, The Matrix, and Predator. I watch more movies now that I finished my set up and turned on the holography! I am happy to say the surround speakers sounded awful in comparison so down the road they went. Now my living room has a much cleaner look to it. I also don't miss the fuzzy sound created by all of the speakers fighting each other at louder volumes since they are directed mostly at each other and your seat is the intersection of the whole mess.

Rainman,

If your rear speakers are making the mains sound fuzzy, and their sound is actually canceling or reinforcing frequencies from the mains, you have them WAY TOO LOUD...

In fact, playing a white noise test tone through a 5.1 system, if you are in the sweet and juicy like these nutz. spot, you should just barely be able to hear the rears. If you can distinctly locate a left or right rear channel on white noise test tones, they are too loud...

In my rig, my rears are a pair of Martin Logan Scenerios, driven by a Carver M-500t, and most of the time, even with the front 3 speakers and the sub CRANKED, the needles barely even wiggle on the M-500t. And I get EXCELLENT spacial cues from the rears at that level. We were watching "Cutthroat Island" yesterday, and my Sweetie actually looked out the back window during the jungle scenes, trying to figure out what sort of weird bird was sitting outside the window...

And even with a decently-calibrated 5.1 setup with Electrostatics all around, I will admit that sometimes, when I'm feeling really adventurous, I will punch in the SH on the mains. For some movies, it makes things sound REALLY good, but for most movies that have good multi-channel Dolby soundtracks it actually makes it sound worse...

The exception, oddly enough, is BluRay disc with DTS soundtracks. These tend to sound FANTASTIC with the SH kicked in. "Across the Universe" and the Eagles "Hell Freezes Over" sound like the musicians are in a wide arc at the front of the room. Wow...

--Richard

I got the pile of movies I ordered, and although the sub I ordered isn't exactly functional yet, it's heading in that direction and I hope I have it working in a number of hours from now.

I did watch the movies I bought anyway. I'd crank up the bass and let the 123A-3 woofer on my JBL L100s do the best they can, which is not too bad, but naturally they're not going to do what a sub can.

The assessment I've got out of the 15 or so movies I've watched recently that I bought for sound, is that the best, (mind you, sans a sub) is "Godzilla", the one from '98 with Matthew Broderick. It's a better movie than I thought it would be, although I'm not going to call it great. It's average as the script contains some moments that are, well...corny. Overall, though, it's done well from a sound standpoint. When that lizard on hormones goes stomping through New York, you'd swear it's outside the house. Lots of sound. It's a movie full of action.

If you've got a system that can hit reasonably low frequencies without a sub, check it out. It's pretty impressive.

I think that the Superbit version of "Das Boot" is going to be spectacular too. When the depth charges go off while watching the movie without a sub, I can't hear anything, which I imagine is the result of the 123A-3 not being able to drop to the frequencies needed. The rest of it is impressive, though.

John

I did a side-by-side comparison of the LD and DVDs of Top Gun. The soundtrack on the DVD just plain SUX!!!! The aircraft on the flight deck and the launching of the catapult at the beginning of the movie have been dialed down and Kenny Loggins singing 'Danger Zone' takes their place. The picture on the DVD is better....if that's any consolation.

ray