horrible

Film Heaven hath no fury than a film fan handed a poor transfer on Blu-ray:

"Gladiator is plagued almost from beginning to end by a lack of definition. The image appears blurred and smudged, with facial textures taking on the consistency of wax and the sets and locations faring no better. [..] Worse still, presumably in an attempt to compensate for the low detail the image has, the BD been subjected to an inordinate amount of edge enhancement, resulting in some of the worst haloing I have ever seen on an HD release. Soldiers now appear to be protected by force fields rather than regular armour, spears and trees literally glow, and, during Commodus’ triumphant return to Rome, literally every single poppy fluttering through the air has a defined white outline several pixels wide."

More screen caps here. This kind of issue plagued dvd at the beginning, with Warner Brothers in particular issuing what looked like transfers from the same master they used for the VHS. My original copy of All The President's Men is horrible. Still holding off on investing in BD for now then ...