Goodfellas 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Review
Brad Sturdivant
December 29th, 2016
Of all of Martin Scorsese’s incredible library of films, I think GOODFELLAS has been scrutinized the most. A lot of it is because it’s such a wonderful film, but I think, 26 years later, people are still surprised it didn’t win Best Picture. It eventually lost to DANCES WITH WOLVES for Best Picture and Best Director, a great film in its own right, but GOODFELLAS probably should have been the film to get Scorsese his first Best Director award.
Reviewing a classic film that’s been analyzed as much as GOODFELLAS is a bit redundant at this point, but I will say that I like the film, even though I don’t consider it to be Scorsese’s best directorial effort (a debate for another time). But every time I watch GOODFELLAS, I’m surprised by how well it stands up over time. It’s truly one of the best gangster films of all time and a definite classic. Instead of going on about how good of a movie this is, I’m going to focus the review on the video presentation of the 4K UHD.
4K ULTRA HD BLU-RAY REVIEW
Video: This 4K UHD of GOODFELLAS has been sitting on my desk for almost a month. I’ve written over 60 video reviews for 4K UHD titles and I can honestly say that this video review of GOODFELLAS has been the hardest video review to write. I refuse to read other reviews before I write my own, but I’ve been told that there seems to be much disagreement among reviewers regarding the video quality of the GOODFELLAS 4K UHD and I completely understand why. One thing to keep in mind when comparing the different versions of GOODFELLAS is that it just got a very nice Blu-ray upgrade for its 25th anniversary, so in some ways we’re comparing Blu-ray at it’s best to 4K in its infancy.
All video reviews are subjective anyway and there are literally thousands of variables that can influence a video presentation from system calibration, type of TV to the size of your TV. Heck, even the amount of ambient light can make a difference in the video presentation. How you feel about GOODFELLAS might depend on your setup, but most likely it’s going to depend on what you’re looking at and what scene you’re comparing. I’ll use two specific scenes to explain the problem(s) with GOODFELLAS.
The first scene to explain the problem is in the beginning (chapter 10, the famous “am I a joke to you” scene). Joe Pesci and Ray Liotta are sitting in the bar talking and right away we notice some problems with the 4K. Or maybe “problems” isn’t the right word, but there are some deficiencies with this 4K that we don’t see in some of the better 4K discs. Pesci is wearing a gray suit while the guy behind him is wearing a much darker suit, presumably black. I would expect to see a nice contrast and a clear definition of color given the HDR, but Pesci’s suit almost bleeds right into the background. I’m using this specific example to point out that this is a constant problem in all of the darkly lit scenes, which of course makes up a lot of the film.
Another scene to look at is chapter 31 (when Henry gets out of prison). This is a brighter scene, but we again don’t get the level of detail you’d expect in a 4K. Part of this is due to the amount of grain found in the presentation, but I’m guessing most of this is due to the age of the film; keep in mind this movie is 26 years old. But the question is; is this 4K UHD disc better than the Blu-ray and that’s where I’m having problems. The 4K does offer some slight improvements in detail and colors, but it also feels a little more saturated at times. I don’t think it’s worse than the Blu-ray, but I can’t say definitively that it’s better. As for a recommendation, I’d say if you didn’t pick up the 25th anniversary a while back, then upgrading here is a no-brainer. If you did, then I’d hesitate before double dipping again.
Audio: We get the same DTS audio from the Blu-ray.
This title was reviewed using a Samsung UBD-K8500 with a Sony XBR75X850C TV.
There are no 4K exclusive features included on the 4K disc, but it does include a copy of the 25th anniversary 2-disc Blu-ray.
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