Alpha Video Classics-bad rips

[Harry Fabian]

I have rented a few noir from Netflix recently that were Alpha releases and they were pathetically bad rips. Alimony and Whispering City are two of them. I think there is another one for two that I cannot remember. They didn't clean up the original prints at all, the sound is awful, and I swear they used a camera phone to record Whispering City. Unless you REALLY NEED these films, I would encourage everyone to avoid paying for these titles and be very wary of any Alpha releases.

[Steve-O]

I'd love to find a nice copy of Whispering City. I understand that there's one floating around but I've only seen the Alpha release (I have yet to find a good Alpha release. Woman on the Run is God-awful too.)

[Keith]

I hate it because Alpha has some great films on DVD, but they're too cheap and lazy to release a good print.

[Davidmk]

Yeh some of those are pretty bad , they look like bad prints being played in someones basement filmed with an old camcorder pointed at the screen ..... It's nice to see some of these films , but some are tough to even understand the Dialogue ..... most of these types i own i got really cheap so no harm , Hopefully someday a lot od these movies will get better releases .

[Ashirg]

Alpha doesn't own the rights to any of the titles they release, so they have to go with titles that fell through the cracks and are in public domain. They usually use some collector's poor 16 mm print or 3rd-generation tape masters from long ago. They can not use better materials because they don't have them - the collectors prints are usually given as is - take them or leave them. They used an ok print for Louisiana Hussey (http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film2/DVDReviews47/louisiana_hussy.htm) (ok=you can tell what's going on the screen most of the time) - too bad the film itself is just dreadful.