The post you are reporting:
Barry, you raise an interesting point and there is an answer. Sort of. Film never used to be filmed in "high def" any more than it is these days. Celluloid film stock is photographic rather than digital - in other words, it is not made of pixels but has an image developed onto it using photosensitive chemicals. The result is that every frame is a true photograph which can be blown-up to large size without much loss of definition. Too big and the image will start to soften, but the development of larger frame sizes (ie from 16mm to 35mm) helped this. These days the new IMAX cameras film onto 75mm frames, massive by any photographic standard and capable of holding a pin-sharp image at almost 28m high! IMAX also has super-fast frame rates which can be as high as 48fps (frames per second) which is twice as fast as the standard cinematic 24fps for smoother motion.
So how does this all fit in with Blu-Ray? Well, because the source material is all "high def" anyway, being stored on photographic celluloid masters, the quality of the transfer is usually down to how good the technology and skill is of the individuals performing the transfers. For example, the old 1978 Superman looks utterly stunning on Blu-Ray, and yet the far more recent Terminator 2 from 1992 looks utterly terrible. Another good example is Escape from New York (1981) which looks awful on Blu-Ray and does the new medium no justice whatsoever.
Over time celluloid prints can deteriorate which is why they tend to be digitally remastered. This remastering is a very expensive time-consuming process in which individual frames are repaired digitally, blemishes removed, images sharpened through digital image filters and so on. It can cost as much as the entire budget of a small movie and take many months of painstaking work but the end result is a fresh, lovely print of the film which will never deteriorate because it is no longer stored only on celluloid but also as high-resolution digital data on hard drives (each frame is scanned at high resolution which is where the "high definition" comes from).
The original print of Escape from New York is probably old and tired by now and without a suitable budget to remaster it properly, it was transferred to Blu-Ray using a special "edge detect" filter which attempted to pick-out and highlight the edges of things. The result is that the movie looks like it is acted by cardboard cut-out people and is possibly one of the worst high-def transfers so far. it looks utterly artificial and crap. Viewing it on DVD is far better.
Blu-Ray as a medium is awesome, when it is done right the results are eye-poppingly fantastic. If you're into audio too then you may have also noticed the rich depth of the uncompressed surround sound is also magnificnet, far better than DVD's compressed audio tracks could ever dream of being. It is also an organic technology that develops as it goes (your PS3 is perfect for this as it downloads all the updates to take advantage of Blu-Ray Live and so on).
What's more, the PS3 and indeed many other digital disk players have pretty good upscaling technology now for DVD playback which has closed the gap between DVD and Blu-Ray. While DVD will never be as good, the upscaling is so good that (in my own humble opinion) it is hardly worth buying all your old faves on Blu-Ray. The DVD playback holds itself together very well even on our giant Bravia.
So to answer your question, no it probably isn't worth buying all your old favourites again provided you keep your PS3 firmware updated and use a good quality HDMI lead (this makes a big difference too - don't ever use a cheap one, use one around £20 - £30 mark for good output). I haven't bought all my old faves again apart from a very few special exceptions.
Blu-Ray does have a few drawbacks, especially on the maximum def of 1080p. The quality of the signal from player to TV is so amazingly good that it can actually affect what you watch. A good example is the slight "drag" you might see on high speed action scenes or the very slight "juddering" on wide shots (ie filmed from a helicopter). While these issues are minimal and hardly noticed, they are things that fussy nerds like me spot immediately. This really happens because of the high quality high frequency playback of the 1080p screen which refreshes at around 60hz/fps (frames per second). But a brand new technology now exists, which sadly is so new that I don't even have it on my telly but the PS3 is already supporting, which can align the refresh rate with that of a proper cinema project's 24 fps. Called "24p" only the very very latest sets have it, and even then only the better ones on the market.
Hi def is in its infancy still and will develop and grow over the next few years, making a lot of modern gear out-of-date at an alarmingly high rate. My TV is already out of date - shocking!! The good thing is that lots of new hardware will require firmware updates to keep it more futureproof and the PS3 is really a shining example of how ALL future hardware will work in this respect.
The other point of course is that cinema will always be a few steps ahead of home systems in order to keep people from staying in and waiting for the DVD releases. IMAX with its giant screens and 7.1 surround sound, the new wave of 3D movies, all things which will keep the home entertainment system firmly in its place as second best.
Phew - cuppa tea now I think! Got steam coming out my ears.