Last week a new "10-year Anniversary" edition of the Ron Howard film "Apollo 13" was released: a 2-disk set with 'digital remastering', new features, and including the complete IMAX version.
What a rip.
Disk one of the set is identical to my 10-year old version. Same features, commentaires. If there is any difference in the picture quality, I sure can't see it. If anything there is a slight decrease in the audio quality. (Here I'm narrowly defining 'quality' as enough bass to dance the glassware off the shelves during the lift-off; it seemed slightly less intense on the new version.)
Disk two has the IMAX version and a couple of historical features. I'm sure the IMAX version was impressive in an IMAX theater, but it is pointless on a TV screen. First off, its 25 minutes shorter, achieved apparently by deleteing scenes at random. Secondly, the aspect ratio is reduced from the wide-screen version. Its about mid-way between the wide screen ratio, and a regular TV full-screen format. I greatly prefer the wide screen version.
The two 'new' features are pretty dull. One is a 10-year old news program about Apollo 13; the other is a 2-year old very general, very incomplete recap of the entire space program.
If you currently have a good DVD copy of Apollo 13, don't waste money on the 'new' one. The only good news is that it was only ~$15; if you don't have Apollo 13 on DVD, what are you waiting for?
GC