While it only ended up playing in a select few American theaters, the blockbuster ambitions can be seen in the film's gorgeous animation. Originally planned for a wide American release, the movie was a rare anime to be produced with an English dub and released with subtitles in Japan (a Japanese dub was later produced for home video). Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust was a 2000 film directed and written by anime titan Yoshiaki Kawajiri ( Ninja Scroll, Wicked City). Those gnarly yellow subtitles are gross and kill the atmosphere somewhat, unfortunately.Discotek has announced that it will be releasing the anime film Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust on Blu-ray and DVD. The transfer is amazing at least, and I'm happy to actually see what's going on during the really dark segments of the movie. That coupled with the BD for VHD: Bloodlust not containing the Japanese audio and we fans really got kicked in the stomach here, even if they are otherwise very nice looking Blu-rays that I'm happy to have.Īnd absolutely no special features to speak of on Sentai's disc (the Urban Vision DVD had a making-of that could've been ported over at least), this certainly could and should have been a much better package. Plus, there's the whole nostalgia bit many people who would want this on Blu-ray first saw it on cable or VHS, so not supplying the Streamline dub as an option was crummy. While there's some unusual parts that alter the intent of the movie, the voice acting is really good, whereas the new dub has some really not-so-good performances. The original dub should have been included. when D slices off Rei Ginsei's hand, he quips about Rei being done in by his own stupidity that should prompt him to question his life choices, to which Rei asks if D has to be so condescending, and the whole exchange (especially the vocal delivery of the guy playing Rei) makes it sound like it was played up for laughs instead of the more grave dialog of the Japanese track. Count Lee speaks no words at the beginning, he consults with the mystical mist in his throne room, and all that-but the voice acting and directing is very questionable, and there are some really stupid choices of dialog: examples that bothered me the most were D exclaiming "Ghost beast" instead of "Phantom" when confronting the spectral cat, and the other being I appreciate that it follows the original Japanese a little closer, e.g. "Follow these mandates or you can't release this film." It's a whole lotta bowlsheet but Sentai had no choice, I suppose. someone from Japan buying the US Blu-ray, since a Blu-ray has yet to be released there and when one is, it will be sold at a much higher price (we're looking at around $60). The former because they thought it sounded old and janky (I'm doubting they speak English well so how would they know), and the latter to deter reverse-importation, i.e. Sadly, both decisions (excluding Streamline dub and forcing subs) were mandated by the Japanese licenser. Also, the English subtitles are not removable when viewing with the Japanese audio. The Streamline dub should have been included for the sake of nostalgia. The movie and the extras only take up about 17GB. It does look good, but I feel like it could have been better. I'm a little disappointed with this disc. I mention this only because the friend I watched it with was surprised that it wasn't in widescreen. One more note: The aspect ratio is 4:3, which is the original aspect ratio for this direct to video feature (although it was shown in theaters, it was primarily made for video). However, the initial 1985 anime has its own charms. 2000's VHD: Bloodlust would realize D's world with much more sophisticated animation. A noticed a lot of animation shortcuts this time - the animation in the OVA is a cut above 1980s TV quality but shy of theatrical feature quality. I found that the OVA still holds up pretty well despite being 30 years old. You can't switch between the English dub and the original Japanese on the fly - English subs are mandatory when viewing in Japanese (this is most likely contractual due to concerns about reverse importation). You can tell this was a new HD scan from a film source. The OVA looks very good despite the title only taking up less than 17 GB on a BD-25 (it's a bare bones disc, which helps in that regard). The main roles of Doris, D and the Count are all fine. Dan (Doris's little brother) sounds like a girl trying to do a Southern accent. They gave some characters accents (i.e, Southern for Dan, and English for the Count's daughter). The dub is mostly fine, and it's more faithful to the original script - the old Streamline dub added quite a bit of dialogue where there was none in the original. I just watched the Blu-ray from Sentai with the new English dub.
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