The Empire Strikes Back, Widescreen, Laserdisc, CBS/Fox video, 1995
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In 1995 the Star Wars trilogy was reissued across many different formats. Known as the "faces" versions among collectors, due to the artwork featuring close up head shots of the Star Wars characters.
On Laserdisc, the restored masters from 1993 had previously only been available in the expensive Star Wars trilogy definitive collection box. Though considered the pinnacle of image and audio quality at the time, the 1993 THX remasters have proved controversial in retrospect, as they introduced unwanted noise reduction artifacts on the image. When looking closely, smearing of details and ghostly trails when objects are in motion is apparent. The sound is uncompressed PCM 2.0, with Pro Logic matrixed surround channels. The 1995 Laserdisc versions were encoded in the "Extended play" (CLV) format, theoretically reducing the image quality slightly, but lowering the number of sides to 3, instead of the 5 sidebreaks from the box set's CAV versions. Though this release omits all the Supplemental Features from the 1993 box set release, you do get a "new" extra. On side 3, after the film, you get part 2 of the 1995 Leonard Maltin interview with George Lucas. Side 4 has the generic "Program Material only on other side" message. Both Empire and Jedi start with the CBS/Fox Video intro, but the first Star Wars has a different "Fox Video" intro, obviously due to the distribution rights being different on that particular film in 1995. |
20th. Century Fox Home Entertainment
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CBS/Fox Video intro
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THX Laserdisc intro
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Fox fanfare
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A long time ago...
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Title card
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Opening crawl
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Binoculars
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I found them
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Binoculars
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On Dagobah
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Alert all commands
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Matte painting
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Duel
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Falcon dish in frame
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End credits
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George Lucas Interview part 2
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George Lucas Interview part 2
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George Lucas Interview part 2
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George Lucas Interview part 2
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George Lucas Interview part 2
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George Lucas Interview part 2
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FBI warning
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Laserdisc side 4
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