I was rewatching some scenes from FWWM just now, and the longer I look at them, the more I'm appalled by this DVD's absolutely godawful color transfer. Compared to the lush, gorgeous contrasts on the Region 1 DVD, this one seems affected by a garish, green hue, which makes even a simple white look like beige yellow...

Is there any region 2 alternative at all?

Don't know, Sourdust.

On a semi-related note, is the Region 2 FWWM DVD worth getting alone just for the 40 page collector's booklet that comes with it?  The Region 1 DVD doesn't come with jack.

There's been two Fire Walk With Me DVD releases in the UK so far. The first was the Second Sight release. It has Laura and Cooper on the cover and no special features. It's possibly the worst DVD release ever. It's virtually unwatchable. Then there's the Cinema Club (special) edition which is a port of the French MK2 DVD and I have no problem with this release whatsoever. It includes interviews with Ray Wise, Sheryl Lee and Madchen Amick. The accompanying booklet's nice (a couple of essays illustrated with some international film posters... an English language version of the booklet that came with the French DVD) but nothing to write home about and if you want one you'll have to move fast because the Cinema Club edition's been deleted and the Second Sight edition's been re-issed!  

Yeah, it really depends which one you're referring to. The MK2 version (or ports thereof, like the MK2/Paramount Scandinavian version and the UK Cinema Club version) is in my opinion the best FWWM DVD out there, better even than theLynch-approved Region 1 version from New Line. The MK2 version might be technically inferior to the New Line disc, but it looks closer to what I remember from the Cinema and the soundtrack is very good all the way through. The New Line disc has the dialogue turned up so loud during the Partyland scene that you actually don't even need the burned-in subtitles, and since the Partyland scene is my favourite of the whole film, that disqualifies the New Line disc no matter what Lynch thinks.

If you are referring to the MK2 disc, I don't know what to tell you. Except maybe that I think you're wrong. ;)

I've always been quite enamoured with the MK2 disc and its ports. I can't really remember what the theatrical release of Fire Walk With Me looked like after all these years but I do find the MK2 ports more aesthetically pleasing that the R1 disc and I totally agree with you about the Partyland scene. I remember the sound levels were much higher in the cinema than on the New Line DVD because my friend and I had no idea what was being said. My exhibit A is a transcript that was printed in Empire magazine around that time. 

I own two Fire Walk With Me DVDs that are so loathsome they make VHS look like high def - one's the UK Second Sight disc (which has just been reissued) and the other's the (mercifully deleted) Italian Cecchi Gori DVD. If I hadn't bought it from the Italian equivalent of Borders I'd have assumed it was a bootleg.    

Speaking of alternate FWWMs, does there exist a version containing Mike/Philip Gerard screaming at Bob, "That's his daughter you're killing?" and laughing afterwards? I know that the scene exists in the script, but I've seen it discussed on message boards as if people actually saw it in the film.

It's not on any of the DVDs. Prints, subtitles, sound levels and framing vary from region to region but the content is exactly the same. None of the releases include additional footage. The "that's his own daughter you're killing" line is in the shooting script but if it was filmed nobody's seen it. 

How many freaking releases were there?!

I have the earlier Cecchi Gori Italian release because it was the first DVD ever to come out here in Italy, but the quality is crappy except it has good enough extras (the interviews all in one 20-30 minutes clip, trailer, bios and stuff like that) for me

Then I bought the Region 2 Paramount/Mk2 (I guess, there are these two logos on the DVD) release, which compared to the other one, looks like a movie shot yesterday.  Please tell me there aren't better looking ones.

Here Dugpa discusses the R2 MK2, but says the R1 New Line did a better job with the compression. (scroll to bottom, check the pics of the case and the film cell. Why couldn't this have had the deleted scenes? Grrrr...)

www.dugpa.com/dugpa_old/archive2005.html

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDCompare7/twinpeaksfirewalkwithme.htm

The second link compares R1 & R2

There also appears to be Greek, Dutch and Polish releases with different covers.

Yes, I have that french master MK2 Region 2 (Pal) version, which here in Italy is distributed by Paramount anyway because the Italian division of Paramount owns exclusive rights to the Twin Peaks market here.

First of all, unfortunately it's not the limited edition with that nice packaging shown on Dugpa. My best guess is that here it just came out as a regular DVD, which in terms of audio/picture quality is really good, but on the Extras side it makes you regret the earlier Cecchi Gori crappy crappy version with the 30 minutes interviews with the cast and other aficionados/experts. 

I didn't trace any compression artifact that is relevant to the human eye, LOL!

It's true. The MK2 master has slightly different hues. It looks more vivid and orangey, which is in any case the proper look of the film if I'm not mistaken. Then I looked at the comparing page you linked me, in which btw I stumbled sometime in the past, and then I took a screencap of mine to compare the three to make sure my copy wasn't a third unknown origins master. The answer is: no, it's the MK2 master.

And, as someone else mentioned this, it must be the closest thing to what was shown in theatres at the time of its first release because in the Pink Room scene if you watch the film in English the music is louder and covers many of the actors' lines, so much that subtitles were superimposed (although you can get rid of them if you don't care). I never watched FWWM in a theatre, because I was just 7 or 8 when it came out, but I know that they put subtitles in that scene because the music was too loud.