Mission: Impossible III is the first major motion picture to be released simultaneously on DVD, HD DVD, and Blu-ray Disc (BD). I don’t get to see many movies in the theater anymore. But MI3 was one of the movies I did get a chance to see in the theater. It wasn’t bad.

But how are the HD DVD and BD versions? According to High-Def Digest, they look very nice!

The BD is MPEG2 encoded. The HD DVD is VC1 encoded. And they both look excellent. The discs each come with an extra disc of bonus material, so lots of bits were allocated to the MPEG2 and VC1 bitstreams. How do they compare? Basically, the reviewer says that both are quite excellent, and that there’s nothing to choose between them.

He also says that MI3 on BD or HD DVD would make a good demo disc. Maybe I’ll pick one up for that purpose, because I didn’t think the movie was good enough to buy otherwise.

HD DVD - Mission: Impossible III
BD - Mission: Impossible III