Backing up Star Wars Eps II

[TinCool]

I'm attempting to back up my copy of Star Wars Ep II. It rips fine using Smart Ripper and DVD Decrypter so that I'm left with the m2v and ac3 files. Opening the m2v in DVD2AVI to ensure the playback quality is good and it is perfect. However, running it through ReMpeg I find that from the point of "A long time ago..." the picture quality flickers brighter and darker for about 5 or 10 minutes in to the movie. I also noticed that the quality towards the end of the movie deteriorates where there is noticable blocking in the picture. I have ripped/encoded a number of movies using the same method (SmartRipper --> ReMpeg --> DVD Maestro) but this is the first time I have come across this problem. It's not a DVD Media problem as I'm using high grade blank DVD-R's.

I've played around with the settings in ReMpeg but always the same problem occurs.

Has anyone seen this before ? If so, how did you get around it ?

[FreedomStarter]

No problem making an AVI for StarWars II.
I used SmartRipper and FlaskMpeg. Great quality picture

1.3GB file size
720x304 resolution
128kbps audio
Divx 5.02 codec
29 FPS
datarate 166kbps

[setarip]

"However, running it through ReMpeg I find that from the point of "A long time ago..." the picture quality flickers brighter and darker for about 5 or 10 minutes in to the movie."

If not properly ripped, the first ACTUAL 2 minutes and 40 seconds of the movie (starting precisely from "A long time ago..." and ending with the large craft just beginning to reappear from within the clouds) is multi-angled - English, French, Spanish - and takes 7 minutes to play...