Question about NTSC DVD footage / PAL conversion

I need to convert some footage from NTSC DVD 23.976 to PAL 25fps. I was under the impression that 23.976 fps was in fact progressive, yet when I open the footage in MPEG Streamclip it states:

224 MPEG-2, 720 ? 480, 4:3, 23.976 fps, 6.00 Mbps, upper field first

Does "upper field first" indicate that the video is interlaced? I must admit to being rather confused about this. I'm trying to find the best possible workflow to convert the footage to PAL retaining as much quality as possible. I was going to export via MPEG Streamclip to ProRes 422 and the do the conversion to PAL in Compressor.

We were supplied with a Digi-Beta but the conversion was done back in 1999 via an ADAC, and I'm sure I can do a much better looking conversion myself direct from NTSC (I know it isn't ideal but we need to save some money on this one!).

I'd really appreciate some help here folks!

Nucleus Films

I just opened a couple of VOB files from theatrical film DVDs and they also say "upper field first" in MPEG Streamclip, but in VideoSpec or MediaInfo Mac they are shown as progressive (and they are, in fact, progressive).

So, I believe this is an MPEG Streamclip notational quirk. I don't know how this may affect the output from MPEG Streamclip. I just exported a few seconds from one of my test DVD files using the export to QT command (I just selected ProRes and set the frame size not to scale up to 854 x 480, but stay at 720 x 480). The output looks fine. However, someone else may have a better understanding of the subtleties involved with using MPEG Streamclip.


-Dave

MPEG Streamclip certainly isn't consistent with files - some it indicates are progressive 23.976 whilst others, like this one, it states a field order.