Bullets 'n' Babes

All discs are progressive.

R1 First, R2FR Second, R2J Third, R2UK Last

The BFI disc suffers from being a bit of an old encode and vertical cropping. Criterion have boosted the hell out of their transfer so it looks completely wrong - night is bright as day. The Criterion disc also has the horizontal cropping which in this film is a big problem.
The BFI subs are better with the Criterion translation filled with stupid colloquialisms which really got on my nerves. The BFI audio is better as well, less hissing and it's just as clear. The Criterion has a commentary and one of the "It's Wonderful to Create" docus from the R2J's. The BFI has the typical Alex Cox intro.

I hopw I get my R2J soon. I have a feeling it won't be much good but I'd like to see anyway.

Is this the old R1 Sanjuro release or the new one?
I'm going to get the new Yojimbo/Sanjuro R1 set in the future.

New one, the old Sanjuro/Yojimbo are letterboxed.

Added the R2J. It proves the Criterion 'boosting' further but it has been filtered frightfully. All 3 audio tracks are well ahead of the BFI/Criterion.

Still you'll obviously want the BFI.

The R2J looks the worst to me. Personally I'd opt for the New Criterion, despite it's flaws. I can see it's not perfect but as an overall package it beats the BFI. All IMO of course, there's no need to say I'm wrong as my comments may differ.

Criterion's windowboxing is a joke. They do windowboxing in order to allow people to see the full image (tv overscan) but the image itself is cropped.

Cropping Kurosawa and presuming to change night into day are indicative of the highest order of arrogance.

Added the R2FR, boosted and horribly over-sharpened.

At some point I'll do the Criterion BD.

Lourdes wrote:Added the R2FR, boosted and horribly over-sharpened.

At some point I'll do the Criterion BD.

Hopefully you'll do it quite soon since I'm more of a Blu-ray person compared to DVD now.