The Whole Box o' Critters (DVD/ Blu-ray Comparison)

Sometimes you buy a movie because it's a masterpiece or a personal favorite you just need to have in your collection.  And other times you just throw something in your cart because it's fun.  Although, compared to the other small creature films being issued on blu-ray recently, like Munchies, Hobgoblins, or Ghoulies, Critters is a minor masterpiece.

Boiling Critters down to one thing that sets it apart from all its fellow Gremlins-inspired brethren, I think it would just be care.  Instead of some quick juvenile humor and little rubber monsters, 1986's Critters is actually rather ambitious.  From its interstellar opening (reminiscent of Night Of the Creeps, which came out the same year) to its well-rounded cast, which includes ET & The Howling's Dee Wallace Stone, M. Emmet Walsh, Insidious fan favorite Lin Shaye and a young Billy Zane, this film just clicks.  You've got some fun gag and puppetry courtesy of The Killer Klowns' Chiodo Brothers... I mean, no, this film isn't as wild and consistently inventive as that film, but some of the spirit carries over.  And yet it also maintains a darker, more serious tone because these creatures can actually be quite vicious, giving the drama some stakes its peers sorely lack.  Then there's more to the story than just a family versus tiny space monsters thanks to the larger than life bounty hunters who come to town to collect them, even if that means blowing everything up in the process.  The first film, at least, manages a rather artful balancing of tones throughout a clearly tightly woven and carefully constructed script.  Again, it's that care factor.  You can tell everybody put in a lot of off-the-clock hours to make this film as good as it possibly could be, whereas you know nobody ever got home to dinner late from the set of Munchie Strikes Back.

New Line first released Critters on DVD in 2003.  They since repackaged it a few times over the years (as recently as 2017), usually in 4-packs with its three sequels, but I never bothered with those.  A decent, inexpensive cope of the first film was all I was ever in the market for.  But Scream Factory finally turned me around with their packed (and still pleasingly inexpensive) boxed set, which gives us the whole series together across four blu-ray discs, giving each of them worthy special editions for the first time ever.  The one thing about the 2003 DVD, though, which I don't believe can be said for all of the subsequent 4-packs, is that includes both fullscreen and widescreen versions of the film.  So that should make this comparison even a little more interesting.

1) 2003 New Line DVD widescreen; 2) 2003 New Line DVD fullscreen;
3) 2018 Scream Factory blu-ray.

So to start with, that 1.33:1 fullscreen transfer is open matte, which is good because it means they didn't cut much of the sides off, and it gives us extra little insight into the film (now we can see that church attack happens just after 9pm).  But it's obvious from all the unused vertical space, that this film was always intended to be matted down, and it looks a lot more attractive at 1.85:1, as the other versions have it.  Scream gives us a new 2k scan from the "original film elements," which looks a heck of a lot cleaner than the old, blotchy DVD.  New Line's disc was anamorphic and un-interlaced, so it felt pretty good for its time.  But seeing them in direct comparison, it's undoubtedly time to upgrade.  Besides the boost in clarity and detail, you'll also notice a big shift in the color timing.  Just looking at the first set of shots, it almost looks like a day for night tint was left off, but no, that scene's supposed to take place in the daytime, and actually the whole DVD is prone to hues cast over the entire picture, which the blu cleans up nicely.

Both the DVD and blu offer us nice audio options, giving us the choice between the original stereo mix or a slightly gussied up 5.1 track, and optional English subtitles in both cases.  Of course, the blu delivers both of its tracks in lossless DTS-HD.

1) 2003 New Line DVD widescreen; 2) 2003 New Line DVD fullscreen;
3) 2018 Scream Factory blu-ray.

Still, as evident as the picture upgrade is, what really sold me on this box was the special features.  All the DVD (or any other DVD edition) had was the alternate ending and trailers.  Thankfully, Scream kept those, but they added so much more.  I'll start with actually the weakest, and more disappointing entries, the audio commentaries.  There's one by Barry (producer) and Don (co-star) Opper, which starts out promising, but runs low on energy pretty fast.  You can feel the moderator sweat as he asks question after question, and just keeps getting a disheartening "I don't remember..." in reply.  Then the second commentary has a different but similar issue.  This one's with the Chiodo brothers, who I was excited for because they were so much fun on the Killer Klowns features.  But the problem here is they didn't write or direct Critters, they just did the creature effects, so when they're not on-screen, they don't have much to say.  In fact, they settle into such abject silence, I feel like they were told they were just doing a partial commentary that was going to be edited into something else (i.e. the Oppers' commentary), but then that didn't wind up happening at the last minute, so we get a track that's about 50% dead air.  Bummer.

Now, to be fair, both of those commentaries do have good content in them... funny anecdotes, inside information fans probably never knew, etc.  But just about everything of value from those commentaries are also repeated (often just about word-for-word) in the awesome, feature length documentary.  And this is just great.  In fact, the documentaries in this box might out-value the films themselves by the time you get to the later sequels.  Besides the Oppers and the Chiodos, they talk to Dee Wallace, Terrence Mann, Lin Shaye, critter voice actor Corey Burton, effects artist R. Christopher Biggs, second unit director Mark Helfrich, "prop supervisor" Anthony Doublin, composer David Newman, miniature effects artist Gene Warren Jr. and a vintage interview with writer Brian Muir (R.I.P.) from 2009.  Then, there's a 20-minute tribute to Muir, which is really just an extension of the documentary, with the same people telling more of the story.  He's such a key figure in the creation of this film, being the first to originate the concept and project, that the two really just feel like one longer piece: the definitive Critters story.

There's also a featurette editing together some fun behind-the-scenes footage the Chiodos shot puppeteering the critters, plus TV spots and a stills gallery.  Scream really did this one up.  Interestingly, the case also promises an interview with star Scott Grimes, which never turns up.  But you can't be disappointed considering how much they put together.

Critters 2: The Main Course is interesting.  I remember first seeing it as a kid when it came out in 1988 and thinking it was every bit as good as the first one, if not better.  Over the years as I got older, I now recognize the disparity and the step down in quality, but it still has its unique strengths that sold me on it back in the VHS days.  It's clearly a higher budgeted film, allowing for more critter and bounty hunter mayhem to be unleashed over a broader swath of town.  The big final act twist is pretty darn cool, and some of the best characters are back including Mann and Opper.  I mean, of course Opper's back since he's the producer's brother... but it's just lucky for us that he's also quite good and manages to give the series a heartfelt through-line.  Lin Shaye is also back (yay!), and so is Scott Grimes (meh).  Most of the new cast, though, despite an earnest attempt at another endearing ensemble, don't quite live up to the first crew.  Barry Corbin's a great character actor, but having him play M. Emmet Walsh's character was a mistake because nobody else can be Walsh; they should've just made him a brother or something.  And adding Eddie Deezin to the mix, well, is just emblematic of what went wrong with this entry.

Upping the comedy and dialing down the horror was probably a mistake, but I can at least accept that was a direction they chose to go in.  But this was actually Mick Garris's first film, and until the final act, he just can't quite bring this film to life.  There's a flatness to everything, performances are stiff and dialogue scenes are stale.  This is a more expensive film, but until they show it off in the effects and set pieces, it feels like a smaller, made-for-TV cash-in.  There's still good times to be had with the bounty hunters and more we get enjoyable critters gags by the Chiodos, but where Critters 1 was a consistently entertaining film, this one just has some cool parts.

So I never bothered with this one or any of the sequels on DVD, but I can just tell you real quick, they all had pretty much identical releases to the first one.  New Line put them all out in 2003 with full and widescreen versions, and then later put them out as 4-disc sets every couple of years after.  But for me, this is Scream box is now my first time owning any of them.

2018 Scream Factory blu-ray.

This is another 2k scan from original film elements (don't get too used to that), and again looks pretty great.  It's matted to 1.85:1 and looks very terrific with soft but natural film grain and strong colors, which after all play a bigger part in this brighter, Easter-set entry.  Sure, a 4k scan of the OCN could probably sharpen things up a bit more, and really clarify it down the individual speck of grain, but this is a really attractive, crowd-pleasing transfer.

This time we don't get a 5.1 mix, just the original stereo track (the only important one, anyway) in DTS-HD, again with optional English subtitles.

The extras package here is pretty similar to the first one.  We get two more audio commentaries and the first one is actually quite good, by Mick Garris and Red Shirt's Michael Felsher.  Garris is a great one for doing commentaries, and he has some good memories.  Then the second is the Chiodos again, and is the same story as in Critters 1.  They do have some cheerful stories to tell, but they're all replicated in the documentary and there you don't have to wait through long stretches of radio silence to find them.  And yes, it's another great doc, this time a little shorter, but still over an hour, talking to all the recurring players from the first doc, plus Mick Garris and Liane Curtis (and again, Grimes is listed but not present).  This time, instead of an alternate ending, we get a collection of deleted and extended scenes from the TV version (including a clean alternate take of Lee's famous nude scene).  Then there's another collection of Chiodos' behind-the-scenes footage, this time including a bonus local access cable news show interview.  And there's the trailer, TV spot and stills gallery.

Now, even as a kid I could feel the life was drying out of the series by Critters 3.  I was optimistic because I saw David J. Schow's name in the credits (fun fact: he's the only celeb I ever wrote a fan letter to; and yes, he wrote me back from the set of The Crow).  But the budget was a lot lower, the series now having gone direct to video, with the story taking place mostly all in one confined location, and almost none of the cast returned.  We got a new family of worse actors who somehow manage to bring some critter eggs with them into their big city apartment building (which actually doesn't seem that big once they get inside).  A pre-fame Leonardo DiCaprio is amusing to point at now, but you won't spot any of the talents he exuded in Gilbert Grape.  Frances Bay (In the Mouth of Madness, Twin Peaks) and Don Opper are the only performances to watch, and they both have small parts here.  In fact, with the Chiodos no longer on set, the critters have a lot fewer bits themselves.  The film is padded out with an extended flashback to the previous films, including plenty of clips that have no bearing on this entry since most of those characters' stories were dropped.  Oh well.

2018 Scream Factory blu-ray.

Remember when I said not to get too used to those new 2k scans?  Yeah, now we're just getting an older HD master supplied by the studio.  To be fair, though, it's not that bad and the colors still pop.  It's matted to 1.86:1 and the grain is mostly visible.  But when you get in close, you can see the deficiencies.  Look at the green in the kid's hat.  It looks like I saved the screenshot as a .gif; but no, that's how it looks on disc.  Still, that's a rare example.  Mostly, it just looks a little less filmic than the first two, with slight loss of detail.  And in motion, you might not notice the difference at all.  It's there, though.  But hey, it's just Critters 3, right?  And once again, we get a strong stereo mix in DTS-HD with optional English subs.

The special features are shrinking now, too.  Although I don't blame Scream at all, and actually the amount they do provide is more than satisfying still.  We get another audio commentary by the Oppers, which is just like their previous attempt.  They start out enthusiastic, but soon it's the poor moderator desperately trying to fish a good story from a sea of "I don't remember"s.  And this time it's just the one commentary.  There's another terrific doc, but now it's shrunk to under half an hour (and no, Leo doesn't participate).  Highly recommended, though.  Schow is now on hand, as is this film's DoP, Thomas J. Callaway.  But you'll definitely be burning through these later discs quicker, which is just as well.  Because yeah, that's about it, besides a gallery, trailer and VHS spot.

Critters 4 is a bit of a return, but just barely.  Made back-to-back with part 3, it's still low budget DTV, and still missing the Chiodos and most of the critter action we come to this series for.  But it returns to its horror roots, which is nice (parts 2 and 3 literally got to the point they were adding Looney Tunes sound effects to the attack scenes); and Terrance Mann, who was conspicuously absent from part 3 makes a triumphant return.  But it's still just flatly performed drama with another batch of weak, new characters.  There's some interesting casting, including Brad Dourif, Angela Bassett and another Twin Peaks alumnus: Eric DaRe, and setting the whole film in space, instead of just a brief prologue, is ambitious.  But still, most of the film boils down to the small cast sitting down and bickering, with the main plotline being a milquetoast teenager who just wants to return to Earth to see his dad.  And the critters don't kill him because they're barely in the movie at this point, relegated to extended cameos in a plot that isn't really about them anymore.

2018 Scream Factory blu-ray.

This is another older master, a la Critters 3 rather than a fresh 2k scan like the first two.  Again, it's matted to 1.86:1 and looks generally fine.  But it's soft and light on detail.  Grain is there but inconsistent.  Again, the colors are attractive, and you're a lot less likely to find anything to gripe about in motion.  It's definitely in HD and lacks any of the compression issues you'd get with a DVD.  But I'm sure more detail and distinction could be drawn out if anyone really wanted to spend the money.  It's fine, just not the level of disc you'd want to use to show off your brand new home theater.  And yep, another fine stereo track in DTS-HD with optional English subtitles.

The star of the show again is the documentary, though it's even closer to 20 minutes this time, and with all the same interviewees as part 3.  We do get to hear from a new voice in the final audio commentary, though, which enlists the director Rupert Harvey.  It's not the greatest commentary either; in fact, you could barely call it a commentary, since they never actually comment about what's on screen.  It's one of those where the moderator starts out, "so tell me how you got into film," and they do a drawn-out overview of their career while everything you're curious about in the movie passes by unmentioned.  I wonder if it was originally recorded as a straight-up interview, but it ran so long they decided to just stick it on as a commentary track instead?  Either way, it's the only time we hear from Harvey, despite him having produced all of the series, so fans will want to check it out.  There's also a stills gallery and the trailer.

Each film in the set comes with reversible cover art (though one of the covers for part 2 is a bit of a spoiler), as it's four distinct cases in a nice, solid box.  Pre-orders direct from Shout's site also got two limited edition lithograph posters.  So I have to say, as someone who only really cared about the first film (and even then, not that much), Scream Factory has made me pretty happy to have gotten the whole run.  Revisiting these films back to back does make me appreciate even the weakest entries a little bit more.  Every film at least makes an earnest attempt to create an ensemble of endearing characters, and it's fun to track Don Opper's story through the series.  And the documentaries tell a parallel narrative that might be rewarding than most of the films themselves, in the same way that I prefer re-watching Halloween: 25 Years of Terror to most of the actual Halloween sequels now.  So if you're a big Critters fan, this is of course the definitive edition for the whole run.  But if even if you're just casually interested, I think you'll get a kick out of this box.

When Nicolas Roeg Met Dennis Potter: Track 29

1988's Track 29 is a late entry of Nicolas Roeg (R.I.P.)'s and Dennis Potter's that fans tend to let slip off the ends of both of their oeuvres.  For Potter, it comes right at the peak of his Blackeyes period, where his work was getting increasingly overwrought, and even long-term admirers were beginning to turn on him.  And for Roeg, well, from all the commemorations I've been reading of him over the past two days, he seems to be essentially remembered as simply the director of Don't Look Now and maybe two other films quietly preserved in the Criterion Collection.  Well, here's another very noteworthy creation they haven't gotten to yet; it hasn't even been released in HD anywhere in the world.  Yes, it's DVD only I'm afraid, but I think you'll find it's definitely worth getting your hands a little dirty and reaching back into the world of standard definition video for it.

Track 29 is a remake of Potter's original 1974 BBC teleplay, Schmoedipus, with Gary Oldman in the lead role, originally played by Tim Curry.  So yes, it's another in a line of big screen cinematic Potter remakes like Pennies From Heaven or The Singing Detective.  But unlike those, which struggled to condense robust miniseries into a single feature's running time, this one actually expands what was just over an hour to just over 90 minutes.  So happily, this one isn't a "Reader's Digest" triviality, instead managing to retain pretty much everything that worked in the original.  The bulk of Track 29's dialogue, at least between the two main characters, is almost word-for-word as it was written in Scmoedipus.

But if Potter was already getting overwrought, he found an enabler in his partnership with Roeg.  To some degree, this is great.  We get to open up the action which previously took place 75% in a single London apartment to a wealth of North Carolinian locations, and you can just tell that creative photography of the underwater swimming pool shots or the bumper cars' electric stalks sparking in Theresa Russell's bedroom are very welcome additions brought to the table by having a visionary, A-list director.  But the absolute insanity of Christopher Lloyd's... political rally of model train enthusiasts which expands what was the husband's completely realistic and grounded hobby in the original version just gets downright bizarre.

But it's not just Roeg's influence that takes this film into over-the-top territory.  As much as the bulk of the original has been faithfully transcribed here, Potter has also made some sensationalized changes.  Where the original tracked the husband character's frustrations with his daily life with him failing to connect to his coworkers or getting chewed out by his manager, Bob Hoskins (here replaced by by the equally terrific Seymour Cassel), he's now indulging in a humorously kinky affair with his nurse, played by none other than Sandra Bernhard.  The original had a simple, natural exchange where the husband points out a beautiful girl on the street and his coworker claims not to notice and then calmly chastises him.  Here, Sandra puts on red rubber gloves and a conductor's hat to spank him to a specially prepared cassette tape.  The same basic themes are presented, but it's a hugely different tone.  And I won't get into any spoilers, but the ending has completely changed.

But don't take this as one long gripe.  It's not all change for the worse.  I would say I slightly prefer the original, thanks in part to Curry's frightening performance, and the fact that the extra half hour does more to dilute the original's power than enhance it.  But this fresh take is often quite rewarding.  It's certainly a lot more artful and entertaining to look at.  And the new ending, while far less subtle, might actually work a bit better, at least in some ways.  You do get the impression that Potter has had the chance to ruminate on this material and make some new observations.  Plus, the new cast is terrific.  And at least taken on its own terms, as opposed to in direct comparison to the original, it's certainly a dark, fascinating little film that has the power to raise eyebrows just like Potter did in '74.

Sorry, I don't have any real comparisons for you today.  I used to own the original 2007 Anchor Bay DVD, but I sold it off when I replaced it for the 2012 Image DVD long before I thought of creating this site.  But I can tell you that it was barebones and fullscreen, looking more or less like a video tape transposed to disc.  And this, happily, is an anamorphic widescreen disc.

2012 US Image DVD.

It's certainly soft and standard def... I'm surprised they came out with a widescreen update of a catalog title as late as 2012 and released it as DVD only.  Imperfect as it is, it certainly deserves a solid blu-ray release.  But for a DVD, it's a welcome improvement over the Anchor Bay disc, looking naturally framed (at 1.78:1) and again, anamorphic.  The only drawback, as you can plainly see in a couple of the shots above, is that it has interlacing issues.  The audio's just your basic Dolby stereo mix, which is perfectly fine, and Image gives you no subtitle options or any kind of features, not even the trailer.  In other words, it's completely barren, but still a decent presentation of a film that, imperfect as it may be, absolutely deserves to be seen.

Autumn Sonata 3.0 (Criterion DVD/ Blu-ray Comparison)

This site needs more Bergman!  I can't be this much of a Bergman fan and only have one of his films covered here (Bergman Island doesn't count, as it's a documentary about him, not by him).  So, I thought I'd take a look at another Criterion reissue, where they brought one of their older DVD titles up to date not just by releasing it in HD, but with a brand new master and all new special features.  This is also one of my favorites: 1978's Autumn Sonata.

Update 11/20/18: Criterion takes their third stab at Autumn Sonata (fourth if you count the laserdisc), this time as part of their massive 30-disc boxed set of Bergman blus, Ingmar Bergman's Cinema.  It just came out today, and obviously that's a ton of discs to cover (especially since I have alternate editions for nearly every title in the box), so I'll be doing these films piecemeal over time, just like I've been doing with Shout's Werner Herzog Collection.  For today, I'm just updating the films I've already covered on this site, which means, not just this post but Cries and Whispers, Summer Interlude, and Bergman Island have all gotten updates today.  Check 'em out!

Autumn Sonata is best known for being the film where Bergman finally met Bergman.  That is to say, towards the tail ends of their careers, Ingmar Bergman finally directed the esteemed Ingrid Bergman (Casablanca, ever heard of it?).  And, no, they're not related.  I don't know about you, but when I first heard of this film, I was dying to see how this huge, celebrity actress from the typically stagey 40s era of filmmaking would be able to compete in a more contemporarily sophisticated art film, particularly one by the great Ingmar Bergman.  And holy crap did she rise to the challenge!  And Ingmar really threw her into the deep end, too; pitting her against Liv Ulmann at her peak.  It's an acting face-off for the ages.

They play mother and daughter.  Liv always felt she'd never had the love of her mother, a famous pianist.  But when Ingrid's husband dies, Liv invites her mother into her family home.  Things have gotten pretty dark there, as Liv's son has died as a small boy, and she and her husband are now taking care of her mentally handicapped sister.  It's another beautiful lighting experience courtesy of Sven Nykvist; but it has a warm natural look to it, as opposed to some of Bergman's more famous and showier films, like Seventh Seal or Persona, which feel almost overwhelmed by what could be described as trick shots.  This is a more subtle, down-to-Earth Bergman, enabling the drama to really hit home.  I don't place a lot of stock in the Academy awards, but it's worth noting both Bergmans were nominated for Oscars for this, which is particularly impressive for a foreign film.   Look for Bergman regulars Gunnar Björnstrand and Erland Josephson in all-too small supporting roles, as well.

Criterion first released Autumn Sonata on DVD in 2000, itself an update of their previous laserdisc edition from 1998.  But as the years rolled by, that transfer was looking pretty creaky, as you'll soon see.  It was released around the world over the years, most notably by Tartan in the UK, who did a fantastic job covering Bergman's body of work.  But the real revelation came in 2013, when Criterion returned to the film with a brand new, 2k scan of the original camera negative, which they released separately on DVD and blu-ray.  But even that wasn't enough for their huge Ingmar Bergman's Cinema collection in 2018, where they gave the film an even newer 2k scan of the 35mm original camera negative.  Can't say they're not giving us our money's worth, but let's see how much this additional pass actually improves things.

1) 2000 Criterion DVD; 2) 2013 Criterion DVD;
3) 2013 Criterion blu-ray; 4) 2018 Criterion blu-ray.

1) 2000 Criterion DVD; 2) 2013 Criterion DVD;
3) 2013 Criterion blu-ray; 4) 2018 Criterion blu-ray.

Wow, what a difference between the original DVD and blus!  That was no slim upgrade.  Perhaps, because it was 1.66:1 (and really more like 1.58:1), they figured they could get away with it, but the original 2000 disc is not anamorphic.  So the picture is small, on top of being fuzzy and heavily red-tinted.  The old DVD is also blocky and pixelated, though the softness covers that up to a degree.  It's not interlaced, though; that's one thing you can say for it, especially since it feels like the oldest editions in a lot of my comparisons lately have had interlacing problems.  The new scan corrects the aspect ratio, though, finding new information on the sides (we now see the "P" in what I presume to read "CHOPAN" on their music book in the first set of shots).  And with the redness corrected, colors looks so much more realistic and alive.  You can see a decided increase in detail, too, even between the 2013 DVD and and its twin blu-ray release.  Not only is grain clear and specific, but look at how much more you can make out of Liv's face in the close-up.

And the updated blu?  Well, it's another 2k scan of the same elements, so it's not really a leap in resolution.  Really, the story here is in the timing.  The contrast is lower (look at the white curtains in either set of shots, but particularly the second) and the colors are more muted.  Overall, it's a much more naturalistic look; the reds don't leap out at you like they did in the 2013 disc, which overall looks more realistic and less stylized.  The framing pulls in additional slivers on the sides, going from 1.67 to 1.66:1.  But really it's all about the more muted colors and contrast.  Should that white paper in Erland's typewriter shine out or no?  I'm inclined to say no and side with this new transfer, but I could absolutely see people going the other way and preferring the more shiny, colorful version from 2013, and of course we've lost our chance to get Bergman or Nykvist to weigh in with their original intentions.  But Autumn Sonata doesn't strike me as the sort of film that should beam like an Avengers movie, so I'm inclined to think Criterion's moved in the right direction here.

On all four discs, we're given both the original English and Swedish mono audio tracks (in LPCM on the blus), remastered for the 2013 editions, with optional English subtitles.

I wouldn't quite call Criterion's first pass at Autumn Sonata a special edition, but it did have one notable special feature, an audio commentary by their resident Bergman scholar, Peter Cowie.  It's a carry-over from their laserdisc, but Cowie's always great and really knows his Bergman.  Besides that, the first edition only has the theatrical trailer and a booklet with notes by Farran Smith Nehme.

The 2013 edition keeps all of that (including the booklet of Nehme's notes), but also fleshes things out to what I would label a loaded special edition.  First they've got another one of those great little introductions that Criterion recorded with Bergman for almost all of his pictures sometime in the mid 2000s.  Next, they've got a brand new, in depth interview with Liv Ulmann and a long, vintage interview with Ingmar Bergman.  But the most exciting inclusion of all is a vintage making-of documentary shot during the filming of Autumn Sonata that runs over three hours long(!), and shows you just about everything you could possibly want to see first-hand.  It includes a booklet with the same Nehme essay from the original disc.

The 2018 blu keeps everything from the 2013 edition, but doesn't add anything else, with the obvious exception, of course, for the fact that it comes packaged with all the other Bergman films, and the extras associated with those.  The set includes a bonus disc with several docs and features about Bergman in general, after all, but there's nothing else Autumn Sonata-specific.  The Nehme essay from the previous booklets is back again, too, in the box's massive 248 page book.

Autumn Sonata is a terrific film, and the 2013 blu-ray is a vast improvement.  I recommend every inch of it.  Even if you already have the old DVD, this is a time to replace.  Heck, they could've just released the 3-hour documentary by itself and I'd be recommending it.  But if you have the 2013 blu, is the 2018 blu worthy of a triple-dip?  Not by itself, I'd say no.  But the Cinema collection is absolutely worth getting as a whole, and it's great that they went the extra mile to give it an even fresher scan instead of just coasting with the blu they already had.