Michael Haneke's Time Of the Wolf (Region 1 vs. Region 2)

I've generally thought of 2003's Time Of the Wolf by Michael Haneke (not to be confused with 2002's Time Of the Wolf starring Burt Reynolds) to be a good, but not top tier Haneke film. However, it's risen in my estimation on repeat viewings; and should probably get a few bonus points now for being a very likely but uncredited inspiration for Cormac McCarthy's The Road. And since I'm a pretty big Haneke fan overall, I wound up picking up both the US and UK DVDs, largely because they had a different set of extras. But going back to them in again in 2015, I'm noticing that the extras aren't the only differences.

Update 11/10/20: Forget the DVDs; this movie's available on blu from TF1 in France, and I've got it! It's from their 2013 'Le Cinéma de Michael Haneke' boxed set, and it's terrific finally seeing this movie in HD. Although, actually, it turns you still may not want to forget the DVDs completely...

The reliably exceptional Isabelle Huppert stars as a mother of a small family trying to stay together and survive after civilization has mysteriously broken down. They flee the city only to discover that things may be even worse in the country. But after losing their car, they have no choice but to wander the French countryside, eventually taking in with a group of fellow survivors in an abandoned train station, who wait because a train once passed down the line, so they gather in hope of another. It's a pretty powerful study of civilization, and the loss of individuality without societal structure; and as you'd probably expect, a grim look at how people will treat each other when order is lost. You can count on Haneke to keep the proceedings free of sentiment and phoniness, which helps make it a very revisitable film.

And originally, I wrote about the question of whether it's better to revisit it via the US disc from Palm Pictures, or the UK one from Artificial Eye. We'll still resolve that, but obviously the introduction of the blu makes that issue a little less pressing.

1) Palm US DVD; 2) AE UK DVD; 3) TF1 FR BD.

I left the subtitles on here because, unless you speak French, that's how you're going to view this film. The US disc has white subs, while the UK has grey ones that dip below the frame, and the BD puts them entirely in the matte. But the most interesting thing about them is that they're different in the actual content. Nothing struck me as a signification change of meaning, but they're two different translations with frequently different wording, and I can't help but wonder which is the most faithful to the original dialogue.

But enough about subtitles, let's get into the picture itself. It's basically the same core transfer for the DVDs. Both are 2:35.1 anamorphic widescreen with identical framing, and both look kinda crummy for 35mm. But there are some definite distinctions.

Palm's US DVD left; Artificial Eye's UK DVD right.

I mean, both of these close-up images look underwhelming. But the US disc on the right looks softer and less defined that the UK on tie right. Although, on the other hand, detail is a little crushed out of the black areas on the UK disc (you can actually see her tongue and eyes, soft as they are, in the US shot on the left. It's a dark film, so I definitely appreciate the Palm pulling up as much image as they can, but both DVDs look so digital and pixel-y that I'd take the UK's smoother, more natural image over the US's. And it looks like the US disc had some issues handling the NTSC conversion, with its interlaced frames, which the UK disc is free of. So between the DVDs, AE wins.

1) Palm US DVD; 2) AE UK DVD; 3) TF1 FR BD.

But once you see the blu, you'll never go back.  It's 1080p photo-realistic image makes the DVDs look like garbage.  The framing reveals a sliver more on the right, but the important distinction is in the detail, which is so much clearer and unmuddied. You can finally read the weight on that box in the family's car; clumps of grass are no longer meshed into singular blobs.  The halos of edge enhancement have been removed.  And colors are more distinct, wiping away overbearing hues (i.e. the yellow-green cast over that image of Isabella and the train).
 
All the discs have a 5.1 mix with optional English subtitles, but of course only the blu bumps it up to DTS-HD.  The DVDs do have exclusive down-mixes of the 5.1 into stereo, if you care about that.

And what about the extras? Let's start with Palm. They've got three core features: an interview with Isabelle Huppert, an interview with Hanake, and several minutes of uncontextualized behind the scenes footage. There's also the trailer and some bonus trailers for Springtime In a Small Town, Last Life In the Universe and Reconstruction. The interviews are okay but quite short and fairly superficial. Huppert has a few interesting things to say about acting with the rest of the cast, and Hanaeke has a couple informative anecdotes. But both also spend a lot of their brief time explaining the very basic themes of the film, which, if you "got" the film at all, you won't find very illuminating. The behind the scenes footage is interesting for hardcore fans, but there's no narration, translated words or anything. It's just a little glimpse of what it was like shooting this on location, but if you're interested in the size of the crew, the type of equipment they used, etc; it's at least a nice little reveal.

Artificial Eye doesn't have any of the stuff that Palm had, but they have their own extras. Primarily, they have a 20+ minute 'making of' which combines behind the scenes footage (not the same footage as the US disc) and interviews. It's a much more cohesive piece, and feels much more engaging and rewarding than the combined extras on the US disc. There's also another brief featurette, a behind-the-scenes look at Haneke and co. at the Cannes film festival. It's definitely a minor extra, but still interesting. And the theatrical trailer is on this disc, too.

TF1?  Well, here's where they lose and why you might want to hang onto your DVDs.  It's not barebones - there is the same 'making of' that the AE had, plus a new interview with a critic - their extras just aren't English friendly, which amounts to much the same thing unless you're fluent in French.

So what I've learned from this look back is A) how badly this film needed a blu-ray release, and that B) you'll still want to go with at least one of the DVDs for extras.  And between them, Artificial Eye's the one.

Boxing Helena: The Director's Cut (Laserdisc/ DVD comparison)

In 1994, Orion released Boxing Helena on laserdisc, and they released the director's cut in 1995 as a special edition boxed set. MGM issued the film on DVD in 2001, and again as part of their "Avant-Garde Cinema" collection in 2003. Both of those DVDs were the unrated version, as opposed to a slightly censored R-rated version that originally played in theaters; but it's not the director's cut. That version, and the wealth of special features from the special edition, have never been seen again since that boxed set. So just what is everybody who wasn't on the laserdisc train missing?

Boxing Helena is the oft-maligned and misunderstood debut of Jennifer Chambers Lynch, daughter of course, of the great David Lynch. But, let's face it, not all of that maligning is based on misunderstanding; some of the criticism is fair. Boxing Helena is a crazily overwrought melodrama, which is clearly intentionally over-the-top and unreal. Writer/director Lynch consistently refers to it as a fairy tale, so anybody expecting a realistic, down to earth drama just needs their expectations adjusted. But even for a fairy tale, it's a bit dopey.

Julian Sands plays a goofy surgeon with huge, on-the-nose oedipal issues and a truly blind, unrequited love for Sherilyn Fenn, who plays her character to such a selfish, nasty degree that they clearly meant her to be some sort of hypothetical archetype rather than a relatable character. Anyway, she doesn't like him back - she's currently involved with Bill Paxton, but seems to resent him almost as much - and continues to push Sands away. So when she's hit by a car outside his house, he leaps at the gruesome opportunity to amputate her legs and keep her completely dependent on him in his house. And yes, at some point he also cuts off her arms and puts her in an ornate box.

It explores the possessive, demanding side of love relationships to comically exaggerated degrees - we see plenty of the Venus De Milo in Sands' opulent home - but not without real substance or compelling things to say about them. It's probably the film's rejection of the more conventional Hollywood entertainment style, specifically that it persistently refuses to allow the audience to empathize or side with any of the characters that turns most people off. We're exploring the bad sides of our characters here; and while I think you could say it has a naturally feminist perspective, it certainly doesn't deliver the expected, pat feminist message either. It wants to be both challenging art and a trashy erotic romp at the same time, and that's not the kind of thing most people will receive well. But there's definitely a lot to appreciate in this movie if you're of the right mind-set.

Plus, hey, almost everybody judging this film is basing it on the DVD, catching it on cable, the old VHS or whatever. Unless you've seen the limited edition laserdisc, you've never even seen the director's cut "including footage not seen in the theatrical or home video versions," as it says on the back of the box. It's not fair to judge the film based on a version the director doesn't endorse, right, when you haven't even seen the whole thing? So, just what is different about the two versions?

"Hasta la whatever" is actually Paxton's exit line in this scene - how can you not love that?

Basically nothing. Despite rumors on the imdb message boards of a scene where Fenn "poops herself," there is not a single scene, or even a single camera shot, in the director's cut that is not in the unrated version, or vice versa. I have synced up both versions and they do not go a single frame out of time with each other from the opening credits to the closing credits. There are no alternate shots in the sex scenes to make them any more or less explicit. The director's cut is unrated, so any references you hear about missing shots do not apply to the laser or the DVD. Neither version has any different music in any scenes.

There is exactly one change differentiating the director's cut. Sands' very last line of the film (which I won't spoil here, of course), that plays in voice over at the very, very end... does not play in the director's cut. She didn't want it to be in the film, so the music plays out into the credits and it's all exactly as you see it on the DVD, video tape, etc... but you don't hear that line. That "footage not seen" claim only applies because the old VHS release was the edited R-rated cut.

Orion laserdisc on top; MGM DVD middle;
and a combination of the two bottom.

So let's talk about picture quality. That is very different. The laserdisc opens with one of those "the image has been formatted to fit your screen" messages, because surprisingly - the special edition director's cut is fullscreen! So was the previous, standard laserdisc, for the record. The laserdisc is... mostly open matte. The majority of the film plays where the framing is the same except the laser has more information at the top and bottom which has been matted out of the DVD. Sometimes there's more above, sometimes there's more below, often it's centered, but that's how most of the movie looks.

Orion laserdisc on top; MGM DVD below.

Some scenes, however, have been "Pan & Scanned," so the laserdisc is missing information on one or both sides. Notice how in this second set of comparison shots, there's now a lot more on the sides of the DVD version. On the one hand, that's better, because it shows they've made an intelligent decision about what is kept in the frame; but on the other hand, the DVD is in the correct aspect ratio and the laserdisc really should've just been widescreen, end of story.  ...Although Nicole Scorsese fans might see a benefit in the open matte transfer, I'll admit.

...The image is also fuzzier, lacking detail and over-saturated, but part of that can be blamed on the imperfect nature of capturing an analog image from a laserdisc onto a computer to screencap it. So give the laserdisc maybe a 10-15% benefit of the doubt when judging the image quality based on these frames. But yeah, the DVD looks yards better.

I'm sorry; I just don't buy that those are her curtains.

So the director's cut is kind of disappointing... But what else is in this laserdisc set? A load of excellent extras? Yes! Real great stuff. First there's a feature -length commentary by Lynch and her producer Carl Mazzocone. The discussion is lively, thoughtful, self-effacing, addresses all the questions we as viewers want answered about this movie (including the reasoning they had for adding and removing that missing last line from the movie), and tackles some interesting topics (did the TV series Dynasty spoil the depiction of dreams in cinema for everybody?). Julian Sands even pops in about halfway through and shares some thoughts.

The usual collection of non-video extras that laserdiscs often have, which I don't think work so well or add much value, are also on hand. There's the complete screenplay, production stills, the shooting schedule. That kind of stuff. But then there's plenty of good video extras, starting with an on-camera interview with Lynch and Mazzocone, this time being interviewed by a moderator, that pretty much fills in the blanks of anything they didn't cover in the commentary. It goes on pretty long, taking up almost the entire side of one disc.

Then there's a short, but very fun featurette with the guy who built and designed Helena's titular box - he makes similar boxes for magicians and illusionists, so he refuses to tell us all its secrets, but it's still a cool little piece. Then there's a comparison of alternate scenes between the R-rated and unrated cuts, where we see full versions of both, with optional audio commentary by Mazzocone, where he takes the opportunity to talk about Madonna and Kim Bassinger, who both agreed to star in the film and later backed out, rather then the footage on screen, but it's still quite interesting. They also include the alternate ending with that last line of dialogue put back into the final scene. It's a pretty thorough set. Curiously, the one absent extra in this set is the theatrical trailer. And it's the only other thing on the DVD.

And you can't argue with the packaging. The set comes in a cool, black box with a note from Lynch and full color photos on the insert. An entire second laserdisc is devoted entirely to the extras. And there's also a bonus 19-track soundtrack CD, which includes both the score and pop songs - a 24K gold CD, no less! And remember, that one techno/ choir song by Enigma got more famous than any other aspect of the movie, so the soundtrack was a big feature.

So look, I respect the director's vision enough to say that the ideal way to see this film is without that last line, but I don't think it's a big enough difference to recommend anyone spend over $100 (the going rate, apparently) to cop the director's cut laserdisc from EBay. Especially not with the drastically inferior picture quality. Just watch the DVDs. BUT for any major fans of this film or the Jr Lynch, the wealth of extras do make the set worth owning. So whether you should track this down boils down to how much you care about the special features... the fact that it has the "director's cut" sound difference would just be an extra little bonus. And as for the movie itself? Yeah, more people might be inclined to laugh at it rather than with it; but I think there's enough there to make at least one interesting viewing.

Scream Factory's Ravenous (A Slightly Controversial DVD/ Blu-ray Comparison)

Last year, Scream Factory aroused a bit of a controversy with their release of 1999's wickedly grisly exploration of man's power over others, Ravenous. It's not the film itself that caused the friction, though it's edgy enough, but the quality of the HD transfer. Of course, this was previously only available in the US on its original, non-anamorphic DVD from Fox (though anamorphic DVDs do exist in other regions), so you can really say Ravenous's blu-ray debut isn't an upgrade. But is it worth it?

 

Certainly, the movie itself is worth having in your collection. It's one of those movies people often don't consider a horror movie just because it's so good, but by pretty much all objective genre distinctions, it's a full-on horror movie. It's just the sort of horror movie that manages to be enough of a compelling drama with well honed characters and biting social satire.that you aren't solely focused on the suspense or the gore.  But those elements are still there, too, and to a degree higher than a lot of other horror titles.

Guy Pearce's star was just beginning to really rise (Ravenous was about one year before Memento) when he took the role of Captain John Boyd, either a disgraced coward or a war hero in the Mexican-American war, depending on your point of view. Unsure what to do with him, the army sends him off to the very remote Fort Spencer, a very remote military installation only encountered by the occasional wagon train heading west for the gold rush. Run by Jeffrey Jones, the 8-man regiment has gone a bit casual, a bit native and a bit eccentric. But it's a happy little community until a beleaguered Robert Carlyle (at the peak of his career after Trainspotting and The Full Monty) stumbles in with a tale of cannibalism and a Native American legend of the wendigo. Soon everyone has to decide just what they're willing to do to another person in order to thrive and prosper. It's both a very clever and well-paced thriller with a very neat little score, and a substantive, thoughtful film which raises some real questions about how we live our lives. You don't find many films like this one, especially from a major studio, so it's absolutely the kind of film to jump on and add to your collection.

So what's wrong up with this blu-ray and just how bad is it, really? And how different is it from our old DVDs? Should we just hang on to those? Well, let's take a look.

Fox DVD on top; Scream Factory blu-ray on bottom.

For starters, I've referenced anamorphic vs. non-anamorphic discs before, and how non-anamorphic discs like the original Fox DVD are window boxed on widescreen TVs. But just so everyone can see what that really entails, for my first comparison I'm showing the screenshots as they look on a wide screen.  In the blu-ray's case (bottom), it's letterboxed with black bars on the top and bottom, because it's a very wide, 2.35:1 movie. But in the DVD's case, the image is just floating there in the center, surrounded by large swaths of black on all sides, because it's an old DVD that predates widescreen TVs. It was alright on an old 4.3 TV, but just looks small and awkward on a modern set.

Apart from that, though, the DVD really doesn't look so much worse than the blu. You have to zoom in to really get a look at the DVD, and the image quality certainly isn't identical when you do, but it's really not much worse. Here, let's have a couple easier comparisons, without those dreaded black bars.

Fox DVD on top; Scream Factory blu-ray on bottom.

So yeah, I think it's right to say the DVD isn't so much worse than the blu. Apart from being non-anamorphic, I think it was a pretty good looking picture for standard def. But I think it's even more accurate to say the blu-ray isn't so much better than the DVD, and it really should be. It's soft, lacking detail, and some of the edges have halos. The DVD does have some artifacting from being smaller and more compressed, which the blu-ray properly does away with (look at Neal McDonough's chin); but where's the clarified detail? Where's the sharper, more lifelike image we expect from blu-ray?

Well, it doesn't look like Scream Factory has done anything particularly wrong. It's still a 1080p presentation, and despite some public accusations, I don't think they damaged the image too badly with DNR (digital noise reduction) or similar tools. They may have sharpened and/or otherwise tinkered with it a bit; but the real problem seems to be that they just used a very old transfer. And that old transfer had some edge enhancement and other effects used on it that Scream then gave the HD treatment to.

 

If you were to make a new scan of this film and give it a nice restoration, I believe this film could look dramatically better. But they just had what Fox gave them, which was good enough for the DVD because the DVD, as we've said, was a smaller, non-anamorphic image. So when they "fixed" the image for the old disc, it looked alright. But now that Scream has blown up that "fixed" transfer to hi-def, it just isn't up to the higher standards of blu-ray. You would need to go back another generation to get a nice, high quality blu-ray presentation.

But still, this new version is a little bit of an improvement over the DVD. A blah looking blu-ray, but the best this film has ever looked on home video. And Scream did give us an upgrade in another sense as well.

All the extras, including the many deleted scenes and three audio commentaries, have been ported over from the DVD. Some of the deleted scenes are pretty interesting, and there's commentary on them, too, which is informative. The three commentaries are a bit excessive... the director's one is fine, but I think the two actor commentaries probably should've been edited together into one stronger piece, because both of those tracks often drag in stretches where they haven't got much to say.  Still, I'd much rather have them than not. The trailer, TV spot and a photo gallery were also carried over. We did lose a tiny little easter egg extra with a map of the Donner party's cross-country trail and a look at a wacky promotional item made for the movie; but it was just a photo thing, not an actual video extra; so it's pretty inconsequential.

The blu-ray has kept both audio tracks, the 2.0 and 5.1, both now upgraded of course to HD, as well as the optional English subtitles. It ditched the Spanish subtitles, though, if you care about that. And they gave us an extra little treat of a music and effects only track for lovers of the soundtrack.

But the main new bonus is a brand new interview with Jeffrey Jones, which is pretty substantial. In most DVD extras, the people involved are still in promotional mode, and aren't apt to talk about anything negative. You know, those infamous "oh, he was wonderful to work with. He was brilliant! And that other actor was marvelous! Oh, and she was delightful!" commentaries. But I guess now enough time has passed for Jones to tell us all about how the producers fired the first director and didn't want the second one they were stuck with, and how Carlyle refused to come out of his trailer, etc. So if you want to hear that whole story, this is the interview for you. And yet his enthusiasm and respect for the film really comes through, too. So okay, it's "just an extra," but I'd say it really adds some noteworthy value to the new release.

Just don't look at the white edges around those tombstones. If we ignore it, maybe it will go away.

So, Scream Factory did the best they could, and they at least gave us the best release of Ravenous available. It's disappointing that Fox couldn't cough up anything better, and I'd definitely say this is a less compelling upgrade than many other titles. But as fantastic as a restoration would be, I don't hold out much hope of one. It's a great film, but not a popular enough one that I think many DVD companies are going to see room enough for a second blu-ray of this title in the marketplace, especially one with the expense of a new scan on the price-tag. So just break down and get this already; I did. I mean, what are you going to do? Player manufacturers seem pathologically incapable of programming a zoom setting for a non-anamorphic DVD that will actually just properly fill a TV screen without screwing up the AR or cropping part of the image. If I had a more suspicious nature...

Zardoz

John Boorman is the guy who made Hope & Glory and Deliverance. But yet, somehow he's also the man who made Zardoz, the infamous Sean Connery in a red diaper film. Of course, his next film was Exorcist II, so maybe it's not as out of line in his filmography as it first seems. Anyway, it's coming out on blu-ray for the first time in April from Twilight Time, but has been available on DVD from 20th Century Fox as a bit of a special edition since 2001. So I'd figure we could take a quick look at that before while we wait for TT.

Upon my first viewing of this film, years and years ago, I started out fully on board with this picture. The strange opening narration, and the wild and wonderful opening scene of strange savages rushing out to meet a giant, floating stone head that spits rifles at them. This was a heck of an imaginative, crazy film! But then... it quickly got kind of boring, with Connery and exchanging some not particularly intellectually compelling hypothetical philosophy with a bunch of bland people in colorful robes. The addition of John Alderton and Charlotte Rampling to the cast help, but they can only do so much, and their sci-fi futuristic cities amounting to a muddy little Irish village with a few random enhancements is a little disappointing, especially when it's interrupted by an outrageous, interesting scene every so often, making everything else look frumpy.

I think this film is probably more interesting to hear about than to actually see. For every crazy visual, the film languishes about for a long time. Even the big reveal of the title just struck me as underwhelming and contrived (I won't spoil it for anyone, but for those who've seen it: they had to come up with a cover featuring the world's smallest "of" in the world to force that name). And the heady ideas it spends so much time pondering - i.e. do an immortal race of people have a reason to create children, and if not, what becomes of their sexuality? - are so far removed from humanity's current issues that it's not particularly compelling to try and work out the answers. But this film is determined to give you the full lecture, anyway.

The DVD presents the film in its very wide 2.35:1 aspect ratio, which looks as epic as this film was meant to. Still, the colors are a little dull, and it all looks soft and pixelated around the edges. It's anamorphic, but still feels like a pretty old DVD, that could even benefit from an updated DVD transfer, and will surely benefit a lot from the upcoming blu. Unless Twilight Time royally screws up somehow, this should be an easy win for them.

 

The main extra on this release is an audio commentary by John Boorman. On the one hand, it's quite valuable, because if any film called out for some explanation - either of what the film means or just along the lines of "what on Earth were you thinking?" - it's this one. But, on the other hand, he runs out of things to say very quickly, and a large percentage of his audio track is dead air, which id pretty tedious to sit through. It kind of mirrors the film in that way... some very interesting bits you want to hear, but it's a grind to sift through it all to get to them.

The other extras are a trailer, which is worth checking out to see how such a weirdo film was marketed in 1974. a stills gallery with some interesting promo pics, and a series of radio spots. Those are interesting because they got The Twilight Zone's own Rod Serling to narrate, so don't skip over them. The only other extras are some bonus trailers for Alien Nation, Aliens, Enemy Mine, Independence Day and The Abyss, and a commercial for Fox DVD which plays at the start of the disc.

So, overall, this is an interesting enough film to see once, for sure. But the novelty value doesn't really hold out for the length of the film, and it's not really a genuinely good enough film that I'll be bothering to upgrade to the blu. But for those who are fans of this film, I could see a top notch scan really give this film a boost, so let's hope Twilight Time do it right. And I've just read Twilight Time's announcement that the commentary, trailer and radio spots will be included on their upcoming release, along with a new commentary by film historians Jeff Bond, Joe Fordham, and Nick Redmanand, and as always with TT, the isolated score. So the film's a little questionable, and the DVD was already pretty decent; but it sounds like they're doing it up right for the blu.

John Cassavetes' Love Streams

I think Love Streams is my favorite Cassavetes film, although that can be tough to call since his films have the ability to make you feel like whichever film you're currently watching is your favorite when you're caught up in them. But Love Streams has the scenes I keep going back to in my mind, especially the heart-breakingly frantic desperation of Gena Rowlands who has to make her husband and daughter laugh in sixty seconds in order to keep their love. Cassavetes is always great, and of course Seymour Cassel is perfect in his role, but it's really the portrayal of Rowland's character that transcends traditional cinematic storytelling to a level of arresting, lasting art.

Update 8/14/24: It's Update Week 2024, and I've got my hands on Kino's A Child Is Waiting DVD, so here it is.

For the longest time, our only option for Love Streams was a 2004 French DVD from Cinemalta, which you could either get separately or paired with a much earlier Cassavetes film, A Child Is Waiting. That's not such a complaint, as it was a nice set with quality transfers and even a few English language extras. But in 2014, Criterion finally brought Streams to the US, and in a big way: a really lavish blu-ray/ DVD combo pack (also available in separate DVD and BD releases) featuring a fresh 2k scan and a bunch of great new special features.

Meanwhile, Child remains unreleased stateside, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was somewhere on Criterion's list as well. It's a solid and critically acclaimed film, but it doesn't feel like "a Cassavetes film" at all. It's pretty emotionally affecting, with strong lead performances by Burt Lancaster and Judy Garland who proves she can do more than sing (though they do have her sing a teensy bit, just because). It does feel like it's taking the easy route tugging on heartstrings by having sweetheart Garland as a new teacher coming to care for a cute classroom of mentally challenged children. You can always rely on Cassavetes from getting overly sentimental, but I don't have that same confidence in screenwriter Abby Mann.

So let's take a look at these discs and see how tall the new 2k transfer stands up over the old edition. And since the Criterion set is DVD and blu, let's side-by-side those, too.

Cinemalta DVD on top; Criterion blu-ray on bottom.

That's a nice improvement. The French disc  The Cinemalta disc is pillarboxed for an anamorphic 1.62:1, whereas the Criterion is now slightly letterboxed to 1.85:1. Neither framing looks particularly right or wrong, though. The bigger difference is just how dirty the old image looks compared to the new scan, like Criterion literally washed the print with soap and water. I previously thought this, being a low budget indie feature was just shot on cheaper stock, but now I see how nice it can look. Criterion has more detail, a smoother yet sharper image and more detail in the blacks. I had always been happy with my DVD, but Criterion really went the distance here. The uncompressed audio is a nice bump up, too.

Criterion DVD on top, and their blu-ray on bottom.

And here's the Criterion DVD matched against the blu. Obviously it's the same transfer, but you can see the digital pixelation in Gena's face and hair that just comes off as natural film grain on the blu.  Oh, and they've added optional English subtitles, too.

Cinemalta DVD on top; Kino DVD on bottom.

A Child Is Waiting, meanwhile, is 1.68:1, similar to their DVD of Love Streams, but this time it's not anamorphic, which is disappointing. Also, the subtitles are forced (they weren't on Love Streams). So it's alright but underwhelming. They also have the trailer for Child on here, also with forced subs.

In 2015, Kino released A Child Is Waiting on DVD and blu - I've got the former[left].  And it's an obvious upgrade for anyone interested in that film.  Even just the DVD is a strong step forward, since it's anamorphic and the subtitles aren't forced.  The AR is slightly corrected to 1.66:1, which reveals a sliver more image, and adjusted contrast levels.  Then the blu would give you the extra bump to HD and lossless audio.  The Kinos also have an informative and engaging audio commentary by Casscvetes biographer Tom Charity and film scholar Michael Van Den Bos, the theatrical trailer and a few bonus trailers.

Extras-wise, the French disc was okay, but Criterion really tops it. First of all, Cinemalta had a nice 9 minute extract from the documentary I Am Almost Not Crazy, featuring behind-the-scenes footage and interviews during the shooting of this movie. Criterion has the whole hour-long thing. Then the Cinemalta disc has another 11 minutes of behind the scenes footage taken from a show called Scene 143, which is actually a decent little exclusive for the French disc. There's another French extra, but it has no English language options... some French lady talks for a few minutes over posters and images from the movie. Lord knows what she's saying.

The Criterion, meanwhile, has brand new interviews with producer Al Ruban and co-stars Seymour Cassel and Diahnne Abbot. Then there's another one of Criterion's excellent "video essays," this time about actress Gena Rowlands. And there's an audio commentary by Michael Ventura who's written extensively on this film, and often reads straight from his book. It's sometimes quite compelling, and sometimes overly gushing and awkward; but overall has enough good content to be worthwhile. Finally, the Criterion disc has the trailer and a 29 page booklet, which includes an article Cassavetes himself wrote on the film for the New York Times. Actually, the French set had a booklet, too; you just couldn't read it unless you knew French.

So the Cinemalta disc was a nice release; it served us well. But now it's time to push it aside for Criterion's definitive blu. Even if you're not that fussed about upgrading your DVDs to blu-ray, this one is well worth it for the new extras and fresh scan. Keep your French disc for that Scene 143 extra, but there's no reason to go out of your way for it today.  Especially now that there's a proper A Child Is Waiting blu-ray out now, too.