The Racket (1951)
Crime, Thriller • 1h 28m
Director: John Cromwell
Cast: Robert Mitchum, Lizabeth Scott, Robert Ryan, William Talman, Ray Collins, Joyce Mackenzie, Robert Hutton, Virginia Huston, William Conrad, Walter Sande, Les Tremayne, Don Porter, Walter Baldwin, Brett King, Richard Karlan, Tito Vuolo, Eric Alden, Gregg Barton, Don Beddoe, Robert Bice, Matthew Boulton, Barry Brooks, Howland Chamberlain, John Daheim, Don Dillaway, Art Dupuis, Jane Easton, Pat Flaherty, William Forrest, Jack Gargan, Dick Gordon, Bret Hamilton, Jayne Hazard, Howard Joslin, Hazel Keener, Mike Lally, Harry Lauter, Ronald Lee, Herbert Lytton, Frank Marlowe, Thomas Martin, Allen Mathews, Harriet Matthews, Philo McCullough, John McGuire, Ralph Montgomery, Al Murphy, William J. O'Brien, Eddie Parker, Ralph Peters, Howard Petrie, Joey Ray, Walter Reed, Richard Reeves, Stephen Roberts, Jack Shea, Miles Shepard, Charles Sherlock, George Sherwood, Milburn Stone, Duke Taylor, Herb Vigran, Max Wagner, Bud Wolfe, Sally Yarnell, Frank Baker, Tex Brodus, George Bruggeman, Dick Cherney, Bud Cokes, Claudia Constant, Curtis Jarrett, Michael Jeffers, Buck Russell
Compare the discs
About the film
The big national crime syndicate has moved into town, partnering up with local crime boss Nick Scanlon. McQuigg, the only honest police captain on the force, and his loyal patrolman, Johnson, take on the violent Nick.
- Alternative Titles
- The Racket
4K restoration of the original 3D left eye and right eye camera negatives
Director: Ernst Lubitsch
4K restoration from Original Camera Negative
Director: Richard Brooks
4K restoration from Original Camera Negative
Director: Vincent Sherman
4K restoration from Original Camera Negative
Director: George Pal
4K restoration from Original Camera Negative
Director: Compton Bennett
4K restoration from original technicolor negatives
Director: Jack Conway
4K restoration from safety preservation elements
4K restoration from safety preservation elements
More Crime on Blu-ray
Director: Wong Kar-Wai
Video format: 1080p Blu-ray
2010 US Kino Lorber or 2012 UK Artificial Eye
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
2017 JP Kadokawa Blu-ray has the best encoding out of all the older discs.
Kino Lorber and Artificial Eye Blu-ray use the same master, between the two the PQ on Kino's release is slightly better, but the difference is negligible. However, Artificial Eye also includes the 2.0 stereo mix in addition to the 5.1 mix, while Kino only includes 5.1 mix.
The 4K restoration (Criterion, 4K etc) are cropped to 2.35:1, have revisionistic colour grading and other changes.
Caps: old master, old master vs 4K restoration
Wong Kar-Wai on the framing:
With Fallen Angels, I have changed the format to cinemascope, because it was originally what I had intended to release the film in. When we were cutting the film, we accidentally turned the Steenbeck on anamorphic instead of standard. I felt that the film looked much more interesting because it enhanced the distance of the characters on top of the extreme wide angle that we shot on. Back then, it was impossible to shoot a film in standard and release it in anamorphic. With this restoration, we have successfully fulfilled this wish.
Director: Robert Altman
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab) · Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
Cinematrographe's HDR grading is overcooked, which is a known VinSyn tendency. Additionally, their booklet mis-credits the encode to FiM.
YMMV, but for some, the included BD encoded by Marcus Johnson—ironically may make for a more pleasing experience.
Director: John Woo
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab) · Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
Arrow has a different grade and a better encode than the Shout! Factory, though the difference in either is not major. Imprint release, which leaves Shout! Factory's master and subtitles as is, is encoded by FiM. https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.php?p=24473097&postcount=56
Original mix: Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray
Alternate mix: Scanbox Nordic PAL DVD
Surround remix: HK Video France 4K Blu-ray (5.0)
Original mix: Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray (similar to Criterion LaserDisc, but less distorted)
Alternate mix: Scanbox Nordic PAL DVD
Surround remix: HK Video France 4K Blu-ray (5.0)
Arrow used the alternate mix, but with extra filtering and lowered dynamic range. The alternate mix has much better fidelity.
Imprint presumably used the Shout! Factory original mix and left it as is, though no official confirmation.
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)
Arrow 4K Blu-ray > Criterion 4K Blu-ray > Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray
1991 Orion LaserDisc vs 2024 Arrow 4K Blu-ray
Director: William Dieterle
4K restoration from Original Camera Negative
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)
The 4K discs in both Criterion and Imprint sets are FiM encodes, but low-passed, Imprint minimally less so. Unfortunately, unlike with The Killing, Kino does not hold up at all, the grain is much rougher and the compression visibly struggles making for a much less pleasant watch, even if select stills look better.
All discs use the same source transfer. Criterion cleaned up some hums and hiss, but lost a little bit of high-end detail. Unlike The Killing, the difference's relatively mino.
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab) · slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
The 4K discs in both Criterion and Imprint sets are FiM encodes, but low-passed. The compression is better, but some of the grain is lost. Difference is pronounced in screen caps, but not likely to be noticed during playback, without a reference to compare it to. Comparisons
All discs use the same source transfer. It's not of the highest quality, and it includes some slight distortion, looping, clicks, pops, and hum. Criterion cleaned it up for their release, but unfortunately also lost a lot of fidelity in the process.
MGM NTSC DVD doesn't seem to have some of the more prominent distortion and has slightly different EQ but is otherwise the same.
Director: Karel Reisz
Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
Cinematographe is mis-credited to be an FiM encode. It isn't. Neither the encode nor the color grading are entirely satisfactory.
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
Arrow UK 4K Blu-ray > Paramount US and Capelight DE, same black crush on all three but the Arrow is encoded by FiM and has very good new supplements, the Capelight looks slightly low-passed, but in motion it probably looks about the same as the Paramount, see caps comparison for all three.
Arrow and Paramount basically sound the same, the Arrow has a slightly higher bitrate. Capelight is probably the same too but for now it's TBA.
Paramount US 4K Blu-ray has FEL Dolby Vision
Arrow UK 4K Blu-ray and Capelight DE 4K Blu-ray have MEL Dolby Vision
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