Angels & Demons (2009)
Thriller, Mystery • 2h 19m
Director: Ron Howard
Cast: Tom Hanks, Ewan McGregor, Ayelet Zurer, Stellan Skarsgård, Pierfrancesco Favino, Nikolaj Lie Kaas, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Thure Lindhardt, David Pasquesi, Cosimo Fusco, Victor Alfieri, Franklin Amobi, Curt Lowens, Bob Yerkes, Marc Fiorini, Carmen Argenziano, Howard Mungo, Rance Howard, Steve Franken, Gino Conforti, Ilya Baskin, Richard Rosetti, Silvano Marchetto, Thomas Morris, Jonas Fisch, August Wittgenstein, Ben Bela Böhm, Paul Schmitz, Jeffrey Boehm, Xavier J. Nathan, Steve Kehela, Ursula Brooks, Rashmi, Yan Cui, Fritz Michel, Maria Cristina Heller, Rafael Petardi, Yesenia Adame, Kristof Konrad, Masasa Moyo, Ed Francis Martin, Cheryl Howard, Endre Hules, Norbert Weisser, Shelby Zemanek, Vanna Salviati, Raffi Di Blasio, Todd Schneider, Roberto Donati, Rocco Passafaro, Emanuele Secci, Anna Katarina, James Ritz, Felipe Torres Urso, Jose David Acevedo, Roy Allen III, Tibor Ambra, Victor of Aquitaine, Michael Ark, John Jason Bailey, Jerred Berg, Sally Berman, Yuki Bird, Anthony Bonaventura, Robert Bradvica, Ciara Bravo, Michael Patrick Breen, Aidan Bristow, Cheryl BryantBruce, Raúl Cardona, Christopher Casa, Patrick Casa, Pasquale Cassalia, Farouk Chakwa, Bacha Chilaia, Jimmy Clabots, Mark E. Clason, Tammy Colbert, Austin Michael Coleman, Robert Corvin, Luca Costa, Gina D'Acciaro, John Dardenne, William "Will" Daubert, Shervin Davatgar, Blake Dawson, Vincent De Paul, David Dedinsky, Lea Deesing, Norman Deesing, Angelique Deuitch, Paul DiVito, Brant Dorman, Allen Dula, Liz Duran, Matthew Earnest, Peter Ettinger, Jonn Faircrest, Les Feltmate, William Ferguson, Amanda Jane Fleming, David Fletcher, Gregory George Frank, Harrison Freed, Aaron Denius Garcia, Justin Giddings, Phil Gold, Alan Gray, Marco Greco, Roger Groh, Nancy Guerriero, Andrew Hamilton, Martin Harris, Miriam Harris, Charlie Heydt, David Hill, Kei Hirayama, Brett Hunt, Marco Infante, Clark James, Christopher Karl Johnson, Dave Johnson, Gina Juliet, Slim Khezri, Sophiah Koikas, Michael Laren, Robert W. Laur, Adrian Lee, David Michael Lewin, Maynor Lopez, Jon Lucero, Eder López, Julie Mabry, Les Mahoney, Gary Mandarino, Albert Marrero Jr., Stephen Marrero, Carina Aviles Marshall, Debbie McAlister, Sandra McCurdy, Anthony Molinari, Elsa Morales Myers, Mary E. Morales, Sauvion Morkunas, William Myers, Manuel Nardi, Justin Orton, Sarita Ospina, Dale Pavinski, Amelia Pawlak, David Pearl, David Pryor, Lawrence Ravettina, Paul Richard, Jarrod Robbins, Bertrand Roberson Jr., Adriana Roze, Franklin Ruehl, Kelly Ryan, Dylan Saccoccio, Frank Scozzari, James Seaman, Keith Shawn, Jutta Speidel, GJ Tiari, Nico Toffoli, Devin Toft, James Tumminia, Julian Vada, Ryan Van de Kamp Buchanan, Ernie Ventry, Damon Viola, Shannon Watson, Denise Winsor, Jon Morgan Woodward, Allan Yates, Alfred Molina
Best English-friendly & video release
Theatrical: Sony 4K Blu-ray
Extended: Old Sony Blu-ray
Updated 11 months ago
About the film
Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is recruited by the Vatican to investigate the apparent return of the Illuminati – a secret, underground organization – after four cardinals are kidnapped on the night of the papal conclave.
- Alternative Titles
- Angels and Demons
Director: Ron Howard
Theatrical: Universal 4K Blu-ray
IMAX Cut: 2005 DVD
Theatrical: Cinema DTS
Director: Ron Howard
2026 Sony 4K Blu-ray Steelbook
2026 Sony 4K Blu-ray Steelbook added Dolby Vision
Director: Ron Howard
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
Universal 4K Blu-ray - caps. Looks stunning against the horribly neutralized old master. Very glad Deakins supervised the new grade and had Universal restore his color filters.
Universal Blu-ray (included in the 4K edition) has the original 5.1 mix not on the 4K disc
The original 5.1 surround mix from the 2011 USA BD was included alongside the new Atmos upmix. The compatibility track is a downmix of the Atmos. The Atmos is overall lightly remixed with noticeably more high frequencies rolled-off relative to the old 5.1. I think the 5.1 sounds better. The 5.1 mix from the USA BD was used as it sounds essentially the same as the EUR BD (with some minor loudness differences) while not featuring the dither noise and low frequency noise that the EUR has. Commentaries between the USA UHD and USA BD are the same, with both featuring Dolby Surround metadata
Audio comparison: 5.1 surround
Director: Ron Howard
Theatrical Cut: Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray
Extended Cut: The 30th Anniversary Extended Cut on fanedit.org
Sources: fanedit.org (opens in a new tab)
Theatrical Cut: Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray
Extended Cut: The 30th Anniversary Extended Cut on fanedit.org has the additional TV footage and is also uncut.
The TV version is extended but is censored. The Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray is restored from an interpositive, no release so far is confirmed to be from the Original Camera Negative.
Director: Ron Howard
Video format: 1080p Blu-ray
OOP British Eureka Blu-Ray
Director: Ron Howard
Director: Dennis Hopper
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)
Director: David Lean
Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
The 5.1 on Sony 4K Blu-ray is from the 1989 70mm mix. The original is 4-track. not on the disc.
Original Stereo mix: Columbia Pictures LaserDisc, Sony 4K Blu-ray
5.1 remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray, Sony Blu-ray
Dolby Atmos remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray
Original Stereo mix: Columbia Pictures LaserDisc, Sony 4K Blu-ray
5.1 remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray, Sony Blu-ray
Dolby Atmos remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray
Director: Satoshi Kon
Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
Director: Ben Stiller
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
Director: Luc Besson
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab) · fanrestore.com (opens in a new tab) · Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
2020 StudioCanal 4K Blu-ray vs 2017 Sony 4K Blu-ray (20th annivesary) vs 2025 Sony 4K Blu-ray (Luc Besson Box Set). The first two have totally different texture.
StudioCanal: More natural looking. Better defined grain. The white balance is rather yellow/orange. Some say it is closer to the original theatrical release.
2017 Sony: More vibrant and impactful. The white balance is rather neutral. While color noise and grain can look busy because it had been sharpened and had micro-contrast boosted.
2025 Sony: Supposedly an improved version of the 2017 release? Shows around 20mbps-higher overall video bitrate. caps
2007 Sony Blu-ray or LaserDisc AC3? (TBC) https://fanrestore.com/thread-7303.html
The Atmos on the Sony release is reportedly better than StudioCanal's.
Disc info of the box set discs. This film have recieved multiple encode/versions in different regions over the years. The 2017 Germany4K Blu-ray is encoded differently than the 2017 Sony but not better. Also, the same can be said to 2024 France Gaumont 4K Blu-ray while comparing to the 2020 StudioCanal 4K Blu-ray. The StudioCanal 4K Blu-ray omits all the extras from previous releases, being barebones.
Director: Frank Capra
More Thriller on Blu-ray
Director: Roman Polanski
Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)
UK 4K teased by 88 Films https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?p=24252379
Carlotta France 4K Blu-ray > Vinegar Syndrome 4K Blu-ray (better encode on Carlotta without any low-pass filtering, more extras and English subtitles on Vinegar Syndrome)
4K restoration of the original 3D left eye and right eye camera negatives
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: Jonathan Demme
Video format: UHD Blu-ray
Sources: vitalpassenger.com (opens in a new tab)
FiM are mistakenly credited, one of the four known instances of this for a Cinématographe title (the other three being Thieves Like Us, Who Killed Teddy Bear?, and The Gambler). 4K encode was done by Vital Passenger. https://vitalpassenger.com/our-work
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.
Video format: UHD Blu-ray
WB 4K
Sources: YouTube (opens in a new tab)
An undeniably significant improvement from the BD yet still severely flawed. See DFIC's review.
Director: Bernard Rose
Scream Factory/Arrow 4K Blu-ray or Turbine 4K Blu-Ray
SF and Turbine also have the 2004 Audio Commentary with Bernard Rose, Clive Barker, Alan Poul and actors Virginia Madsen, Tony Todd and Kasi Lemmons
Director: Rob Reiner
Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab) · instagram.com (opens in a new tab)
UK Arrow 4K Blu-ray > US Kino Lorber/Germany Capelight - caps and audio comparison on this page. Discussion is still ongoing about the 2.0 but as none of the three 4Ks seem to have the true original mix, I think it's fair to leave them all in the blue tier for now and only note that Kino Lorber has the worst PQ.
The initial release of the Capelight 4K mediabook had some playback issues with Dolby Vision on Panasonic devices due to an encoding error, the HDR10 apparently works fine, see Capelight’s official response here.
The 4K master has a shot at the very end of the movie (on James Caan's face) that looks incredibly soft and not good at all. This was visible on the DCP as well so it might just be a source issue rather than being the fault of Kino, Capelight or Arrow.
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