Casino Royale (1967)
Adventure, Action, Comedy • 2h 11m
Directors: Val Guest & Ken Hughes & John Huston & Joseph McGrath & Robert Parrish
Cast: David Niven, Peter Sellers, Ursula Andress, Orson Welles, Joanna Pettet, Daliah Lavi, Woody Allen, Deborah Kerr, Charles Boyer, John Huston, Jean-Paul Belmondo, George Raft, Terence Cooper, Barbara Bouchet, Gabriella Licudi, Tracy Reed, Tracey Crisp, Kurt Kasznar, Elaine Taylor, Angela Scoular, Jacqueline Bisset, Alexandra Bastedo, Ronnie Corbett, Bernard Cribbins, Derek Nimmo, Anna Quayle, Graham Stark, Colin Gordon, John Bluthal, Geoffrey Bayldon, John Wells, Duncan Macrae, Chic Murray, Jonathan Routh, Percy Herbert, Jeanne Roland, Vladek Sheybal, Richard Wattis, Penny Riley, Jack Gwillim, Geraldine Chaplin, Caroline Munro, Anjelica Huston, Peter O'Toole, Mireille Darc, Valentine Dyall, Ian Hendry, Stirling Moss, Nikki Van der Zyl, Eddie Powell, David Prowse, John Le Mesurier, Veronica Carlson, Erik Chitty, John Hollis, Burt Kwouk, Mona Washbourne, Jennifer White, Richard Reeves, Hal Galili, Robin Tolhurst
Best English-friendly release · updated 10 months ago
Overview
Sir James Bond is called back out of retirement to stop SMERSH. In order to trick SMERSH, James thinks up the ultimate plan - that every agent will be named 'James Bond'. One of the Bonds, whose real name is Evelyn Tremble is sent to take on Le Chiffre in a game of baccarat, but all the Bonds get more than they can handle.
Director: Guy Hamilton
Director: Terence Young
WB 4K Blu-ray despite frozen grain
Director: Cary Joji Fukunaga
(for original forced subtitles font)
IMAX sequences have not been released on home video to date
Video format: 4K Streaming
4K Streaming
Sources: 007homemedia.blogspot.com (opens in a new tab)
Warner Bros Blu-ray is the best Blu-ray even though it has color and major contrast issues
4K SDR master on streaming seems to be from the same scan and looks like it has less tinkering than the Blu-ray
Caps of 4K SDR master: 007 on Home Media: On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969)
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: Stanley Kubrick
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)
Director: Frank Capra
Director: John Carpenter
Sony 4K Blu-ray or Carlotta 4K Blu-ray (FiM encode)
Sony 4K Blu-ray and France Carlotta 4K Blu-ray (FiM encode) are similar
Director: Michael Arias
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
GKIDS 4K Blu-ray is a sharpened upscale. Caps
GKIDS 4K Blu-ray has a true lossless English dub and correct volume levels for the Japanese audio
Director: David Fincher
4K Blu-ray has exclusive “unrated” audio with a small change to one line under the request of David Fincher (removed the poor dub over of frickin’ in the line “Screw it, let’s gut the f**kin’ nerd.”).
Director: Martin Scorsese
2024 Sony 4K Blu-ray Steelbook
Sources: blah-ray.blogspot.com (opens in a new tab)
2024 Sony 4K Blu-ray Steelbook fixes duplicate shot seen on the previous Columbia Classics release and has better encoding
Original mono mix: 1990 Criterion LaserDisc/1991 Columbia LaserDisc
The 4K Blu-ray mono is only minimally worse (see blah-ray).
5.1 remix: Sony 4K Blu-ray
Director: Michael Apted
Video format: HD Streaming
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