Peter Ibbetson (1935)
Drama, Fantasy, Romance • 1h 28m
Director: Henry Hathaway
Cast: Gary Cooper, Ann Harding, John Halliday, Ida Lupino, Douglass Dumbrille, Virginia Weidler, Dickie Moore, Doris Lloyd, Gilbert Emery, Donald Meek, Christian Rub, Elsa Buchanan, Jack Adair, Robert Adair, Stanley Andrews, Martha Bamattre, Ambrose Barker, Theresa Maxwell Conover, Marcelle Corday, Harry Cording, Blanche Craig, Adrienne D'Ambricourt, Leonid Kinskey, Cyril McLaglen, Clive Morgan, Marguerite Namara, Martha O'Driscoll, Gerald Rogers, Colin Tapley
Best English-friendly release · updated 6 months ago
Overview
When his mother dies, young Peter Ibbetson leaves Paris and his best friend, Mary, behind to live with a severe uncle in England. Years later, Peter is an architect with little time for women, until he begins a project with the Duke and Duchess of Towers. When Peter and the duchess become great friends, she reveals that she is Mary — but the duke soon suspects his wife of infidelity and challenges Peter to a duel, threatening the pair's second chance.
Directors: Henry Hathaway & John Ford & George Marshall
Warner Bros Blu-ray 2-Disc version (Digibook) for the Smilebox presentation
Sources: YouTube (opens in a new tab)
Directors: Henry Hathaway & Howard Hawks & Henry King & Henry Koster & Jean Negulesco
Director: Alan Clarke
Video format: UHD Blu-ray
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)
The 88 Films 4K Blu-ray is disappointing. Indicator Blu-ray > 88 Films Blu-ray. From nicolas:
Fine master, solid HDR but very poorly encoded with strong blocking artifacts in normal areas and clipped highlights that bring Criterion’s Walkabout to mind. Their Blu-ray is slightly better overall but then again still not as good as FiM’s encode for Indicator.
Director: Vincent Sherman
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab) · DVDBeaver (opens in a new tab)
> Kino Lorber see DVDBeaver
Indicator is using a different restoration from earlier Kino Lorber Blu-ray and it has much better contrast and slightly better grain resolution
Director: John M. Stahl
Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
Indicator Blu-ray is encoded by FiM and likely better than Kino Lorber Blu-ray
Director: Fritz Lang
Sources: DVDBeaver (opens in a new tab)
Indicator Blu-ray is superior to Kino Lorber transfer see caps. 2K restoration
More Drama on Blu-ray
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
BD LPCM 5.1
The DTS-HD on the UHD has been dynamically compressed, has had its center channel boosted, and surrounds lowered (typical modern nearfield mix for soundbars). Very different from the BD and DVD tracks. The BD LPCM is basically just a lossless version of the DTS and AC3 from the original DVD (the AC3 actually being the superior mix on that particular release).
Directors: Emeric Pressburger & Michael Powell
Imprint 4K Blu-ray
Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab) · filmalert101.blogspot.com (opens in a new tab) · slow.pics (opens in a new tab)
FiM encode and none of the low-pass filtering present on the Criterion 4K, resulting in more detail and better handling of highlights on Imprint
Review, comparisons
All HD and 4K sources use the same 2009 restoration. Criterion's master (also used by Imprint) is a bit more rolled off, though the difference is minor.
Director: Tony Scott
The 70mm 6-track mix has a higher bitrate on the Paramount 1998 DVD, but is more limited than on the THX LaserDisc The Paramount 1998 DVD also has open matte versions in fullscreen 1.33:1 and widescreen 2.00:1 instead of the theatrical aspect ratio of 2.39:1, but the 2.00:1 widescreen presentation is non-anamorphic. The THX LaserDisc is available in both fullscreen 1.33:1 and widescreen 2.00:1 variants.
Director: Lloyd Bacon
4K restoration from Original Camera Negative
Director: Preston Sturges
No information on French Elephant Films Blu-ray
Director: Ralph Bakshi
Director: Martin Scorsese
Other releases have horrendous DNR
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