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Dead Ringers (1988)
Dead Ringers (1988) poster

Dead Ringers (1988)

Thriller, Horror • 1h 55m

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-friendly & video release

Updated 1 year ago


About the film

Elliot, a successful gynecologist, works at the same practice as his identical twin, Beverly. Elliot is attracted to many of his patients and has affairs with them. When he inevitably loses interest, he will give the woman over to Beverly, the meeker of the two, without the woman knowing the difference. Beverly falls hard for one of the patients, Claire, but when she inadvertently deceives him, he slips into a state of madness.

TSPDT
2026: #526
2025: #523
2024: #513
2023: #523
2022: #523

More from David Cronenberg

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Director: David Cronenberg

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Second Sight 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)

Best Audio:

2003 R1 MGM DVD

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

UK Vertigo 4K Blu-ray

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Entertainment One Blu-ray

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Sony Blu-ray

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

UK Entertainment One Blu-ray

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Fox/Shout! Factory Blu-ray

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Shout! Factory Blu-ray

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

Shout! Factory 4K Blu-ray

Additional Info:

Arrow, 101 Films, and Ecstasy of Films Blu-rays all have different extras

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

NSM Records 4K Blu-ray

Additional Info:

Arrow Blu-ray has some exclusive extras

Director: David Cronenberg

Best English-Friendly & Video:

France Metropolitian 4K Blu-ray

Additional Info:

US Sony Blu-ray has exclusive extras

More from Plaion

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Director: Alexandre Aja

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly:

US Lionsgate Limited 4K Blu-ray

Best Video:

US Lionsgate Limited, France ESC, or Germany Plaion 4K Blu-ray?

Video Notes:

Germany Plaion is reportedly better than UK Second Sight.

Not sure about the US Lionsgate or France ESC.

Director: Rose Glass

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly:

A24 4K Blu-ray

Best Video & Audio:

Plaion Germany 4K Blu-ray 

Video Notes:

Markedly better encoding on Plaion than A24 and without any low-pass filtering

Director: Soi Cheang

Best English-Friendly & Video:

US Well Go or Germany Plaion 4K Blu-ray?

Video Notes:

UK 4K is SDR only Japan is HDR10 only

Director: David Lynch

4K · Solid
Best English-Friendly & Video:

 Criterion 4K Blu-ray or Germany Plaion 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab) · slow.pics (opens in a new tab) · Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)

Upcoming Release:

UK Arrow 4K Blu-ray in December

Video Notes:

Subtle difference in encoding to the Criterion in encoding, trading blows in different shots, with Plaion taking a slight edge with less highlight blocking

Best Audio:

1993 MGM LaserDisc/2000 Region 1 MGM DVD

Audio Notes:

Criterion's 2.0 sounds muffled due to noise reduction and EQ.
Plaion's 2.0 lacks bass and has a very bright EQ, more resembling the 5.1 remix. Plaion’s 2.0 doesn't have any filtering unlike the Criterion, see https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.php?p=23831289&postcount=110

Director: Joshua Oppenheimer

Best English-Friendly:

UK Dogwoof Blu-ray vs US Drafthouse Blu-ray: see below

Best Video & Audio:

DE Koch Media

Video Notes:

DE Koch Media is presented in the correct 25fps and is likely better compressed than UK Dogwoof (29 vs 14 Mbps), but it doesn’t have English subtitles.

US Drafthouse is in 24fps for Region A compatibility, and is encoded at around 30 Mbps.

(Although bitrate does not solely determine the quality of the encode, the difference is large enough here and there are no publicly available caps.)

No info on the JP VAP Blu-ray.

Audio Notes:

DE Koch Media and US Drafthouse feature a lossless 5.1 track. Dogwoof offers only AC-3.

Director: Ivan Reitman

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Plaion German 4K Blu-ray

Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab) · Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)

Video Notes:

> US Kino Lorber see comparison and caps

Kino Lorber has an exceedingly poor encode, only slightly improved by the DV layer.

Best Audio:

Original matrixed Dolby Stereo: Universal US Blu-ray
Dolby Atmos remix: Plaion DE 4K Blu-ray

Audio Notes:

Universal's BD uses the same transfer as the old LaserDisc and sounds a bit better than Plaion's, which has worse dynamics.

Plaion's Atmos remix is tastefully done and preserves the original mix's characteristics, the 5.1 track on Kino's release is overly aggressive and unbalanced.

Director: William Wyler

4K · Superior Imports
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Italy Plaion 4K Blu-ray

Video Notes:

> Paramount 4K Blu-ray (marginally)

Director: Adrian Lyne

Video format: UHD Blu-ray

Video Notes:

Better compression than other 4K Blu-rays

Director: Enzo G. Castellari

Video format: UHD Blu-ray

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly:

UK Cult Films Blu-ray

Sources: slow.pics (opens in a new tab)

Best Video:

German Plaion 4K Blu-ray

Video Notes:

German Plaion 4K Blu-ray see caps but doesn't have EN subtitles

Directors: Alan Mak Siu-Fai & Andrew Lau Wai-Keung

Best English-Friendly:

Criterion US Blu-ray or Umbrella Australia 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab) · Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)

Best Video:

Maybe Umbrella Australia 4K Blu-ray (FiM encode), Plaion Germany 4K Blu-ray, or Pony Canyon Japan 4K Blu-ray. All other existing 4K Blu-rays have terrible compression: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showpost.php?p=21423337&postcount=173

The master is heavily DNR'd.

Best Audio:

Original 5.1 from Jokers France 4K Blu-ray or Criterion US Blu-ray or older Blu-rays

More Thriller on Blu-ray

Director: John Boorman

Best English-Friendly & Video:

WB Blu-ray

Upcoming Release:

2027 Criterion 4K Blu-ray

Best Audio:

1984 WB LaserDisc

Director: Bong Joon Ho

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly:

UK Artificial Eye 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)

Upcoming Release:

Criterion 4K Blu-ray releasing January 2027

Best Video:

France The Jokers 4K Blu-ray

Video Notes:

France The Jokers 4K Blu-ray has the least DNR (UK Artificial Eye might be similar? Both better than Universal 4K Blu-ray)

Criterion even though doesn’t have 4K, it has the B&W version and a lot of extras.

Director: David Fincher

Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

20th Century Studios Blu-ray

Additional Info:

Digipack release includes an Amazing Amy book the standard edition doesn’t have.

Director: Brian De Palma

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Arrow 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab)

Best Audio:

1993 Universal LaserDisc

Additional Info:

Carlito’s Way was released theatrically in both Dolby Stereo and DTS. The 2.0 on the Arrow UHD is the original stereo mix, unknown if the 5.1 mix on the  Arrow disc is the original DTS mix.

Director: Toshiharu Ikeda

Best English-Friendly:

UK Third Window Blu-ray and US Error 4444 Blu-ray

Sources: Blu-ray.com (opens in a new tab)

Best Video:

FRA Carlotta Blu-ray

Video Notes:

caps; UK and US Blu-rays share the encode

Director: Stanley Kubrick

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Criterion 4K Blu-ray

Video Notes:

Included in the Complete Kubrick box set with FiM encode of the same master from the WB release without the filtering, 1.85 ratio restored for US Cut; both US and International Cuts are 4K.

Best Audio:

US Cut: 1999 WB DVD/Criterion 4K Blu-ray

Additional Info:

No Blu-ray or DVD release until the Criterion 4K Blu-ray has presented the US in its original theatrical aspect ratio of 1.85:1. The International Cut has never been presented in it's OAR of 1.66:1 in any home video releases.

The packaging on the back of the WB 4K Blu-ray incorrectly states it as 1.85:1 when the movie is actually 1.78:1 as is the original Blu-ray. 

Director: Doug Liman

4K · Worse Than BD
Best English-Friendly & Video:

US Cut: Universal HD-DVD

International Cut: International Universal Blu-ray but slightly filtered and DNR'd

Video Notes:

The Universal Blu-ray is slightly filtered and DNR'd compared to the HD-DVD, and the Universal 4K Blu-ray, on top of being upscaled, adds additional DNR and is softer than both previous HD releases.

Best Audio:

Universal Blu-ray DTS-HD 5.1

Additional Info:

Versions:
- The International version contains a short additional scene (part of the "Farmhouse" extended scene from the special features). See additional detail below.
- The US version does not contain this scene during the film. Director Doug Liman confirms in his audio commentary that the scene was cut from the original US theatrical release "for time".
- "The Explosive Extended Edition" found on some DVD releases is not an alternate cut of the film, simply an access mode that plays "The Bookend Scenes" features via non-seamless branching.

Deck the Halls scene:
The U.S. release is 118:17 while the European/Australian/Japanese releases are 118:36. There is no difference between the two running times from the start, but at 81:21, the U.S. version cuts from a kitchen scene of Marie and Eamon washing dishes, to a scene of Eamon bringing blankets to Jason and Marie. On the European/Australian releases, at the same point, there is a scene of Jason, Marie, Eamon and his children eating dinner while "Deck the Halls" plays in the background. There is no dialogue, the characters just each exchange uncomfortable glances. The scene goes to 81:40, then picks up the same scene of Eamon bringing blankets. This scene is included as an extra ("Farmhouse" extended scene) albeit sans the holiday themed music. Many thanks to Rewind user Mark Bowen for comparing these releases and letting us know the difference.

Director: Tony Scott

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

Arrow 4K Blu-ray

Director: Michael Mann

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly & Video:

Arrow 4K Blu-ray

Sources: Criterion Forum (opens in a new tab) · thedigitalbits.com (opens in a new tab) · slow.pics (opens in a new tab)

Video Notes:

Arrow 4K Blu-ray is encoded by FiM and is better than Criterion, see caps https://slow.pics/c/Z2RRQAAT

Criterion 4K Blu-ray vs Blu-ray: caps colors are more different and nuanced than anticipated even in the SDR-converted caps and the usual gain in highlight detail is also apparent. Encode looks excellent except for the brightest areas as usual.

Best Audio:

5.1/5.0 mix (essentially a 4-track mix in 5.1 and 5.0 containers respectively)-Arrow/Criterion 4K Blu-ray. Only imperceptible differences in bit-depth: 20 vs 24. 

2.0 mix- Arrow 4K Blu-ray (original stereo)

Additional Info:

Arrow and Criterion 4K Blu-rays have differing extras 

Criterion has FEL Dolby Vision, Arrow has MEL

Arrow Limited Edition includes the Theatrical Cut Blu-ray from an older HD master, most likely from a 2K scan of an interpositive.

Director: Lewis Teague

4K · Excellent
Best English-Friendly, Video & Audio:

UK Arrow 4K Blu-ray 

Video Notes:

> disappointing US Kino Lorber 4K Blu-ray

Audio Notes:

UK Arrow 4K Blu-ray / R1 Lionsgate DVD sounds best and has the original mono and the R1 Lionsgate DVD has a Dolby Stereo remix

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· last reviewed 1 year ago

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