A Ship to India Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		3.5

A Ship to India Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov October 30, 2018

Ingmar Bergman's "A Ship to India" (1947) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion. There are no bonus features on this release. In Swedish, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-Free.

The lovers

Note: Sawdust and Tinsel will be included in Criterion's upcoming Ingmar Bergman's Cinema thirty-disc box set, which will be available for purchase on November 20. Currently, there is no preliminary information about an upcoming individual release of the film.

The text that is included below was initially used for our review of Artificial Eye's first Blu-ray release of A Ship to India, which was part of the label's Classic Bergman Collection that was produced in 2012.

***

After seven years of traveling the world, sailor Johannes Blom (Birger Malmsten) returns home. While wandering around, Johannes meets an old friend (Hjördis Petterson) and she invites him for a cup of coffee. At her place, he meets Sally (Gertrud Fridh), a beautiful dancer he once loved who has lost her passion for life. They try to talk but can’t find the right words to express how they feel. He leaves and ends up at a remote beach where he recalls what took place seven years earlier.

The past. Captain Alexander (Holger Löwenadler), Johannes’ rude and constantly drunk father, is told that he has only a few months, possibly a year, left before he goes blind. Having lived in poverty his entire life, Alexander decides to travel the world with Sally, a beautiful dancer whom he has recently met. But when Sally meets Johannes, Alexander is forced to change his travel plans.

Based on a play by Martin Söderhjelm, A Ship Bound for India is a beautiful but unusually cold film. Alexander and Johannes have both suffered tremendously and come to realize that their anger is destroying them from the inside out. Both drink heavily to suppress it and numb the pain.

Sally brings hope into their lives – at least temporarily. Her arrival also reveals why they are angry. One of them is seen in a slightly more positive light, but ultimately both make terrible mistakes and hurt each other in a way that makes it incredibly difficult to embrace them. It is a Greek tragedy, Swedish style.

A Ship Bound for India was Bergman’s third feature film, but the first to be screened in the United States, in 1949. It is a minor entry in the director's oeuvre, which is quite possibly the reason why it has not always been easy to see in North America.

*This upcoming release is sourced from a new 2K remaster of the film that was completed in 2017. The first international release of the film was sourced from a different master.

A Ship to India Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.38:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Ingmar Bergman's A Ship to India arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion.

The film initially appeared on Blu-ray via Artificial Eye's Classic Bergman Collection box set, which we reviewed in 2012. However, this release is sourced from a new 2K remaster that was prepared in 2017, not the old remaster that was accessed for the first release.

I looked closely to see what type of discrepancies there are between the two remasters, and to be honest I found them extremely similar. In fact, one of the first things that I examine closely is the type of density levels that a new remaster has, and here the difference is, at very best, cosmetic. Even on a large screen the daylight footage, for instance, appears virtually identical. I looked very closely but I did not see any meaningful improvements in terms of depth and clarity. The darker footage has some grading adjustments, or at least it appears that balance is slightly altered, but on the previous remaster the fluidity was already very good. I also find the contrast settings to be practically the same (a few of the darker sequences on the older remaster look slightly harsher, but this is again something that I find largely irrelevant). Grain exposure is the same, though slightly tighter, and this could be the one area where some trained eyes will spot a difference. Image stability is very good. There are no debris, cuts, or damage marks, but a few tiny blemishes remain. (Note: This is a Region-Free release. Therefore, you will be able to play it on your player regardless of your geographical location).

A Ship to India Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: Swedish LPCM 1.0. Optional English subtitles are provided for the main feature.

I assume that the audio is optimized as best as possible because it is very clean and stability is excellent. There are a few spots here and there were it is not as nicely rounded as the audio is on some of Bergman's bigger films, but there are no obvious deteriorations so this is almost certainly an inherited quality of the native soundtrack.

A Ship to India Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There are no bonus features on this disc.

A Ship to India Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I am fairly certain that a lot of people that enjoy Ingmar Bergman's classic work will also find A Ship to India quite attractive. The truth is that it is a small film, or at least when placed next to the likes of Summer with Monika and Wild Strawberries, but it tells a moving story and has quite a bit of that unique unforced elegance that usually make the Swedish master's films special. The release is sourced from a 2K remaster that was completed in 2017 and is included in Criterion's upcoming Ingmar Bergman's Cinema thirty-disc box set, which will be available for purchase on November 20. RECOMMENDED.