8.2 | / 10 |
Users | 5.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.5 | |
Overall | 4.7 |
Determined to avenge his family's death at the hands of the Nazis, 12-year-old Ivan joins a Russian partisan regiment as a scout. He becomes indispensable for his ability to slip inconspicuously through enemy lines, but as his missions become increasingly dangerous, the enemy starts taking notice.
Starring: Nikolay Burlyaev, Nikolay Grinko, Evgeniy Zharikov, Andrey Konchalovskiy, Valentin ZubkovDrama | 100% |
Foreign | 99% |
War | 10% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.34:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.37:1
Russian: LPCM Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
English
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (locked)
Movie | 5.0 | |
Video | 5.0 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 3.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
Andrei Tarkovsky's "Ivanovo detstvo" a.k.a. "Ivan's Childhood" (1962) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion. The supplemental features on the disc include a video interview with film scholar and writer Vida T. Johnson; video interview with actor actor Nikolai Burlyaev; and a video interview with cinematographer Vadim Yusov. The release also arrives with an illustrated booklet featuring an essay by film scholar Dina Iordanova; "Between Two Films", Andrei Tarkovsky's essay on "Ivan's Childhood"; and "Ivan's Willow", a poem by the director's father, Arseny Tarkovsky. In Russian, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-A "locked".
It was just a dream...
Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.34:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Andrei Tarkovsky's Ivan's Childhood arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion.
The following text appears inside the booklet provided with this Blu-ray release:
"This high-definition digital transfer was created on a Spirit 4K from a 35mm fine-grain master positive. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris, scratches, splices, warps, and jitter were manually removed using MIT's DRS and Pixel Farm's PFClean, while Image Systems' Phoenix was used for small dirt, grain, noise reduction, and flicker.
Transfer supervisor: Lee Kline.
Colorist Joe Gawler/Technicolor, New York."
The high-definition transfer is beautiful. The dramatically improved depth and especially clarity during the nighttime sequences actually allow one to see objects that are basically lost on the R1 DVD release. Where there is plenty of light, the various close-ups also look fantastic (see screencaptures #3 and 13). There are no traces of excessive degraining. Problematic sharpening corrections have not been performed either. Colors are stable and lush, but never looking artificially boosted. There is a wide range of rich blacks, solid grays and gentle whites, all of which are consistently well balanced. Furthermore, it is obvious that the film has been carefully cleaned up as there are no large debris, scratches, flecks, or stains. There are no serious warps and frame transitions issues. Compression is also very good. All in all, this is a very impressive upgrade of Criterion's DVD release of Ivan's Childhood, and one that will likely end up on my Top 10 list at the end of the year. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray disc. Therefore, you must have a native Region-A or Region-Free PS3 or SA in order to access its content).
There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray disc: Russian LPCM 1.0 (with a few small portions of German). For the record, Criterion have provided optional English subtitles for the main feature.
Clarity and crispness are virtually identical on the Blu-ray and DVD releases, but depth is definitely improved. The difference is not subtle and during select sequences the gap in quality immediately becomes obvious. The dialog is crisp, stable, and easy to follow. While viewing the film, I also did not detect any pops, cracks, distortions, or heavy background hiss to report in this review. The English translation is excellent.
Ivan's Childhood is a stunningly beautiful, deeply atmospheric film from one of cinema's greatest masters, Andrei Tarkovsky. In the West, it is not as universally praised as his latter films, but I think that it is one of his most complete, most profoundly moving films. Criterion's presentation of Ivan's Childhood is outstanding. In fact, I believe that it is the best looking Tarkovsky film currently available on Blu-ray. VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
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