Leave Her to Heaven Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		3.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Leave Her to Heaven Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov March 7, 2020

John M. Stahl's "Leave Her to Heaven" (1945) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion. The supplemental features on the disc include vintage trailer for the film an exclusive new program with critic Imogen Sara Smith. The release also arrives with an illustrated leaflet featuring an essay by author Megan Abbott and technical credits. In English, with optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature. Region-A "locked".

In the United States, John M. Stahl's Leave Her to Heaven was first released on Blu-ray by Twilight Films in 2013. For an in-depth analysis of the film, please see Jeffrey Kauffman's review of this release here.

Leave Her to Heaven Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.37:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Leave Her to Heaven arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion.

The following text appears inside the leaflet that is provided with the release:

"This 2K digital restoration was undertaken by Twentieth Century Fox and the Academy Film Archive, with support from The Film Foundation. A new digital transfer was created from a 35mm color reversal internegative. A 35mm nitrate IB Technicolor print was used as a reference for picture restoration, which was completed at Reliance MediaWorks in Burbank, California. The original monaural soundtrack was remastered from a 35mm composite fine-grain master track at Audio Mechanics in Burbank."

In 2013, Twilight Time used the same restoration for this release of the film. Unfortunately, the restoration has all of the major shortcomings that made the various big color films with Marilyn Monroe that have appeared on Blu-ray look problematic (Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Niagara). What does this mean exactly? If you have seen the Monroe films and the first release of Leave Her to Heaven, you will quickly recognize that they are graded in an extremely similar fashion, which introduces color balance issues and frequently some anomalies in terms of dynamic range. So, while it may be unfair to speculate that LUT values might have been preset on all restorations that emerged via Fox, it certainly appears that the final color balance that each restoration received was in fact curved with the same end goal in mind. Leave Her to Heaven in particular has a problematic creamy/yellowish font that very clearly impacts negatively its dynamic range, and in most darker areas mild digital flatness is often easy to spot. Yes, the elements that were used to produce the restored master appear to have had some limitations as well, but the grading is unquestionably the biggest factor. (The exact same anomaly can also be observed on various older and more recent restorations of color films that were completed in France, so sadly this has been a trend for quite some time now). On the other hand, the density levels on the restoration are excellent and as a result fluidity is solid as well. Also, the entire film looks virtually spotless. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-A or Region-Free player in order to access its content).

Leave Her to Heaven Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: English: LPCM Mono (48kHz, 24-bit). Optional English SDH subtitles are provided for the main feature.

As far as I am concerned, the lossless audio track serves the film very well. It has been fully restored, so clarity, depth, and overall balance are outstanding. There are no audio dropouts, pops, or digital distortions to report in our review.

Leave Her to Heaven Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer - a vintage trailer for Leave Her to Heaven. With music. (3 min, 1080p).

• Imogen Sara Smith - a new video interview with critic Imogen Sara Smith, which was conducted exclusively for Criterion in 2019. In English, not subtitled. (27 min, 1080p).

• Leaflet - an illustrated leaflet featuring author Megan Abbott's essay "The Eyes of Ellen Berent" and technical credits.

Leave Her to Heaven Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I give the folks at Criterion a lot of credit for adding Leave Her to Heave to their Blu-ray catalog so that film buffs that want to own a copy of it can purchase one with a decent price tag. However, in an ideal world they should have also produced their own restoration of the film, which I am absolutely convinced would have been done right. Yes, it is an impossible scenario, but anyone that likes this film knows that it would have been the perfect scenario.