The Lion in Winter Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		3.5
Audio		3.5
Extras		1.5
Overall		4.0

The Lion in Winter Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman March 22, 2019

Peter O’Toole belongs to a select group of performers who were nominated twice in the annual Academy Awards sweepstakes for playing the same role in different films, as I recently outlined in our Life After Flash Blu-ray review, and he was in fact the only actor so recognized other than Bing Crosby until Al Pacino scored two nominations in the first two Godfather films. O’Toole’s achievement is kind of interesting for a number of reasons, including the fact that both films in which he played Henry II, Becket and The Lion in Winter, have very little in common other than the character of Henry II. While both films were culled from pre-existing plays, Becket was originally a French work by noted playwright Jean Anouilh which only later transferred to English speaking countries courtesy of a translation by Lucienne Hill. The Lion in Winter didn’t last extremely long on the Great White Way boards (just a couple of months, much like the Broadway staging of Becket), but it still managed to attract a lot of attention to its writer, James Goldman, who had previously arguably been at least slightly in the shadow of his better known brother, William. While the subjects of the plays are manifestly different despite sharing the same focal character, both Becket and The Lion in Winter are kind of unavoidably literary at times, but they both also benefit from unusually energetic performances, not the least of which is O'Toole's take(s) on a character who had a penchant for almost Machiavellian level scheming.

While the “history” offered in both Becket and The Lion in Winter may be at least occasionally questionable, both films have a rather authoritatively “real” feeling about them, something that’s quite unusual in terms of films that seek to depict iconic real life characters. Henry II (Peter O’Toole) is an aging monarch in this film, at least somewhat removed from the youthful roue of Becket, but he’s still a machinating type, especially when it comes to who will inherit the throne from him. It’s Christmastime, and Henry II summons all of his sons home, including Richard (Anthony Hopkins) and Geoffrey (John Castle). Youngest son John (Nigel Terry) who, had he not been born a royal probably would have been dubbed the village idiot, is already at the King’s Anjou residence, where he also summons his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine (Katharine Hepburn), whom he has had imprisoned for several years.

A series of rival alliances and plots ensue which also draw in two other characters (who are themselves related), Alais Capet (Jane Merrow), a French princess who has been betrothed to Richard for years but who also been Henry’s mistress for quite some time, and King Philip II of France (Timothy Dalton), Alice’s half brother who arrives to tell Henry either he can marry Alice off to Richard or return her sizable dowry — his choice. That’s just part of this particular set of palace intrigues, however, for the jockeying for position to assume Henry’s throne involves all sorts of shenanigans that involve not just the potential heirs, but Eleanor as well. It’s all the stuff of overheated soap operas (and in fact Empire reportedly owes as much of its inspiration to this work as it does to King Lear), but what’s so oddly endearing about the amped up emotions and almost murderous exploits involved is that it’s quite clear this family loves each other, at least in their own slightly demented ways.

While director Anthony Harvey does good work in “opening up” the stagebound source, including quite a bit of outdoor location work, there is an inherent theatricality to this piece, and in fact Harvey probably could have done without the early scenes of a kind of “magical emissary” showing up behind Richard and Geoffrey to tell them they’re needed “back home”. As Harvey himself confesses in his commentary, he was probably way too enamored of then trendy zoom lenses, something that can become distracting at times. What really makes The Lion in Winter click, though, is the absolutely amazing performance acumen of the cast, which crackles with the sort of electricity that is all too rare in films generally, and often in “historical epics” particularly. O’Toole and Hepburn are impeccably matched (Harvey gets into their personal relationship in his appealing commentary included on this Blu-ray disc as a supplement), but they’re effortlessly supported by the really winning and often quite funny supporting cast.

The Lion in Winter Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Lion in Winter is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber's Studio Classics imprint with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.35:1. Kino Lorber touts "newly restored in 4K!" prominently on the back cover of this release, but many will probably be aware of the scuttlebutt surrounding this title, which reportedly had a problematic master that at least one other niche label passed over. Some online information states that there was an earlier master that was passed over, but this is culled from newer work supervised by StudioCanal (whose logo is included on this release's leader). My bottom line reaction here is perhaps colored by the awareness that source elements may be compromised in some way, but I was frankly generally pleasantly surprised by the appearance here, though there are issues to be aware of. Whatever "restoration" was undertaken has still left signs of age related wear and tear, and while minor, they're surprisingly recurrent. There are also bugaboos like pretty bad wobble during the opening credits sequence. Color temperature and brightness vary noticeably, especially in the early going in the outdoor scenes, where backgrounds kind of warm and cool momentarily second by second. There does appear to have been some high frequency filtering done here, as some scenes seem suspiciously devoid of grain, while other moments have a nice, tight and organic looking grain field. The palette overall is arguably a bit on the brown side, but pops of color, especially reds, still reverberate quite strongly, and a lot of the outdoor material looks fantastic, with richly blue skies well in evidence. All of this said, detail levels are generally very good to excellent, especially in the many close-up and midrange shots. Fine detail on elements like the fabrics on costumes is often very precise looking. It's kind of shocking that a film with the imprimatur that this one has evidently wasn't curated more carefully over the years, and without more information it's probably pointless to speculate about what might have been done, since the elements may simply have been too damaged to do anything better with, but this is a case where seeing the glass "half full" or "half empty" may determine how you feel about the transfer. My score is 3.75.

The Lion in Winter Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Lion in Winter features DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and 2.0 (mono) mixes, though the surround mix was evidently rejiggered from the original mono track (in the interview with him included on this Blu-ray as a supplement, even sound recordist Simon Kaye appears slightly confused about what audio options were available during the original theatrical exhibition of the film). The 2.0 track sounds pretty tinny and shallow to my ears, and while the 5.1 track doesn't really ever bristle with abundant surround activity (especially with regard to discrete channelization) it at least has a somewhat more fulsome midrange and low end, something that helps to support John Barry's exceptional Oscar winning score. Dialogue comes through cleanly and clearly without any problems.

The Lion in Winter Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Audio Commentary by Director Anthony Harvey stems from circa 2000 (according to comments Harvey makes early on), and covers a wealth of behind the scenes information, as well as some stylistic choices Harvey made along the way.


• Interview with Sound Recordist Simon Kaye (1080p; 10:22) is a really interesting if brief featurette which gets into some of the technical aspects of the shoot, which by design was planned so that no post looping would be necessary.


• The Lion in Winter Trailer (480p; 3:18)

The Lion in Winter Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

If you haven't seen Becket or The Lion in Winter , they make for an absolutely fascinating double feature, especially with regard to O'Toole's characterization. I'd love to know whether he screened Becket before undertaking The Lion in Winter , for as different as the underlying plot mechanics are in each film, Henry II seems like the same character in both, albeit older if no wiser in this film. O'Toole manifests some of the very same mannerisms, including furtive glances, bowed head and occasionally hyperbolic bellowing, all to fantastic effect. Hepburn, who famously shared a Best Actress Academy Award that year with someone named Streisand or something, delivers one of her finest latter day performances as well. Production elements are top notch, including James Goldman's Oscar winning adapted screenplay and (perhaps especially) John Barry's monumentally inventive and similarly Oscar winning score. Technical merits have some intermittent obstacles to overcome, but my hunch is those who have had previous home video versions of The Lion in Winter will indeed be putting this release in the "glass half full" category. Recommended .