8.1 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
The film depicts a small family, a husband and wife and two sons, struggling to get by on a tiny island in the Seto Inland Sea, over the course of a year. They are the island's only occupants, and survive by farming. They must repeatedly carry the water for their plants and themselves in a row boat from a neighboring island...
Starring: Nobuko Otowa, Taiji Tonoyama, Shinji Tanaka, Masanori HorimotoForeign | 100% |
Drama | 65% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.46:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.35:1
Japanese: LPCM Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
48 kHz / 1152 kbps / 24-bit
English
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region B (locked)
Movie | 5.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
Kaneto Shindo's "The Naked Island" (1960) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of British distributors Eureka Entertainment. The supplemental features on the disc include an audio commentary with the Japanese director and his longtime composer and friend Hikaru Hayashi, and a short video introduction by director Alex Cox. The release also arrives with a 32-page illustrated booklet featuring an essay by Acquarello, and a reprint of film critic and scholar Joan Mellen's interview with Kaneto Shindo from Voices from the Japanese Cinema. In Japanese, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-B "locked".
The island
Presented in an aspect ratio of 2.46:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Kaneto Shindo's The Naked Island arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of British distributors Eureka Entertainment.
The high-definition transfer is beautiful. Image depth and clarity are very pleasing during the daylight footage as well as during the few nighttime sequences (see screencaptures #3 and 5). Contrast levels remain stable throughout the entire film. The blacks, whites, and the variety of grays are well balanced. There are absolutely no traces of problematic denoising corrections. Sharpening adjustments have not been performed either. Predictably, the film has a terrific and very consistent organic look. Compression is also very good. Purely transfer-specific anomalies, such as banding or aliasing, are nowhere to be seen. The film has also been carefully cleaned up. There are no large cuts, damage marks, or warps. A couple of tiny scratches, vertical lines and stains remain, but I suspect that they were left in order to preserve the integrity of the image. All in all, this is a wonderful presentation of Naked Island which is guaranteed to impress those who are going to see the film for the first time as well as those who have previously seen it on DVD. (Note: This is a Region-B "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-B or Region-Free PS3 or SA in order to access its content).
There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: Japanese LPCM 1.0. For the record, Eureka Entertainment have provided optional English subtitles. When turned on, they appear inside the image frame.
The film is virtually dialog-free, but it has a beautiful soundtrack that greatly benefits from the lossless treatment. Overall dynamic movement is quite modest, but clarity and depth are very good. Background hiss is not an issue of concern. Also, there are no problematic audio dropouts or distortions to report in this review.
Kaneto Shindo's The Naked Island might be one of the purest and most beautiful Japanese films ever made. Its poetic freedom and elegance are as striking as those witnessed in the films of Michelangelo Antonioni, Mikhail Kalatozov, and Miklos Jancso. Eureka Entertainment's presentation of the film is simply outstanding. I liked it so much that even though it is only July, I can guarantee that the Blu-ray release will appear on my Top 10 list at the end of year. VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
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