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David Bowie stars in Nagisa Oshima’s 1983 Palme d’Or-nominated portrait of resilience, pride, friendship and obsession among four very different men confined in the stifling jungle heat of a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp in Java during World War II.

In 1942, British officer Major Jack Celliers (Bowie) is captured by Japanese soldiers, and after a brutal trial sent, physically debilitated but indomitable in mind, to a POW camp overseen by the zealous Captain Yonoi (Ryuichi Sakamoto). Celliers’ stubbornness sees him locked in a battle of wills with the camp’s new commandant, a man obsessed with discipline and the glory of Imperial Japan who becomes unnaturally preoccupied with the young Major, while Lieutenant Colonel Lawrence (Tom Conti), the only inmate with a degree of sympathy for Japanese culture and an understanding of the language, attempts to bridge the divide through his friendship with Yonoi’s second-in-command, Sergeant Hara (Takeshi Kitano), a man possessing a surprising degree of compassion beneath his cruel façade.

Produced by Jeremy Thomas (The Last Emperor, The Sheltering Sky), it was the first English-language film by Oshima (Death by Hanging, In the Realm of the Senses, Gohatto), a leading light of Japanese New Wave cinema, and provided breakthrough big-screen roles for comedian Takeshi Kitano and musician Ryuichi Sakamoto, who also composed the film’s hauntingly memorable BAFTA-winning score. This powerful wartime drama was adapted from Laurens van der Post’s autobiographical novel ‘The Seed and the Sower’ (1963) by screenwriter Paul Mayersberg (The Man Who Fell to Earth).

SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS

• High Definition Blu-ray™ (1080p) presentation
• Original uncompressed stereo audio
• The Man Who Left His Soul on Film (1983), Paul Joyce’s 82-minute documentary profile of Nagisa Oshima
• The Oshima Gang (1983), a 30-minute documentary following the film’s cast and makers at the 1983 Cannes Film Festival
• Video interviews with producer Jeremy Thomas and actor-composer Ryuichi Sakamoto
• Exclusive newly filmed interview with critic Tony Rayns
• Original theatrical trailer
• Image gallery
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Sam Hadley

FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Jasper Sharp

I imagine there has been no comment on this because it has already been released on Blu Ray before, but I think this is a really good example of excellently curating a film and its contextualising extras. The booklet essay by Jasper Sharp, Tony Rayns interview (which I enjoyed more than I think I would have a commentary) and Paul Joyce documentary are all very interesting and the transfer, bearing in mind my relatively limited set-up, seems as good as you would expect.

Is the transfer an improvement on the Criterion? I haven't been able to find anything about that

Sorry, I can't help with that (probably wouldn't be able to even if I had both editions to be honest, due partly to my set-up but also my lack of expertise). There seem to be a couple of reviews on the internet but nothing that compares the transfers unfortunately.

swo17 wrote: Mon Jul 06, 2020 11:35 am Is the transfer an improvement on the Criterion? I haven't been able to find anything about that

Right off the bat, the AA release features the original aspect ratio of 1.85, while the Criterion is slightly opened to 1.78. Only a slight difference. I would guess that the AA release is similar in picture quality to the German 2017 release, which also is in the OAR of 1.85. The German bitrate is ~35 mbps while the Criterion is ~27 mbps. The higher birate gives the German a slight a edge. The grain is slightly more visible, and detail a tad bit improved over the Criterion. I honestly say, if you already have the Criterion, the slight improvement that Arrow release is likely to offer is probably not substantial enough to warrant double dipping unless you're a huge fun of the film, are Region-B locked, or you are watching this on a very large screen.

You can compare the German release and the Criterion here:
https://caps-a-holic.com/c.php?go=1&a=0 ... 66&i=9&l=1

I just got this. The menu runs fine - it actually plays video of a scene in the background. But if I try playing the feature, it only displays a single frozen frame (a shot of the floor with a shoed foot coming in from the upper right) while the sound continues to play. If I try playing a featurette, something similar happens where it plays a frame or black while the sound plays through.

I only have access to an old Oppo at the moment, so I can't test it on other players. Anyone else having similar issues? I know Oppo has been having problems playing some newer BD's that has more data coming in the signal - is this another case of that?

It played fine on my Oppo BDP-93

Watched my copy recently on a low price Sony player and encountered no problems.

A new 4K scan of MCML is playing in Tokyo until the end of the month. Audio engineer Seigen Ono and commentator Peter Barakan gave a presentation about the film at the opening.
https://oshima2021.com

I'm hoping this version gets picked up for release on blu-ray in the near future.

konoyaro wrote: Wed Jul 14, 2021 7:18 pm A new 4K scan of MCML is playing in Tokyo until the end of the month. Audio engineer Seigen Ono and commentator Peter Barakan gave a presentation about the film at the opening.
https://oshima2021.com

I'm hoping this version gets picked up for release on blu-ray in the near future.

EDIT:

Let me start over.

I found this link, but I now believe this pre-dates the new 4K scan. Color-wise it looks the same as previous Blu-ray releases and it's a great transfer - I just saw the film projected in 35mm tonight and this upload definitely looks as good as I can hope.

I went to the link konoyaro posted and found a link to this trailer - it's a new link because it was uploaded on April 20 of this year and translated to English, it says "Merry Christmas on the Battlefield 4K Restored Version" Memorial Screening for Ryuichi Sakamoto.

Both YouTube clips above show the famous kiss...but note the drastic change in color. Let the record show that the 35mm print I saw tonight looked NOTHING like the trailer for the 4K restoration - the sky was NOT a deep teal, if anything it was pretty close to the first link I posted above. In other words, hold on to those Arrow (or I guess Criterion) Blu-rays.

hearthesilence wrote: Tue May 23, 2023 3:34 am
I found this link, but I now believe this pre-dates the new 4K scan. Color-wise it looks the same as previous Blu-ray releases and it's a great transfer - I just saw the film projected in 35mm tonight and this upload definitely looks as good as I can hope.

That YT channel is full of amateur 4K/8K upscales. Most likely some random guy took the BD and ran an “AI” upscaler on it.

I wonder why no label anywhere has picked up the new restoration. Even if the colors aren’t accurate, detail level on the old BDs look very dated now, being sourced from an IP print scanned on the infamous Spirit Datacine. IIRC grain looked very chunky on this one.

rrenault wrote: Mon Apr 08, 2024 1:59 pm On a side note, Carlotta in France are releasing In The Realm of the Senses on UHD. If it’s done by FiM it should be a beauty.

I hope that bodes well for Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence on UHD. These two's 4K restorations premiered in Japan side by side in 2021: https://oshima2021.com

Granted, I've also heard concerns over Lawrence's color grading, but the current Blu-ray master (interpositive scanned on a Spirit Datacine) is showing its age.

I really hope it doesn't look like the trailer I posted (which looks legit). Again, I immediately compared it to the 35mm print I saw and it wasn't even remotely close in terms of color grading - no way would I watch it like that.