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Licensor Information
Toho Co.
Directed by: Akira Kurosawa
In this powerful early noir from the great Akira Kurosawa, Toshiro Mifune bursts onto the screen as a volatile, tubercular criminal who strikes up an unlikely relationship with Takashi Shimura’s jaded physician. Set in and around the muddy swamps and back alleys of postwar Tokyo, Drunken Angel is an evocative, moody snapshot of a treacherous time and place, featuring one of the director’s most memorably violent climaxes.
Streaming Options
32894.
+26353
Release Information:
Technical Specifications
Format:
DVD
Disc:
DVD-9 (1 Disc)
Total: 1 Disc
Regions:
1 (DVD)
Aspect Ratio:
1.33:1
Audio Options:
Japanese Dolby Digital Mono 1.0
Resolution:
480p/29.97
Subtitles:
English
Supplements
Types of Supplements Included: Audio Commentary, Documentary, Video Essay, Booklet
- Audio commentary featuring Japanese-film scholar Donald Richie
- A 30-minute documentary on the making of Drunken Angel, created as part of the Toho Masterworks series Akira Kurosawa: It is Wonderful to Create
- Kurosawa and the Censors, a new, 25-minute video piece that looks at the challenges Kurosawa faced in making Drunken Angel
- Booklet featuring an essay by cultural historian Ian Buruma and excerpts from Akira Kurosawa’s Something Like an Autobiography
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Film
Picture
Audio
Supplements
Artwork
Release Credits
Producer: Kim Hendrickson
Artwork: Eric Skillman
Release Notes on Restoration
Drunken Angel
The original film materials for Drunken Angel survive in considerably degraded condition. This new high-definition digital transfer was created on a C-Reality Telecine from a master positive and is presented in the film’s original aspect ratio of 1.33:1. On widescreen televisions, black bars will appear on the left and the right of the image to maintain the proper screen format. The picture has been slightly window-boxed to ensure that the maximum image is visible on all monitors. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris, and scratches were removed using the MTI Digital Restoration System. To maintain optimal image quality through the compression process, the picture on this dual-layer DVD-9 was encoded at the highest possible bit rate for the quantity of material included.
The soundtrack was mastered at 24-bit from the 35mm an optical soundtrack print, and audio restoration tools were used to reduce clicks, pops, hiss, and crackle. The Dolby Digital 1.0 signal will be directed to the center channel on 5.1-channel sound systems, but some viewers may prefer to switch to two-channel playback for a wider dispersal of the mono sound.
The soundtrack was mastered at 24-bit from the 35mm an optical soundtrack print, and audio restoration tools were used to reduce clicks, pops, hiss, and crackle. The Dolby Digital 1.0 signal will be directed to the center channel on 5.1-channel sound systems, but some viewers may prefer to switch to two-channel playback for a wider dispersal of the mono sound.