38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

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jojo
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#101 Post by jojo » Mon Jun 26, 2017 3:26 pm

I agree that the Criterion does look more artificially boosted, but from the screenshots it doesn't seem to have the drastically different color grading situations seen in Arrow's Female Prisoner Scorpion movies, or Criterion's Lady Snowblood.

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tenia
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#102 Post by tenia » Mon Jun 26, 2017 4:58 pm

No, you're right in that regards, but the grading direction made me think of it. It's much more contrasted and extremely saturated.

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dwk
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#103 Post by dwk » Mon Jun 26, 2017 6:02 pm

The contrast isn't artificially boosted. When using a low-contrast print, you get an image that is more contrasty than if you use another source and the contrast isn't adjustable. What is on the print is what you get, which is why it isn't a first choice for creating a master.

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tenia
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#104 Post by tenia » Tue Jun 27, 2017 1:28 am

I wouldnt say the contrast is artificially boosted but it certainly looked too strong, at least.

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#105 Post by Michal Szeremeta » Tue May 22, 2018 1:14 am

tenia wrote:
Mon Jun 26, 2017 12:28 pm
A French BD release of Tokyo Drifter has been released earlier this month. I've compared it to the quite well-received Criterion 2011 release, and it turns out it's massively different, to the point the Criterion looks like the Female Prisoner Scorpion movies from the Arrow set.

The comparisons can be found here : #1, #2, #3 and #4.

Interestingly, Tokyo Drifter's Criterion technical notes state that the restoration was created from a 35mm low-contrast print, which is what the FPS movies were using too (low-contrast prints).

I have no idea which is best in case of the Suzuki, because the more "regular" look of the French release doesn't look vastly off, though it clearly looks dated with its coarser grain, but on the other hand, the Criterion looks absolutely over-contrasted in comparison, to the point many elements seems now lost in this overly contrasted look.
What elements are lost? And maybe more important - colors in these kind of movies are really so much important? (if anybody know the answer please explain me).

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#106 Post by tenia » Tue May 22, 2018 3:42 am

By elements, I meant details.

Yes, colors for these kind of movies (actually : especially these kind of movies) are very important because stylistically, colors were an important part of their "pop" style. Suzuki, for instance, was very famous for its use of colors to the point that when the studio tried to control more his style, they forced him to shoot in B&W.

However, I also wanted to point this out because of the controversy over the Female Prisoner Scorpion color-scheme, which is interesting to put in context with the overall lack of intense reaction towards the look of Tokyo Drifter, which actually is similar to the FMS gradings.

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#107 Post by Michal Szeremeta » Tue May 22, 2018 4:08 am

no no. I mean something else. Here, look at this screen number 3 and screen number 4 http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDReview ... ifter_.htm Are here white color on screen number 4 actually means that this dead person lying on floor means ''he goes to heaven''?

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#108 Post by Titus » Tue May 22, 2018 9:13 am

Tenia, would it be possible for you to re-upload your screenshots? The earlier links don't seem to be working anymore.

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tenia
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#109 Post by tenia » Wed May 23, 2018 4:43 am

Yeah, screenshotcomparison wiped a first time their database and now seems to be dead altogether. I'll upload the 2 sets this evening. In the meantime, the ones from the French disc are available her on my review : http://retro-hd.com/tests/blu-ray/2461- ... tokyo.html
Michal Szeremeta wrote:
Tue May 22, 2018 4:08 am
no no. I mean something else. Here, look at this screen number 3 and screen number 4 http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDReview ... ifter_.htm Are here white color on screen number 4 actually means that this dead person lying on floor means ''he goes to heaven''?
My impression with Tokyo Drifter is that the Criterion presentation might be too contrasted and overly colored in a punchy way. I never realised that because it was the first time I watched the movie and that was years ago, but revisiting it with the French disc after the FPS controversy made me realised it actually shares some visual characteristics with the FPS presentations. It looked interesting for me because the Criterion Tokyo Drifter never generated the kind of flaming controversy the FPS set generated, and that it is sourced from the same kind of elements the FPS movies were sourced (low contrast prints).

I don't recall it drastically changing the movie colors, but I thought it was an interesting step back regarding these color-gradings discussions.

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#110 Post by tenia » Wed May 23, 2018 2:41 pm

And here you go :

Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image Image


First 12 caps are from the French disc, next 12 from the Criterion one.

Note how many shadow details get lost in the Criterion disc : the left cars on the 1st cap, the opening to another room on the right side of the 2nd, the sitting part of the chair on the 3rd, the hair on the 4th and the 5th, etc.

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#111 Post by Titus » Wed May 23, 2018 4:14 pm

Thanks! Certainly a startling difference, particularly in the more darkly-lit scenes.

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#112 Post by Michal Szeremeta » Thu May 24, 2018 2:36 am

Tenia you don't answer on my question. I post
Here, look at this screen number 3 and screen number 4 http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDReview ... ifter_.htm Are here white color on screen number 4 actually means that this dead person lying on floor means ''he goes to heaven''?
I believe that Seijun Suzuki know film theory and meaning of colors in his but no one interview ask him ''what is meaning of colors in your movies?'' In my opinion http://www.imagebam.com/image/8fff59872298774 is perfect example where BLACK wagon means is personification of BLACK character of main hero in this movie. Thats all.

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NeoNical
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#113 Post by NeoNical » Sun Oct 16, 2022 6:02 pm

A bit late to this but a 4K restoration of Branded to Kill screened at the Venice Film Festival last month and won the Venice Classics Award for Best Restored Film. Although this is not one of Criterion's bigger titles, this film now at least has some kind of potential for a possible 4K UHD release by Criterion. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtJwa4gV9Lo

Nikkatsu's Facebook Site: https://www.facebook.com/47087676504268 ... 5538956469

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#114 Post by swo17 » Wed Feb 15, 2023 2:12 pm


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yoloswegmaster
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#115 Post by yoloswegmaster » Wed Feb 15, 2023 4:04 pm

Do the Japanese companies dislike using HDR/DV for the older films that are restored in 4K? The 4K UHD releases from Toho for the 4 Kurosawa films and King Kong vs Godzilla don't have HDR, there isn't a HDR grade on the Japanese release of Akira, and Nikkatsu clearly didn't create a HDR grade when they did the 4K restoration for Branded to Kill.

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#116 Post by ryannichols7 » Wed Feb 15, 2023 7:59 pm

NeoNical wrote:
Sun Oct 16, 2022 6:02 pm
A bit late to this but a 4K restoration of Branded to Kill screened at the Venice Film Festival last month and won the Venice Classics Award for Best Restored Film. Although this is not one of Criterion's bigger titles, this film now at least has some kind of potential for a possible 4K UHD release by Criterion. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtJwa4gV9Lo

Nikkatsu's Facebook Site: https://www.facebook.com/47087676504268 ... 5538956469
well done, when I saw this award I figured it was a long shot that Criterion would upgrade this, or that we'd see the new restoration on an English friendly disc release. a very left field (but awesome pick) for their first Japanese UHD - gives me hope we can see Tokyo Olympiad or Pale Flower in the future, and that it isn't only Kurosawa and Ozu that they may be interested in releasing on the format!

I do echo others wishing for Suzuki's other films on BD - Fighting Elegy and Gate of Flesh should really be available

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feihong
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#117 Post by feihong » Thu Feb 16, 2023 1:41 am

ryannichols7 wrote:
Wed Feb 15, 2023 7:59 pm
I do echo others wishing for Suzuki's other films on BD - Fighting Elegy and Gate of Flesh should really be available
Gate of Flesh has a really nice-quality blu ray out in France, and there's been a 1080p transfer of Fighting Elegy floating around online––a 1080p transfer of Capone Cries Hard has recently surfaced, as well. There's certainly sources available. And I think Janus has rights for a lot of the prime cuts from the Suzuki Nikkatsu catalog. Pretty sure they still have Kanto Wanderer and Tattooed Life.

These films don't reach blu ray in Japan either, though, which is pretty weird. Dunno what to attribute that to.

I've discovered a lot of hidden gems in Suzuki's catalog over the years. There's the TV movie The Fang in the Hole, a kind of a less-successful but very interesting dry run for Zigeunerweisen (very instructive for how Zigeunerweisen works as well as it does). There's a very funny short section he does in the movie Marriage, with wonderful, strange sets like the open-plan house from Carmen from Kawachi, taken to a new level of surreality. Probably the best gem I've discovered is an experimental TV movie called Cherry Blossoms in Spring, which is shot on video between Mirage Theater and Capone Cries Hard. The early video, circa 1983, looks pretty harsh, but this is still one of Suzuki's most beautiful movies, no less so because the beauty feels so casual, and even amateurish. But it's a film about as radical as Mirage Theater, but nearly as funny as Capone Cries Hard. It's a fascinating transitional piece, but a great movie in its own right. There's also great movies I've seen in retrospective screenings, which have no purchase in home video: Passport to Darkness is a fantastic "wrong man" thriller, about a trombonist accused of murdering his new wife, who must retrace her footsteps and discover her hidden life in order to prove his innocence. Satan's Town is a racetrack film noir, in gritty black-and-white, with a gripping tension throughout and a final confrontation in a power station worthy of Kurosawa. Inn of the Floating Weeds is also a very nice noir––I wish these last two played on TMC's Noir Alley once in a while––they've screened The Bitter Stems from Argentina, after all––though maybe that didn't play as big as they'd hoped.

Also, Criterion is still sitting on the phenomenal Everything Goes Wrong, which should be on blu ray as well.

At one screening I heard Chris D. say he'd never seen a bad Seijun Suzuki movie. I almost shouted "Our Blood Will Not Forgive!" into the void there (another film where a 1080p transfer has appeared online)––but I think in general, he's right. The whole catalogue ought to be available.

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tenia
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#118 Post by tenia » Thu Feb 16, 2023 5:23 am

Story of a Prostitute also had a BD release in France, which IIRC isn't too far from Gate of Flesh in terms of PQ.
There's also a BD release for Tokyo Drifter, though with a not-uninterestingly-different HD master than the one used by Criterion.

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feihong
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#119 Post by feihong » Thu Feb 16, 2023 3:05 pm

tenia wrote:
Thu Feb 16, 2023 5:23 am
Story of a Prostitute also had a BD release in France, which IIRC isn't too far from Gate of Flesh in terms of PQ.
There's also a BD release for Tokyo Drifter, though with a not-uninterestingly-different HD master than the one used by Criterion.
I'm no expert at all, but when I compared the French blu ray of Story of a Prostitute to the HD version of the film on the Criterion Channel, there were substantial differences. The contrast on the French disc looked much thicker, the film looked much higher contrast, and the framing was zoomed in quite a bit. The Criterion print lined up in terms of framing with the screening I saw at UCLA––and the framing looks very deliberate, but the French disc's framing looks quite a bit too close, and it loses that feeling of deliberate framing. I don't know which is right. But the version on the Criterion Channel was much, much closer to the theatrical presentation I saw. I think the Criterion Channel version is 720p. But the framing on the French disc looked pretty strange to me, and my impression versus the screening I saw was that the image could have been much sharper, and more balanced in terms of contrast. I don't know if it's the difference between color and black and white, but the Gate of Flesh disc looked much more on-point to me, in terms of framing and sharp picture quality, color and contrast––and more aligned with the theatrical presentation I've seen of that film. But I also don't have real expertise here to judge the discs on a technical level, this is all just impressions after watching the two presentations, one after the other. I generally end up watching the Criterion Channel version of Story of a Prostitute when I watch the film, and the French disc of Gate of Flesh when I watch that movie, just because the qualities of the picture line up best with what I've seen theatrically.

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#120 Post by Rupert Pupkin » Sat Apr 15, 2023 8:03 pm

test of the UHD is at blu-ray.com
but I can read "Branded to Kill made its high-definition debut more than a decade ago with this release which was sourced from a master struck from a fine-grain positive. The Blu-ray is sourced from a brand new 4K master that was prepared after the film was restored in 4K from the original camera negative."

I had bought day one Tokyo Drifter and Branded To Kill on blu-ray; so this time the blu-ray will be an upgrade and downscaled from the new 4K restoration, that's it ?

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#121 Post by andyli » Sat Apr 15, 2023 8:07 pm

Rupert Pupkin wrote:
Sat Apr 15, 2023 8:03 pm
test of the UHD is at blu-ray.com
but I can read "Branded to Kill made its high-definition debut more than a decade ago with this release which was sourced from a master struck from a fine-grain positive. The Blu-ray is sourced from a brand new 4K master that was prepared after the film was restored in 4K from the original camera negative."

I had bought day one Tokyo Drifter and Branded To Kill on blu-ray; so this time the blu-ray will be an upgrade and downscaled from the new 4K restoration, that's it ?
I think by "the Blu-ray" they actually mean the 4K blu-ray. The reviewer did say "At the moment, I have only the 4K Blu-ray disc..."

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#122 Post by Rupert Pupkin » Sun Apr 16, 2023 12:45 am

"The Blu-Ray is sourced from a brand new 4K master"... so the reviewer is talking about the UHD disk, not the blu-ray disk ?
so, until there is no confirmation, the blu-ray of this UHD/Combo release will be exactly the same one as the "Branded To Kill" Blu-Ray I had bought years ago ?
Thing would be less confusing to call a UHD blu-ray a UHD disk, and a blu-ray a blu-ray.

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tenia
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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#123 Post by tenia » Sun Apr 16, 2023 6:32 am

It's not the first time, though, that it's hard to understand what Svet means technically.

In any case though :
* it's clear he only received the UHD ("At the moment, I have only the 4K Blu-ray disc, which features a brand new 4K restoration of the film.") so he can't be reviewing the BD content.
* it's clear now that Criterion upgrades are only including older BDs, so the Branded to Kill 4K restoration will only be accessible if you're able to playback UHD.

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#124 Post by NeoNical » Thu May 11, 2023 12:32 am

Can confirm that last post's statement. Popped in the 4K UHD last night and it looks phenomenal. The Blu-ray, however, is the older 2011 edition. Now I have two copies of the 2011 Blu-ray discs. The 4K is a very nice upgrade and I do watch the Blu-ray every year and never realized just how outdated the Blu-ray looks now that the 4K is out. The black halos that is bleeding around the edges of the characters and the very soft, grainy appearance of the fine-grain positive is all fixed in the 4K restoration that uses the original camera negative. The only issue is a brief frame skip in the shot where
SpoilerShow
Hanada kills his lover after she tries to lure him into bed
, which was also in the older Blu-ray. That small issue is clearly unremovable.

The LPCM Japanese mono on the 4K is quieter than the Blu-ray but offers better dynamics during the action scenes. Blu-ray's audio also shows some age as the sound comes off very harsh and screechy. A good scene to compare is the Nikkatsu logo that opens up the film.

Would recommend fans who are upgrading to wait for the 50% off sales. Unless if you're willing to pay more just for the restoration alone, it has always been a barebones release in terms of extras and may be harder to recommend as an upgrade over something like The Red Shoes in my opinion.

P.S.: Worth noting that my 4K disc had small scratches on one side of the disc which may have happened because of the 4K disc stacked on top of the Blu-ray. Of course, this may have been an issue with the processing factory since many customers (Outside of this particular release) have expressed the same concerns as well. Won't be asking for a replacement as I think the scratches won't quickly deteriorate the copy although I know I will be watching this film again in the near future (I've seen Branded to Kill more times than any other Criterion title).

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Re: 38-39 Branded to Kill & Tokyo Drifter

#125 Post by Michael Kerpan » Tue Jan 02, 2024 12:32 am

Finally tried to play the UHD -- it looked great -- until it got stuck around the 31 minute mark. Ironically, the BD also glitched almost at the same point. I tried playing these on my PC. No SGX so no UHD playing. And the BD didn't work either (no error message -- just nothing).

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