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Licensor Information
Toho Co.
Directed by: Masaki Kobayashi
Featuring: Michiyo Aratama, Misako Watanabe, Rentaro Mikuni, Tatsuya Nakadai, Keiko Kishi, Jun Hamamura, Katsuo Nakamura, Tetsuro Tanba, Takashi Shimura, Kanemon Nakamura, Noboru Nakaya, Osamu Takizawa, Haruko Sugimura
After more than a decade of sober political dramas and socially minded period pieces, the great Japanese director Masaki Kobayashi shifted gears dramatically for this rapturously stylized quartet of ghost stories. Featuring colorfully surreal sets and luminous cinematography, these haunting tales of demonic comeuppance and spiritual trials, adapted from writer Lafcadio Hearn’s collections of Japanese folklore, are existentially frightening and meticulously crafted. This version of Kwaidan is the original three-hour cut, never before released in the United States.
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Release Information:
Technical Specifications
Format:
DVD
Discs:
DVD-9 (2 Discs)
Total: 2 Discs
Regions:
1 (DVD)
Aspect Ratio:
2.35:1
Audio Options:
Japanese Dolby Digital Mono 1.0
Resolution:
480p/29.97
Supplements
Types of Supplements Included: Audio Commentary, Interview, Theatrical Trailer, Insert
- New audio commentary by film historian Stephen Prince
- Interview with Masaki Kobayashi from 1993, conducted by filmmaker Masahiro Shinoda
- New interview with assistant director Kiyoshi Ogasawara
- New piece about author Lafcadio Hearn, on whose versions of Japanese folktales Kwaidan is based
- Trailers
- Insert featuring an essay by critic Geoffrey O'Brien
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Film
Picture
Audio
Supplements
Artwork
Release Credits
Producer: Curtis Tsui
Artwork: Eric Skillman
Release Notes on Restoration
Kwaidan
Kwaidan is presented in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1. Black bars at the top and bottom of the screen are normal for this format. This new digital transfer of the original full-length version of the film was created in 2K resolution on a Scanity film scanner from the original 35mm camera negative and a 35mm interpositive. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris, scratches, splices, and warps were manually removed using MTI's DRS, while Digital Vision's Phoenix was used for small dirt, grain, noise management, jitter, and flicker.
The complete monaural soundtrack for this 183-minute version was assembled from a variety of archival sources by Toho Co., Ltd., and remastered at 24-bit. Further restoration was done by the Criterion Collection using Pro Tools HD and iZotope RX 4
The complete monaural soundtrack for this 183-minute version was assembled from a variety of archival sources by Toho Co., Ltd., and remastered at 24-bit. Further restoration was done by the Criterion Collection using Pro Tools HD and iZotope RX 4