![]() ![]() Thanks to dubbing (and then a voice over from the young Daigoro) the plot is adjusted as needed but the last half follows closely to the rest of the second film. It would have been easy to just make a mess out of this but I’m actually rather impressed with what was constructed here: we actually do get a fairly coherent film. It takes most of its story from the second film, I assume because it’s the bloodier one of the two. The film actually contains very little from the first film, really only taking the origin story of Itto, and ignoring pretty much the rest of the plot. The most impressive inclusion (as I thought the rights were tied up with other entities) is the inclusion of the English language version of the first and second film, Shogun Assassin. Outside of the theatrical trailers that accompany their respective films over the first two discs, the bulk of the set’s special features are found on the third dual-layer disc. They could be better, and maybe spreading the films over three discs instead of two would have helped, but a lot have work has still gone into the films and the work has still paid off.Ĭriterion puts together a rather cool special edition for the series that I think should make a lot of fans fairly giddy, especially since it appears to be the most complete and comprehensive version that exists. In general the presentations and encodes are nice. The snow is bright but it doesn’t impede the darker objects in the foreground. Contrast is nice on the other hand, and this is best shown in the final battle scene of the last film, which takes place in the snow. Compression could probably also be a bit better, though it certainly isn’t the horror show that was seen on some of Criterion’s releases from a couple of years ago (like My Own Private Idaho) and grain looks nice most of the time, though it can look a bit pixilated in places. Black levels are okay but can come off a little muddy at times. Colours lean a bit on the warm side and saturation feels a bit weak, but this admittedly could be intentional. The one aspect that threw me were the colours and the black levels. The restoration work has been very good and though a few minor marks remain they barely register and I didn’t note any heavy damage that detracted from the presentation. Though all of the films may be open to some improvement the level of quality is at least consistent, no large disparities between them at least. All six films have been given new 2K restorations and were scanned from the original 35mm negatives. The set includes the films Sword of Vengeance, Baby Cart at the River Styx, Baby Cart to Hades, Baby Cart in Peril, Baby Cart in the Land of Demons, and White Heaven in Hell. The Criterion Collection gathers together all six Lone Wolf and Cub films into a new three-disc Blu-ray box set, presenting all of the films in their original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 and spread evenly across the first two dual-layer discs, three films on each disc (the third disc is devoted entirely to special features).
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