The Lady from Shanghai arrives on 4K as part of Sony’s 100th Anniversary celebration of Columbia Pictures.
The Production: 4.5/5
Orson Welles’ 1947 film noir The Lady from Shanghai is a very confusing film, its history almost as confusing. Originally, Columbia Pictures head Harry Cohn snagged the film rights to pulp novel If I Die Before I Wake from producer William Castle (given an Associate Producer credit in exchange) on the request from Orson Welles, who needed a $55,000 cash advance to get his costumes for a musical stage production of Around the World in 80 Days out of hock. According to legend, Welles had never even read the book at that point, and began adapting the novel, retitling his screenplay as The Lady from Shanghai, rewriting the script even after shooting began. Harry Cohn hated Welles’ initial rough cut (clocking in at 155 minutes), sparking numerous reshoots and editing (many of the reshoots were closeups that Welles initially refused to include), delaying the release over a year. The final film, clocking in at a mere 87 minutes, was a box office disappointment, gathering respect over the years with six critics on BFI’s 2012 Sight & Sound poll listing it as one of the top ten movies ever made (it officially ranked 283) and was added to the Academy Film Archive in 2000.
Home Theater Forum’s Mychal Bowden reviewed the 2023 Kino Blu-ray release, which can be read here.
Video: 5/5
3D Rating: NA
The Lady from Shanghai has been released on Blu-ray at least three times previously, all taken from the same 1080p HD master. Sony has now scanned the original camera negative in 4K (per the studio’s press release) as the source for this 2160p HEVC encode, including both Dolby Vision and HDR10 high dynamic range. As good as those previous HD releases were (based on current HD streaming versions since no Blu-ray disc is included in this release), this new 4K scan is a vast improvement. Nearly all evidence of dirt specks and scratches are non-existent here, while maintaining a healthy and natural level of film grain. Fine detail is excellent, with HDR assisting with additional details in black fabrics such as the creases in the ribbon of a fedora. Charles Lawton Jr.’s black and white cinematography has never looked better.
Audio: 5/5
The DTS-HD MA 2.0 mono soundtrack has exceptional clarity, free of distortion, crackling, popping, and hissing as well as surface noise.
Special Features: 3/5
This release carries over the two main special features from Sony’s previous DVD releases.
Audio Commentary by Filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich
A Conversation with Peter Bogdanovich (upscaled 1080p; 20:52)
Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 1:49)
Digital Copy: A Movies Anywhere code is included on an insert to redeem a 4K digital copy. Below is my report card for digital redemptions for this release at the time of this review:
Movies Anywhere: 4K HDR10, no special features.
Apple TV: 4K Dolby Vision, no special features
Fandango at Home: 1080p HDX, no special features (currently unavailable in 4K)
Prime Video: 1080p HD, no special features (4K is available as a separate purchase)
Overall: 4.5/5
Sony’s new 4K release of The Lady from Shanghai is the best this film has ever or likely will ever look. If you own the Kino Blu-ray release from last year, you may want to hold on to that for the additional audio commentary tracks and bonus features.
Todd Erwin has been a reviewer at Home Theater Forum since 2008. His love of movies began as a young child, first showing Super 8 movies in his backyard during the summer to friends and neighbors at age 10. He also received his first movie camera that year, a hand-crank Wollensak 8mm with three fixed lenses. In 1980, he graduated to "talkies" with his award-winning short The Ape-Man, followed by the cult favorite The Adventures of Terrific Man two years later. Other films include Myth or Fact: The Talbert Terror and Warren's Revenge (which is currently being restored). In addition to movie reviews, Todd has written many articles for Home Theater Forum centering mostly on streaming as well as an occasional hardware review, is the host of his own video podcast Streaming News & Views on YouTube and is a frequent guest on the Home Theater United podcast.
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