クライテリオン4Kレビュー – 天国と地獄 (1963) | 黒澤明監督の傑作が復元

クライテリオン4Kレビュー – 天国と地獄 (1963) | 黒澤明監督の傑作が復元

Hey there, welcome to the channel. My name is James and here at 20th and 21st Movies, we are about all things cinema. All right, I am waiting on my son to wrap up his basketball training and workout. And in the meantime, I thought I’d come on here and share my thoughts on a recent release from the Criterion Collection on 4K Ultra HD. This is a title that is another item I’m checking off my Criterion 4K wish list. This is a title I’ve long long waited to see get a 4K release and it is Akira Kurasawa’s 1963 film High and Low starring Tashiro Muffune. This is from 1963. It is now out on 4K Ultra HD and I cannot wait to share with you what I think about this title and how it compares to the Blu-ray that came out a number of years ago. So, this new 4K is based off of a new 4K digital restoration. This old Blu-ray was based off of a highdefinition digital transfer. So, we’ll talk about how the picture quality compares between the two. We’ll talk about the movie, the supplements, and as a package overall is high and low. this classic crime drama, police procedural film. Is this family drama, crime drama, police procedural thriller of a film? Is it worth picking up on 4K Ultra HD in an upcoming sale? Let’s talk about it. [Music] [Music] All right, we’re talking about High and Low, the 1963 classic film from director Akira Kirasawa, Japanese director, one of the great filmmakers of all time. Of course, this is the same director that gave us Seven Samurai, Rashiman, Kagamusha, Yajimbo, Sanjurro, Akiru, so many amazing films. And of all those films, this one here stands as my favorite. I am just just so happy through the moon happy through the moon happy that Criterion has released this on 4K Ultra HD. So, we’ll talk about it. Let me go ahead and pull up my first slide here. This is High and Low Criterion 4K Ultra HD review. And I I am just so beyond thrilled to finally have this in my possession. This is the 1963 crime classic. It blends corporate drama, police procedural and social commentary and it remains one of Kiraasawa’s towering achievements. So, let me read the back of the case, a summary on the back of the case to give you just a little bit of a snippet of what this film is about. You have Tashira Muffune. He is unforgettable as King Gondo. He’s a wealthy industrialist. He’s an executive of a shoe company called National Shoe Company, whose family becomes the target of a cold-blooded kidnapper in High and Low, the highly influential domestic drama and police procedural from director Akira Kiraasawa. Adapting Ed McBain’s detective novel King’s Ransom, Kiraasawa moves effortlessly from compelling race against time thriller to exacting social commentary, creating a diabolical triotus on class and contemporary Japanese society. Fantastic. That’s a very nice summation of what this film’s about. This film comes in at 143 minutes, so two hours and 23 minutes. It’s in black and white with just a little glimpse of color which will come at a very very fascinating moment in this film that I will not spoil. But this is an absolutely extraordinary film that is so rich and so deep and it Kiraasawa creates a beautiful world in 1960s Tokyo, Japan of this story of King Gondo who’s this executive of this shoe company. He gets into a power struggle with other directors of the shoe company and he basically tries to take over the company. But as he tries to take over the company, this kidnapping occurs which then sends him and his family through this spiral working with the police being on the phone with a kidnapper trying to figure out how to get the kidnapped child back home. Just an absolutely extraordinary film. and then so much more beyond that that I will not spoil. But this is a film that has incredible themes and a story to it. You have morality under pressure. So you see at the top right you’ll see a Toshiro Mafune as King Gondo. He’s got these shoes here. This is at the very beginning of the film as he’s meeting with these different executives who are trying to convince him to throw his votes in play with them at the upcoming board meeting to take over the company. But unfortunately, the direction they want to take the company is not the direction he wants to take the company. So they so he ends up making them mad. They storm out, but he has his own plan to buy up enough shares to take over the business himself. So that’s a very interesting dynamic at the very beginning of the film, but then shortly thereafter, you get into this whole piece around the kidnapping, which is so fascinating. At the very top left, you’ll have the two boys. One of the boys is King Gondo’s son. The other boy is the son of of King Gondo Chauffeur. And so one of these children gets kidnapped which leads you down this incredible fascinating story and race against time. And then you’ll see at the bottom left the police listening to the to one of the calls and the kidnapper. And then the bottom right is just showing how Kiraasawa frames these different scenes and really is showing the internal struggle that King Gondo is going through between deciding whether or not to pay the ransom, being stubborn about it, trying to figure out what to do. And the way that Kiraasawa frames the scenes is he’ll have the other actors in one corner and King Gondo isolated over in another corner. or you’ll have actors here and here in King Gondo isolated in the back in the back to himself. He just frames this story up so beautifully just showing the weight of the decision that King Gondo has to make with regards to whether or not to pay the ransom and free this child. So you have morality under pressure, you have a class divide, high versus low. You have King Gondo high. You have the chauffeur being kind of on the low end of things trying to convince King Gondo to pay the ransom to get his son released. So you have that dynamic going on. Wonderful police procedural and corporate drama which I think is just fantastic. So much richness in this story with the the corporate drama of the shoe company and how they’re trying to trying to ring out as much profit as possible, but King Gondo wants to go about it a different way. And then you have the police procedural. Beautiful stuff. And then Tashi Muffune as a torren businessman. So fantastic stuff with the themes and the story. And then you have Kiraasawa and genre. Here we’re talking about how Kiraasawa blends noir, police procedural, and human drama all together in this incredible story. He anticipates modern police thrillers. This movie, High and Low, has influenced so many modern police thrillers and so many films that have come afterwards in terms of the police procedural aspects of it, the whole ransom aspect of the story. Just absolutely fantastic stuff that we’ll get into in just a second. And then he has a very sharp lens on class disparity, the halves and the half knots. This story high and low is very much about showing that distinction and disparity between the halves at the top of society in Japan and the people on the on the lower end of things from a socioeconomic standpoint. And I think that this film does a beautiful job of laying out those distinctions. At the bottom there, you’ll see the police procedural aspects where they’re meeting and trying to figure out how to find a kidnapper and trying to callull every every clue that they can and every lead that they can. So, that is so interesting how they go about their detective work. And then of course I would be remiss if I did not include the picture of my dog Shiloh there at the bottom left there as I just got the Amazon delivery of my 4K of High and Low. Just had to show it to him as I was getting ready to feed him dinner. So had to throw that in there. And then of course High and Low’s lasting influence. This film High and Low has influenced so many different films throughout the years. It’s inspired police procedurals like from David Fincher and Bong Junho like the rich family on the hill in par in in Parasite and then the poor family kind of on the lower end of things. a similar dynamic that is played out in Parasite as a mirror and an homage to High and Low. And you have several other areas that have been influenced um including the prison sequence in the Batman in the Batman film from 2022. You have Spike Lee’s reinterpretation, Highest to Lowest, starring Denzel Washington, now out on Apple TV Plus. That is a remake of this film. So Spike Lee put his spin on it. I have not seen it yet, but let me know in the comments section if you’ve seen Highest and Lowest and what you think about it. But yeah, this is High and Lows: Lasting Influence, one of the great films of all time now available on 4K Ultra HD. So I love this film. It’s one of my favorites from Kiraasawa. It is my favorite Kiraasawa film. And if you if you have not seen this and you like Akira Kiraasawa’s film making style, this is one to check out. Now, this is a film that is a departure from his samurai films. So, it’s very different than Seven Samurai and some some of his other films that he’s made. This is a film that takes place in modernday Japan. modern day as of this time is now over 60 years old, but this takes place in modern day Japan versus the time of the samuris back in ancient uh Japan. So, little bit different genre and vibe, but absolutely extraordinary film. So, let’s talk about how this film looks on the 4K format, and then I’ll talk about how it compares to the Blu-ray. And in short, folks, this 4K picture of high and low looks absolutely fantastic. I was so incredibly pleased when I popped the 4K in the player because what I did is the night before or two nights before I got the 4K, I rewatched this Blu-ray and just fell in love with this film all over again. So, I watched it on Blu-ray and then when I got it on 4K, I popped it in the player to just do a side byside. I looked at it on Blu-ray a little bit more, then I popped in the 4K to see if I could immediately tell a difference. And the long and short of it is I could immediately tell the difference. I mean, not that the Blu-ray is bad in any way. The Blu-ray is fine. It’s a perfectly fine picture, but in comparison to the 4K, I am happy to report that based on this new 4K digital restoration, this is a this is a Blu-ray that came out like a number of years ago, I think at least a decade ago. And this new 4K digital restoration, I don’t want I don’t want to say it blows the Blu-ray out the water, but it it is clearly a better picture over the Blu-ray. It’s one of those deals where sometimes I do these Blu-ray and 4K comparisons and there’s not a huge step up from the Blu-ray to the 4K. Oftent times the Blu-ray stands up very well to the 4K. This is one of those cases where the Blu-ray is a nice Blu-ray, but the 4K is just so much richer in terms of detail, depth, clarity. It’s a cleaner image, slightly more stable image. Just the way it handles the blacks and the whites, the grayscale. Every aspect of picture quality is just handled more beautifully and elegantly with this 4K. It’s just a smoother, bolder, clearer image. Overall, it it just looks absolutely fantastic. It handles the blacks and whites and the light levels excellently. One thing I noticed on the Blu-ray is while the picture looks good, sometimes the whites are a bit blown out, it is a slightly lighter image. So, this 4K has that quality of a more natural looking image than the Blu-ray in my opinion. Um, it just it just has more detail, more depth, more clarity. When you add all those elements together, you just have a much more robust and convincing image overall that stands head and shoulders over the Blu-ray, which was my expectation because it is a new 4K restoration versus an older Blu-ray that was based off of a highdefinition transfer. So, from a picture quality standpoint, I was through the moon pleased when I started watching this on 4K. It is an incredibly nice and appreciable upgrade and step up above the above the Blu-ray in picture quality. Um, the audio I believe is about the same. Actually, let’s see here. From an audio standpoint, you had a DTS HD Master Audio on the Blu-ray. And here you have the uh the same DTS HD Master Audio soundtrack. I think the audio is the same between the two. So, the big upgrade is the blue is the 4K. There is no Dolby Vision. There is no HDR on this, but I don’t think it missed it at all. I mean, HDR might have improved the black levels a little bit. Maybe gave it a little bit more contrast, but overall, I just think that this 4K handles the contrast levels, the grayscale, the the blacks and the whites, and all the gradients uh along that whole grayscale so well. just handles this black and white picture and film so beautifully. It looks incredible and I was very happy. It’s one of those deals where sometimes I pop in a 4K and I find myself slightly disappointed that I’m not seeing as much of a difference as I would have hoped. That wasn’t the case here. I got everything I could have hoped for off of this 4K and I was I was very pleased. So, from a picture quality, it sounds great. I mean, it looks great. It sounds great from the audio standpoint. The same audio as the as the original Blu-ray. And then when you crack open the case, you’ll see here you have your you have your excuse me, you have your 4K right here, your Blu-ray here. You have your booklet, which is the same booklet. It’s a staple booklet that you had before. And of course, when you look on the inside of the case, you’ll see the paneling on the wall here, which is a nice touch. You have a nice staple booklet here, high and low. This is Tashir Muffune. And then and then this other gentleman here is a director who is sort of his right hand at National Shoe. But you have here you have a couple of essays in here which are fantastic. You have Tatsuya Nakadai who is the police the the one of the police chiefs. Tatsuya Nakadai played the lead in The Human Condition which is available on Blu-ray from the Criterion Collection. So definitely check that out. It’s basically three it’s it’s a huge film split into three parts and it’s like nine and a half hours. You have here Jeffrey O’Brien’s Between Heaven and Hell essay. Fantastic essay. And then you have another fantastic essay on the set of High and Low here, which is great. And then you have toward the back here you have about the master which I will read. And of course you see you see a cura there. But on about the master it says high and low is presented in the aspect ratio of 239 to1 on the 4K Ultra HD disc and 235 on the Blu-ray. The new 4K restoration presented in the on the 4K Ultra HD disc was created from the 35mm original camera negative by Tokyo Lab Limited. The 4.0 surround soundtrack was remastered was remastered from a 35mm soundtrack positive disc mastering next spec. I think it says that my contacts are acting funny on me. But yeah, fantastic. This is a nice nice staple booklet. Of course, on the disc on the on the 4K and the Blu-ray, you have the audio commentary, which is fantastic audio commentary by Aira Curasawa scholar Steven Prince. And then on the Blu-ray, you have the special features with along with the film. And one of the features is the documentary on the making of High and Low created as part of the to the Toho Masterwork series. Akira Kiraasawa. It is wonderful to create. Then you have interviews with actors Toshiro Mafune and Tatsuya or Suto Tommo Yamakazi. And then you have trailers and a teaser. And then of course the essays that I mentioned. This is look at the front and the back of the case, the inside. So the interior looks very similar to the old Blu-ray with the exception that of course the old Blu-ray just had just the Blu-ray. uh but the same stapled booklet. But this 4K is absolutely wonderful. I am super super happy to have this upgrade of spy number 24 in the Criterion collection in my library and a Kira Rasawa’s High and Low is one of my favorites from him. It’s actually my favorite Akira Kirasawa film. But let me know in the comments section below what do you think about this film High and Low. Have you seen it? What are some of your favorite films from Akira Rasawa? Is High and Low among your favorites? Let me know that in the comments section below. And as always, thanks for watching. We’ll look forward to seeing you next time at the movies. And we’ll see. I guess he’ll be coming out here probably in about 10 minutes or so. But yeah, hope you have a great one and we’ll talk to you soon. Peace.

Akira Kurosawa’s High and Low (1963) arrives in a brand-new Criterion 4K UHD edition, and it has never looked better. This taut crime thriller starring Toshiro Mifune blends corporate drama, police procedural, and social commentary into one of Kurosawa’s greatest achievements.

In this review, I cover:
• Picture and audio quality in the new 4K UHD restoration
• Supplements and special features included by Criterion
• The film’s major themes of morality, class struggle, and justice
• How High and Low influenced later filmmakers like Bong Joon Ho, David Fincher, and Spike Lee

This is one of the most influential crime films ever made, and Criterion’s 4K release is the perfect way to experience it.

What are your thoughts on High and Low? Drop them in the comments — and let’s talk Kurosawa.

▶️ Related Reviews:
• Rashomon (Criterion Spotlight)
• Thief Criterion 4K Review
• Sunset Boulevard

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