Spartacus (Blu-ray) [1960]

This 55th anniversary restoration is streets ahead of the earlier Blu Ray. From the opening credits on the images are far superior is colour and quality. My only quibble is that they used 35mm negatives and not the 70mm the film was shot in (even the restoration expert gets this wrong saying it was shot in 35mm Technirama. He should have watched the credits closer. Super Technirama 70) so it is not quite up to the superb Blu Ray restoration of King of Kings which was able to use 70mm sources. 70mm is a bigger frame than 35 and gives a clearer image. But if you've not seen this movie before, other than those terrible scan and pan versions they used to show on TV you don't know what you've been missing! A wonderful human story of the search for freedom wrapped in the glorious clothing of a Roman epic, one that only mentions religion in passing. Superb performances, especially from Charles Laughton, Peter Ustinov, and Laurence Olivier, a literate and intelligent script, and great battle scenes.

An epic film, very well made and lovingly restored. Faultless transfer to Blu Ray which results in amazing colour rendition. You get everything here - great acting all round, beautifully filmed, excellent location photography and the most impressive battle sequences ever filmed. Thousands of extras were used to create an unforgettable final battle - no CGI used back in 1960. Finally you get Stanley Kubrick directing.

A noticeable improvement over the previous blu ray release but still not perfect. Most of the picture enhacements in this very latest blu ray upgraded movie are good. But again when there are close up scenes with Jean Simons the picture becomes a little blurred like it was on the previous blu ray release. Just a minor flaw really but I am still glad I purchased it as I love the movie so much.

This version of the 1960 production directed by the American director Stanley Kubrick, on a single region free 50gb Blu-ray disc finally gives a restoration of this film that it deserves using the cinema re-release’s from 1968 running time of 197 minutes which is restored using large format 35 mm original film elements with the 12 minutes missing from the DVD version released in 2000 which had a running time of 186 minutes.Comparing this to the DVD version to the Blu-ray even the opening credits are better and from the first scene the improvements in sound and picture are very evident with the flesh tones more convincing and the red of the Roman soldier’s capes are now popping from the screen there is also a wider range of blacks giving a greater sense of depth to the picture and the audio track reveals details in the music soundtrack and the sound effects such as the thud of the wooden swords and clang of the metal ones while the Gladiator’s train.This Blu-ray is in 1080p resolution using the codec MPEG 4 AVC in aspect ratio 2.22.1 the Original aspect ratio was 2.35; the original cinema version which was in Mono this Blu-ray’s audio track has been up-graded to DTS-HD master audio 5.1 48 kHz 24 bit there are also 14 sets of subtitles which include the following:- English for the hard of hearing, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Arabic, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Hindi, Icelandic, Norwegian, and Swedish.There are also soundtracks in French: DTS 5.1, German: DTS 5.1, Italian: DTS 5.1 and Spanish: DTS 5.1 this Blu-ray came with a UV digital copy (expired) and a Digital copy which is also (expired)The Ensemble cast which includes Kirk Douglas in the title role and the ever excellent Peter Ustinov as the owner of Gladiator school Batiatus and Laurence Olivier as Crassus being of note.

pleased with this

This is a classic film given a new leases of life in this 2015 restoration into high definition. Picture quality is excellent. The film has a wonderful screenplay by Dalton Trumbo who had just emerged from years of being black-listed by the McCarthy witch-hunt crew. The excellent script attracted top class actors such as Charles Laughton, Laurence Olivier, Peter Ustinov and Jean Simmons all of whom relish their parts. Directed by the brilliant Stanley Kubrick the end result is outstanding. An especially interesting extra feature is an interview with the star Kirk Douglas who is 99 years old. He gives a very interesting take on the making of the film of which he was executive producer. Of course, he can't resist ending the interview with the wholly appropriate quote: "I am Spartacus!".

I've owned three versions of this and this edition is certainly the best of them, a quite stunning restoration. My only gripe is the scene access is not as comprehensive as it should be and the extras are far less than the Criterion release, which until this restored disc was the definitive film version. I'll be keeping the Criterion edition that has served me so well for the extras but this disc is something to behold.

Film collection of old films blue ray lasts longer.