Does anyone know? If so, when?
Perkins...the Uncanny
"Zombies, man. Creep me out..."
No, never. Criterion is a U.S. company that only releases its discs on Region 1 NTSC. You'll need a Region-free player to view its DVD of Godzilla outside of Region 1.
shareThanks, Hobs!
shareBy the way, Perkins, I have the R2 version of the original film released in Britain, with a beautiful and unusual cover done in the style of traditional Japanese art. It's not Criterion, but it's about as good as the Classic Media release in the US from 2006. The only (minor) difference is that the subtitling is often a bit different from either US disc, which themselves have slightly different subtitles in many spots.
sharethat's the BFi release right?
Is it widescreen?
http://img295.imageshack.us/img295/2746/kellyitsaboutdattimexu4.jpg
Yes, it's the one from BFI.
Gojira/Godzilla was not filmed in widescreen. Its correct aspect ratio is 1.37:1, or the so-called "standard" screen size. So of course no DVD will be widescreen.
cheers for that,so the bfi and criterion contain the same transfer?
http://img295.imageshack.us/img295/2746/kellyitsaboutdattimexu4.jpg
Well, they -- and the other releases of Gojira such as Classic Media's in the States back in 2006 -- contain the same film, that is, the complete original movie, in its "full screen" 1.37:1 aspect ratio, unedited and as released in 1954. No differences there.
But they don't have the same transfer, that is, they didn't all use the same print of the film to make their copies. The movie, itself, is exactly the same, but the physical print used by each company for its transfer is a different one, though of course they obviously all ultimately come from the same source print.
Also, Criterion always uses the print closest to the original camera negative it can obtain, and cleans it up more than other companies do their prints, so its sound and image are better than any of the others'. But while the difference in quality is noticeable, the other releases are perfectly good.
Finally, the subtitles are a bit different on all the prints I've seen. I have four different copies of the film from four companies: the BFI R2 UK disc, plus three R1's from US companies -- Criterion, Classic Media, and an outfit called Video Daikaiju that specializes in Japanese films. The subtitles for each are slightly different in places. Criterion claims to have the best translation, and since I don't speak Japanese I have to take their word for it.
One other note: The Criterion and Classic Media releases each contains the "Americanized" (really the international) version of the film, Godzilla, King of the Monsters. The others (including BFI) don't include that version. The Criterion disc of GKOTM is superior to Classic Media's in that they have the closing credits, cut from prints for decades, fully and accurately restored; CM's disc doesn't quite have the full credits, nor correctly shown.
Hope all this helps.