Region 4 Winners and Losers

    This trilogy was released in DVD in Region 2 by Artificial Eye/MkII Editions in 2001 and this was, until recently, the clear and obvious preference over Region 4, both for source and transfer quality and for the very comprehensive extras package Region 2 received. However after much ado, the trilogy has now finally been released by Miramax in Region 1, and the decision as to which is now the better release is less clear-cut. Region 1 benefits from not only (mostly) the same extras as Region 2, but some exciting new ones including additional interviews and a commentary track. However weighed against this is differences in the quality of the transfers, plus Region 1 being in NTSC. Let's start by looking at extras, first the Region 2 release and then highlighting the new Region 1 extras.

In comparison to Region 2, the Region 4 release misses out on:

• A decent transfer effort direct from film,
• 1.78:1 16x9 enhanced transfer (note that the Region 2 aspect ratio is not 1.85:1, as some UK reviews indicate),
• Dolby Digital 5.1 audio,
• Discrete English subtitle stream (not burned on to the image),
• Theatrical trailers for Blue, White and Red,
• Featurette: "Krzysztof Kieslowski's Master class", a superb 10 minute excerpt from an interview with the director at the editing table, discussing a few scene from the film
• Featurette: "Making of White" (18 minutes/8 segments), not narrated, but just a fly-on-the-wall look behind the scenes during filming
• Interview segments (8):  Julie Delpy, discussing scenes from the film (including her interpretation of the final scene)
• Interview segments (2): producer Marin Karmitz, and
• Isolated music score extracts (3), played over the main menu screen.

In comparison to Region 1, the Region 4 release misses out on:

• all of the above, except note that the Region 1 audio is Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround encoded - not 5.1 - and Region 1 also misses out on the isolated music score extracts
• Audio Commentary by Annette Insdorf (refer below)
• Featurette: "A look at White" (7:27), an interesting analysis and discussion of the film by film critics
• Featurette: "Discussion of K's later years" (21:30), principally Annette Insdorf discussing the context of K's development as a film-maker
• Featurette: "Discussion on working with K" (12:35), as told by Juliette Binoche, Julie Delpy and others
• Featurette: "Discussion on K with Julie Delpy" (5:36), this one just more of the same and largely already seen in the previous featurettes
• Featurette: "K's Student Films: Trolley (5:29), The Face (6:05) and The Office (5:48)". The first and last of these are two of K's earliest known works, dating back to 1967. The middle one, from my research, isn't even credited as a K film at all, so goodness knows where this one was dredged up from!  The first short film is interesting, the second one I won't comment on and the last one is fairly bland. The inclusion of these short films as extras really is a tease. Whilst they are interesting enough to give a glimpse of the early period (very very early period!) K, it is incongruous to put these student films on the same disc up against the masterpiece of White. They are a very poor choice for extras indeed, when any of K's numerous other slightly later documentaries or short films would have been both more preferable and more representative of his early work.
• Director's filmography
• Trailer for Heaven

    Annette Insdorf had nothing at all to do with the making of the films, but was a personal language translator for and close friend of Kieslowski for many years and so had exclusive access to the recluse director for interviews over a prolonged period of time. Insdorf is a scholar, film critic and writer, being the author of the book "Double Lives and Second Chances: The Cinema of Krzysztof Kieslowski", which is highly recommended. The audio commentary is authoritative, well-planned, enlightening and is virtually non-stop. It provides some great insight into the development of the story and K's layering of imagery.

    OK, so Region 1 is the clear winner in terms of extras; it gets (virtually) all of the Region 2 goodies, plus much more. But what about transfer qualities? Well, it's not an easy choice, but on balance I would say that Region 2 is the preferred transfer of the film. It benefits form superior PAL video resolution, full 5.1 audio specs and, arguably, more faithful colouring (albeit with high contrast). There is no denying that new Region 1 print is more warmer and more richly saturated, but this has the unintended consequence that skin tones are not balanced and many colours are just too saturated in quite a few scenes. In comparison, the Region 2 colouring may be said to be more reserved and even a bit washed, yes, but it remains in my opinion more faithful. Check out DVDCompare's great comparison page here, and note the screen captures. Finally, the subtitle stream on the Region 1 transfer is just too big and too high up on the frame, which I find extremely annoying in comparison to the well placed Region 2 subtitle stream (OK, call me picky).

    This is a difficult choice and the decision will be one of personal preference, but I am going to call this a Region 2 winner. Despite the additional extras it misses out on, I feel the extras package on Region 2 still provides enough of an insight into the film that the missed extras and commentary only provide incrementally greater insight, and this is outweighed by superior video and audio transfers. If you are obsessed about this film enough like me to justify investing in it more than once, then my recommendation is buy Region 2 for the film transfer and Region 1 for the extras. Indeed, that's the order in which these two discs now appear at the top of my top 10 DVDs list.