NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were ripped directly from the Blu-ray disc.

ADDITION: Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' Blu-ray - March 2012: This film drains me - and I feel doubly exhausted in MoC's new glorious 1080P transfer. I'm convinced that The Gospel According to Matthew (Pasolini's correctly translated title) can't look any better than this. The dual-layering has extracted every important facet of the film to the new format medium. The bitrate is extremely high and supports the film's thickness and heavy texture. Contrast is well-balanced to present a high level of detail. After all the SD version I can safely say that, comparatively, this MoC Blu-ray is of stunningly beautiful quality. Grain is present, there is slightly more information in the frame, the aspect ratio is tight to the original 1.85:1, damage seems almost non-existent - overall it is far beyond my expectations. I was blown away.

The music of Gospel is an important part of the film experience and the Masters of Cinema group have via an authentic linear PCM 2.0 channel track at 1536 kbps. This uncompressed transfer handles the impacting music from "Sometimes I feel like a motherless child" to J.S. Bach's Matthäus Passion, "Concerto for violin in E major (BWV 1042)" and Blind Willie Johnson's "Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground". Surprisingly this is the first digital edition with optional English subtitles (all other were burnt-in or didn't offer English translation). The Blu-ray disc is coded for region 'B' - which pains us all (that it is NOT region FREE) - none more than Nick Wrigley.

Masters of Cinema have added some great supplements. We get the 5-minute original Italian theatrical trailer for the feature and the 53-minute long Sopralluoghi in Palestina [Scouting in Palestine], Pasolini’s 1965 film on the surveying of locations for The Gospel According to Matthew. There is a 1963 newsreel extract on The Gospel According to Matthew and Sopralluoghi in Palestina and 3-minutes of Outtakes from the original Sopralluoghi in Palestina rushes. Also included in the package is a stacked 36-page booklet featuring a 1963 letter by Pasolini to Lucio S. Caruso of the Catholic Pro Civitate Christiana; a 2012-updated essay on the film by critic Pasquale Iannone; excerpts from a 1969 interview with Pasolini by Oswald Stack, on The Gospel According to Matthew and Sopralluoghi in Palestina; an excerpt from the Book of Matthew; and rare archival imagery.

The Image Entertainment has compressed the aspect ratio so that everyone looks squished. There is visible print damage in spots on the Out Of Print Image Entertainment disc. We can now verify some issues of aspect ratio and cropping while looking at the Water Bearer print. The Tartan disc has some visible digital manipulation and has taken some grain from the original image. It also has some contrast boosting. There are no excessive scratches or dirt on either the Tartan or Water Bearer print. Although hazy at times, the quality of both are still much better than the  'Out of Print' version. There is no longer a reason to pay an arm and a leg on EBay for the Image Disc in Region 1 now that Water Bearer have put this out.

The Tartan is softer and cropped, so although I am unhappy with the current state of this film on DVD I will go with the Tartan for strictly the clearity of the image for now. the Water Bearer has a nice documentary on Pasolini. The subs on the Water Bearer are very poor and look to be duplicates of the Image release probably meaning they used the same print. This is a tough call... but I am glad I own both Tartan and Water Bearer ( for the doc).    

- Gary W. Tooze