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

ADDITION: Kino Blu-ray (June 2024): Kino have transferred another three films for their nineteenth edition of Film Noir: The Dark Side of Cinema series to three, single-layered, Blu-rays. This has 1950's No Man of Her Own and Dark City as well as Beware, My Lovely from 1952. They are cited as being from a "New HD Masters by Paramount Pictures – All from 4K Scans". We reviewed the 2012 Olive DVD of No Man of Her Own, HERE and compared it to the 2022 Imprint Blu-ray (in their Essential Noir Collection #3) HERE. We also compared the Dark City, 2010 Olive DVD and 2012 Blu-ray HERE and have compared some captures for both films below. No Man of Her Own looks superior to the Olive release from over a decade ago. This 1080P has more information in the frame (notably side and bottom edges.) It's really not much of a comparisons as the Kino outdoes the Olive handily - with contrast balance being a key to the improvement. Also showing more information in the 1.37:1 frame is Dark City that is, appropriately darker. It exports a shade of depth and the texture is more consistent. It still has more than average speckles but I judge it to be the better HD presentation. I suspect that the reason Beware, My Lovely has not even had a DVD release until now is that the elements are in imperfect condition. It's not that bad a few spots with damage (se samples below), muddy contrast and softness - that look inherent. It's fully watchable but could do with a film-level restoration. Nonetheless I was thrilled to finally have it on physical disc.      

NOTE: We have added 146 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Kino uses DTS-HD Master dual-mono tracks (24-bit) in the original English language for all three films. There is the anticipated violence that come with the cycle; guns, a train crash, police raid etc.) but nothing extraneous in terms of bass response.  The score for No Man Of Her Own was by Hugo Friedhofer (Plunder of the Sun, One-Eyed Jacks Two Flags West, Man in the Attic, Ace in the Hole, Body and Soul, Gilda, The Bishop's Wife.) The score for Dark City was by Franz Waxman (The Devil Doll, Bride of Frankenstein, Fury, Untamed, Rebecca, Dark Passage, Rear Window, Sunset Boulevard etc.) and there are a few numbers 'performed' by Lizabeth Scott (dubbed by Trudy Stevens); I Don't Want to Walk without You, A Letter from a Lady in Love, That Old Black Magic, I Wish I Didn't Love You So and If I Didn't Have You. I found these numbers kind of a filler in the film and they sound okay in the lossless. The score for Beware, My Lovely was by Leith Stevens (Crashout, When World's Collide, I Married a Monster From Outer Space, Great Day in the Morning, The Gun Runners, Syncopation, World Without End, The Night of the Grizzly, 20 Million Miles to Earth, The Garment Jungle) No flaws - the audio comes through authentically flat for all three, plus consistent and clean with clearly audible dialogue. Kino offer optional English (SDH) subtitles on their Region 'A' Blu-ray.

The Kino Blu-ray package offers four new commentaries. There are two for No Man of Her Own - first by one of our favorites - film historian Imogen Sara Smith (author of In Lonely Places: Film Noir Beyond the City) and a second by film historian/writer Julie Kirgo (author of Becoming John Ford) and writer/filmmaker Peter Hankoff (Producer of The Cold Blue). Imogen talks about it being "small town noir" or "domestic noir" and talks about her all-time favorite actress, Barbara Stanwyck and how No Man of Her Own has a  theme that haunts her filmography; a woman's complicated and tortured relationship with home, she states that this is director Mitchell Leisen's only noir, and why she feels he is underrated as well as oodles more about the cast, production and observations about Noir. Julie and Peter talk about this as a "romantic noir" and they discuss No Man of Her Own as a cross between noir and melodrama, Julie's two favorite genres. They talk about Stanwyck's voiceovers, and much more. They make a good pairing. Dark City offers a commentary by noir stalwart Alan K. Rode (author of Charles McGraw: Biography of a Film Noir Tough Guy) who talks about this being Charlton Heston's feature debut and how he would become one of Hollywood's biggest stars in the 1950's and 60s. He states that Hal Wallis was one of the most effective and efficient film producers, and he cites many films, talks of the impressive cast (Lizabeth Scott, Viveca Lindfors, Dean Jagger, Don DeFore, Ed Begley, Jack Webb and Harry Morgan,) director William Dieterle and he fills the running time with interesting information - another gem of 'dark cinema' analysis. There is also a commentary by Professor and film scholar Jason A. Ney on Beware, My Lovely. He talks about how rare this film has been on home video with only a VHS tape in existence before this Blu-ray. He informs us that Beware, My Lovely is based on the 1950 play The Man by Mel Dinelli, (who also wrote the screenplay) and it is far from the first adaptation - including the radio show Suspense - promoted as "To Find Help" in 1945 with Frank Sinatra and Agnes Moorehead and again as an episode of Suspense with Gene Kelly and Ethel Barrymore in 1949. Jason discusses clues of Howard Wilton's (Robert Ryan) cleanliness, and he identifies the number of times that the character's reflection appears in windows, mirrors and a Christmas ornament and what it represents. This is another strong commentary from Jason. Also included are trailers for each film with the last one, Beware, My Lovely, being low resolution. Plus there are trailers scattered across the three discs of, mostly, other noirs. 

Kino's Film Noir: The Dark Side of Cinema #19 Blu-ray is an all around excellent trifecta of important Noir cinema starring the likes of Barbara Stanwyck, Charlton Heston, Lizabeth Scott, Ida Lupino, and Robert Ryan. Their characters are navigating stories involving murder, mistaken identity, presumed amnesia, illegal gambling, unrequited love, and mental illness including paranoia. Beware, My Lovely is the big attraction never having been on physical disc previously. It's with Ida Lupino and Robert Ryan who had co-starred in Nicholas Ray's On Dangerous Ground, also released in 1952. Beware, My Lovely is a tension-building 'suburban damsel-in-distress noir' with excellent performances. No Man Of Her Own is a fabulous film with Stanwyck at her most vulnerable and compelling. While I love the title of "Dark City" I've only recently gained a further appreciation for the film as noir-crime cinema territory although I will continue to question the DUB'ed torch singer character played by Lizabeth Scott and her abundance of performance numbers utilized in the film. Meh. But I think this is one of the best Kino Blu-ray Film Noir: The Dark Side of Cinema series groupings in years. Great flics - including a must-own for devotees of the cycle and a desirable assemblage of Noir mainstay actors. Very much recommended.

Gary Tooze