NOTE: Watched "The Golden Coach" last night, and the DVD is for the most part fine, but the final minutes, which are crucial to the full impact of the film, are ruined by deplorable mastering. The scene appears to be out of focus and the colors are washed out to the point of barely being able make out what is happening (especially where Camilla has come out front and is surrounded by children from the troupe). I believe Criterion made some kind of mastering error, because Martin Scorsese's introduction to the film explicitly refers to the wonderful restored ending of the film.

submitted by Louis Erwin (Thanks Louis!)

This is regarding the addendum to The Golden Coach. I don't think it is a mastering problem at all, as the writer seems to think it is. The grain structure in this segment is equal to that of the rest of the film, and the problem seems primarily to be in the center of the image. The edges, i.e. the curtain and the like, are relatively without problem. After watching this segment, I'm of the impression that the problem was with the original camera negative. I highly doubt that Criterion would allow for, or let slip by, such a glaring flaw. The color bleeding/flaring evident in this segment seems typical of a technical issue that was present either in the negative, perhaps with the synchronization of the three-strip process or in the printing of the film. I think that perhaps the strip filtered to capture magenta was loose, not loaded properly, or something to that effect, which is why you see the red in the image, affecting the skin tones as well, bounce around to and fro. Perhaps Criterion used the best source material available and the problem is simply local, but I even doubt that. Unless the folk at Criterion chime in, or someone more knowledgably on the subject, or film specifically, for that matter, I'll remain believing the problem in this segment is an uncorrectable flaw of the original film itself.

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