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On their Blu-ray, Film Detective use a DTS-HD Master dual-mono track (16-bit) in the original English language. Like the video it has weaknesses. The Amazing Mr. X has a haunting voice from the ocean, spiritualist parlor tricks, few aggressive sequences (minor gunplay) and a serene score by Alexander Laszlo (The Great Flamarion, The Atomic Submarine) sounding scattered at times with a couple of dropouts noted. Film Detective offer optional English subtitles on their Region FREE Blu-ray. 

The Film Detective Blu-ray offers a new commentary by Professor and Film Scholar, Jason A. Ney. He is informative and gives a rundown of the careers of Austrian-born actor of Turkish and Czech-Jewish origins Turhan Bey, Lynn Bari (in 150 movies for 20th Century Fox from the early 1930s through the 1940s), Cathy O'Donnell (how 24-year-old O'Donnell married 47-year-old producer Robert Wyler - marginalizing her offered roles), Richard Carlson (Tormented, It Came From Outer Space) but spends more extensive time talking about the great Noir cinematographer John Alton - T-Men (1947), He Walked by Night (1948), Raw Deal (1948), The Big Combo (1955), Slightly Scarlet (a rare color film noir) etc. etc. He debunks the Carole Landis rumor that she was considered for the lead role. Overall a very good commentary. I also enjoyed the 20-minute documentary ''Mysteries Exposed: Inside the Cinematic World of Spiritualism", with author Lisa Morton (Calling the Spirits: A History of Seances) and author/film historian C. Courtney Joyner as they talk about the fascinating role of spiritualism in history and film. The package has a full color booklet with essay, ''The Amazing Mr. Bey,'' by Don Stradley.

What we have in "The Amazing Mr. X" is a minor masterpiece from the supernatural thriller aspects to the impressionist treatment of light by John Alton adding delightfully to the noirish and Gothic, mansion-on-the-ocean, heavy shadows, a 'seer' bilking the rich and other dark cinema conventions. In a film of this nature, the séance scene always carries significant weight to defining the film's genre. Unfortunately, the Film Detective Blu-ray can't make a silk purse from a sow's ear in terms of the a/v presentation. But is is in acceptable, if far from pristine 1080P and has a well-researched commentary and wonderful documentary. It's been a decade of waiting for it to come to BD and we still recommend this one - on the strength of the film, happily ignoring the imperfections. See this one!  

Gary Tooze

***

ADDITION: Sony - Region 0 - October 2010: A staple of public domain releases, Sony Pictures owns the only existing 35mm elements of this title under its UK title, The Spiritualist. The disc was released as part of Sony's 'Screen Classics by Request' line - on-demand service. There are no menus and the film starts right after an un-skippable 18-second FBI warning. The film looks very good, with less damage than the cheaper, and also progressive, Image Entertainment DVD. The blacks are richer compared to Image release but it as negligible improvement. The film is divided onto 8 chapters every 10 minutes. For the $6.50 savings most will be content with the Image Entertainment release which may have less compression artifacts.

  - Gregory Meshman