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

ADDITION: Kino Blu-ray (August 2024): Kino have transferred Alberto Cavalcanti's Nicholas Nickleby to Blu-ray. It is on a dual-layered disc with a max'ed out bitrate. Aside from a few speckles and frame-specific marks (see below) the 1080P looks pleasing - at times better than others but a few stellar example of contrast and detail. There is texture and I enjoyed the video presentation.

NOTE: We have added 58 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Kino use a DTS-HD Master dual-mono track (24-bit) in the original English language. Nicholas Nickleby (or The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby) has a few aggressive moments (beating, brawl...) that come through with modest depth and a score by British composer, novelist, painter, and aesthete known as Lord Berners (The Halfway House.) He was the 14th holder of the Berners Barony <eyebrows raised>. The music is supportive of a Dickensian period drama. It's also clean with reasonably consistent dialogue in the lossless transfer. Kino offer optional English subtitles on their Region 'A' Blu-ray.

The Kino Blu-ray offers a 10-minute interview with BFI Dickens Season Curators Adrian Wootton and Michael Eaton that might have been on the Optimum (UK) DVD providing some background on the production. Also ins three minutes of the 1903 short of Nicholas Nickleby starring William Carrington, courtesy of the Library of Congress. Lastly is a trailer for the 1947 version.

Alberto Cavalcanti's Nicholas Nickleby is the first talkie film adaptation of the Charles Dickens novel that followed 'silents' released in 1903 and 1912. Like many, I'm a big fan of the author's Great Expectations where there was the David Lean film version made one year before Nicholas Nickleby but I was especially enamored with Alfonso Cuarón's 1998 modern adaptation with Ethan Hawke, Gwyneth Paltrow, Chris Cooper, Anne Bancroft and Robert De Niro. It still hasn't reached Blu-ray to my knowledge - we've compared DVDs HERE and I even wrote an article about it HERE. Anyway, Nicholas Nickleby is not at the stratospheric level of GE, but has all the tropes you might expect; a Victorian workhouse atmosphere filled with Dickensian, mistreated, urchins, a money-grubbing relative, flawed but kind secondary characters, and the titular, noble, protagonist - protector to his struggling mother and sister. Bottom line is that it is great storytelling, sets, costumes and acting. Fans of 'Boz' should indulge. The Kino Blu-ray has the film in 1080P, no usual commentary, but a couple of relevant extras. Certainly a film worth revisiting and package worth a place in your digital library.

Gary Tooze