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http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/direct-chair/hitchcock.htm
USA 1943

 

Teresa Wright plays Charlie, a small-town high-schooler who enjoys a symbiotic relationship with her favorite uncle,... also named Charlie (Joseph Cotten). When young Charlie "wills" that old Charlie pay a visit to her family, her wish comes true. Uncle Charlie is his usual charming self, but he seems a bit secretive and reserved at times. Too, his manner of speaking is curiously unsettling, especially when he brings up the subject of rich widows, whom he characterizes as "swine." When a pair of detectives (MacDonald Carey and Wallace Ford), posing as magazine writers, arrive in town and begin asking questions about Uncle Charlie, young Charlie's curiosity is aroused. Why, for example, has Uncle Charlie torn an article out of the evening newspaper? Rushing to the library, Young Charlie locates the missing item: the headline screams WHO IS THE MERRY WIDOW MURDERER? As the horrified Charlie reads on, the conclusion is inescapable: her beloved Uncle Charlie is a mass murderer, preying upon wealthy old women.

Excerpt from MRQE located HERE

***

One of Hitchcock's finest films of the '40s, with Cotten as the infamous 'Merry Widow' murderer, who takes refuge with the small-town family of his sister (Collinge). Focusing on adoring niece Wright's dawning realisation that her kind, generous and handsome uncle is in fact a cold and cynical killer, the film is not only psychologically intriguing (both niece and uncle are called Charlie, and he arrives in town as if in answer to her prayers for excitement), but a sharp dissection of middle American life, in its own quiet way an ancestor of Blue Velvet. Is Uncle Charlie all these gentle folk deserve, when adolescent girls dream of the romantic life, and middle-aged men (papa Travers and neighbour Cronyn) endlessly discuss gruesome murder? Funny, gripping, and expertly shot by Joe Valentine, it's a small but memorable gem.

Excerpt from TimeOut Film Guide located HERE

Posters

Theatrical Release: January 12th, 1943

Reviews                                                                                                       More Reviews                                                                                       DVD Reviews

 

Review: Universal - Region FREE - 4K UHD

Box Cover

CLICK to order from:

Available individually:

     

or as part of the The Alfred Hitchcock Classics Collection 2 with Saboteur / Shadow of a Doubt / The Trouble with Harry / Marnie and Family Plot:

     

Bonus Captures:

Distribution Universal - Region FREE - 4K UHD
Runtime 1:47:49.963     
Video

1.37:1 2160P 4K Ultra HD

Disc Size: 66,313,486,184 bytes

Feature: 62,578,987,008 bytes

Video Bitrate: 69.02 Mbps

Codec: HEVC Video

NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.

Bitrate 4K Ultra HD:

Audio

DTS-HD Master Audio English 1775 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1775 kbps / 24-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1509 kbps / 24-bit)
DUBs:

DTS Audio French 768 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 768 kbps / 24-bit
DTS Audio Japanese 448 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 448 kbps / 24-bit
DTS Audio German 448 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 448 kbps / 24-bit
DTS Audio Italian 448 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 448 kbps / 24-bit

Subtitles English (SDH), French, Spanish, Japanese, German, Italian, Dutch, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, None
Features Release Information:
Studio:
Universal

 

1.37:1 2160P 4K Ultra HD

Disc Size: 66,313,486,184 bytes

Feature: 62,578,987,008 bytes

Video Bitrate: 69.02 Mbps

Codec: HEVC Video

 

Edition Details:

4K Ultra HD disc

• Beyond Doubt: The Making of Hitchcock’s Favorite Film (34:48)
• Production Drawings by Art Director Robert Boyle (6:10)
• Production Photographs (8:30)
• Theatrical Trailer (1:22)

 

 

Universal - Region FREE - Blu-ray

• Beyond Doubt: The Making of Hitchcock’s Favorite Film (34:48)
• Production Drawings by Art Director Robert Boyle (6:10)
• Production Photographs (8:30)
• Theatrical Trailer (1:22)


4K Ultra HD Release Date: May 10th, 2022
Black 4K Ultra HD Case

Chapters 18

 

 

Comments:

NOTE: The below Blu-ray and 4K UHD captures were taken directly from the respective discs.

ADDITION: Universal 4K UHD (May 2022): Universal's have released Alfred Hitchcock's "Shadow of a Doubt" to 4K UHD. It has HDR applied and is described as "4K Ultra HD is the ultimate movie watching experience. 4K Ultra HD features the combination of 4K resolution for four times sharper picture than HD". This shows in two dominant ways; the grain textures are wonderfully consistent and fine - plus there is a notable uptick in contrast layering with richer, deeper, black levels and cooler, more natural, flesh tones. There is occasional depth and if you look closely a cleaner image with some very minor speckles and surface scratches removed. The 4K UHD image has slightly more information in the frame on the side edges bringing it close to 1;37:1. It looks like a brand new film. Magnificent and easily the best I have ever seen in the film on my system. 

The second disc Blu-ray is the exact same one as released in 2012 (reviewed HERE) as evidence by the file dates:

It is likely that the monitor you are seeing this review is not an HDR-compatible display (High Dynamic Range) or Dolby Vision, where each pixel can be assigned with a wider and notably granular range of color and light. Our capture software if simulating the HDR (in a uniform manner) for standard monitors. This should make it easier for us to review more 4K UHD titles in the future and give you a decent idea of its attributes on your system. So our captures may not support the exact same colors (coolness of skin tones, brighter or darker hues etc.) as the 4K system at your home. But the framing, detail, grain texture support etc. are, generally, not effected by this simulation representation.

NOTE: 62 more more full resolution (3840 X 2160) 4K UHD captures, in lossless PNG format, for Patrons are available HERE

We have reviewed the following 4K UHD packages to date: The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (software uniformly simulated HDR), A Fistful of Dollars (no HDR), In the Heat of the Night (no HDR), Jack Reacher (software uniformly simulated HDR), Death Wish II (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Apartment (no HDR), The Proposition (software uniformly simulated HDR), Nightmare Alley (2021) (software uniformly simulated HDR), Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Godfather (software uniformly simulated HDR), Le Crecle Rouge (software uniformly simulated HDR), An American Werewolf in London (software uniformly simulated HDR), A Hard Day's Night (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Piano (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Great Escape (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Red Shoes (software uniformly simulated HDR), Citizen Kane (software uniformly simulated HDR), Unbreakable (software uniformly simulated HDR), Mulholland Dr. (software uniformly simulated HDR), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Hills Have Eyes (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Servant (software uniformly simulated HDR), Anatomy of a Murder (software uniformly simulated HDR), Taxi Driver  (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Wolf Man (1941) (software uniformly simulated HDR), Frankenstein (1931) (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Deep Red (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Misery (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Silence of the Lambs (software uniformly simulated HDR), John Carpenter's "The Thing" (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Cat' o'Nine Tails (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Bird With the Crystal Plumage (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (software uniformly simulated HDR), Perdita Durango (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Django (software uniformly simulated HDR) Fanny Lye Deliver'd (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, (NO HDR applied to disc),  Rollerball (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Chernobyl  (software uniformly simulated HDR), Daughters of Darkness (software uniformly simulated HDR), Vigilante (software uniformly simulated HDR), Tremors (software uniformly simulated HDR), Cinema Paradiso (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Bourne Legacy (software uniformly simulated HDR), Full Metal Jacket (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Psycho (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Birds (software uniformly simulated HDR), Rear Window (software uniformly simulated HDR), Vertigo (software uniformly simulated HDR) Spartacus (software uniformly simulated HDR), Jaws (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Invisible Man, (software uniformly simulated HDR), Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds (software uniformly simulated HDR), Lucio Fulci's 1979 Zombie  (software uniformly simulated HDR),, 2004's Van Helsing (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Shallows (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Bridge on the River Kwai (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Deer Hunter (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Elephant Man (software uniformly simulated HDR), A Quiet Place (software uniformly simulated HDR), Easy Rider (software uniformly simulated HDR), Suspiria (software uniformly simulated HDR), Pan's Labyrinth (software uniformly simulated HDR) The Wizard of Oz, (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Shining, (software uniformly simulated HDR), Batman Returns (software uniformly simulated HDR), Don't Look Now (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Man Who Killed Killed and then The Bigfoot  (software uniformly simulated HDR), Bram Stoker's Dracula (software uniformly simulated HDR), Lucy (software uniformly simulated HDR), They Live (software uniformly simulated HDR), Shutter Island (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Matrix (software uniformly simulated HDR), Alien (software uniformly simulated HDR), Toy Story (software uniformly simulated HDR),  A Few Good Men (software uniformly simulated HDR),  2001: A Space Odyssey (HDR caps udated), Schindler's List (simulated HDR), The Neon Demon (No HDR), Dawn of the Dead (No HDR), Saving Private Ryan (simulated HDR and 'raw' captures), Suspiria (No HDR), The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (No HDR), The Big Lebowski, and I Am Legend (simulated and 'raw' HDR captures).

The audio is via the same DTS-HD dual-mono track at 24 bits that was on the 2012 Blu-ray. This is notable for the score by the influential Dimitri Tiomkin's (The Men, A Bullet Is Waiting , Night Passage, High NoonAngel Face, Strangers on a Train, The Men, Dial M For Murder, Spawn of the North, Jungle Queen, The Thing From Another World etc. etc.) that builds gently beneath the surface - eventually bringing the tension to prominence. There isn't a lot of depth exported or effects by the film aside from the final train sequence but everything sounds tight and secure. Plus there is Franz Lehár's "The Merry Widow Waltz" hummed and played throughout the film. There are a three European and a Japanese language DUBs as well as plenty of foreign subtitle options plus English (SDH.) Both the 4K UHD disc and included Blu-ray are region FREE.

There are the duplicate extras on the 4K UHD disc as on the second disc Blu-ray rendered in 2012. Actually, nothing new from the older DVD and 2005's The Masterpiece Collection with the 1/2 hour documentary Beyond Doubt: The Making of Hitchcock’s Favorite Film by Laurent Bouzereau from 2000 with interviews with Patricia Hitchcock, Peter Bogdanovich, Teresa Wright, Hume Cronyn and Robert F. Boyle. There are also Art Director Robert Boyle's Production Drawings and some Production Photographs plus a Theatrical Trailer. Nothing new.

Universal's
4K UHD release of Alfred Hitchcock's "Shadow of a Doubt" has the exquisitely improved image - same audio and extras and the second disc, duplicate, Blu-ray. The film is a fan favorite, as well as the director's of his unparalleled body of work. Teresa Wright and Joseph Cotten export subtle facial cues that brilliantly escalate the tension throughout the film buoyed by Tiomkin's score. It builds from an idyllic family atmosphere to a tense, suspenseful thriller with murder at its core. A 'must have' if only for the pristine home theater appearance. It, of course, is strongly recommended - even for a double or triple dip for the title on digital. Your library is significantly richer with its inclusion.

Gary Tooze

 


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More full resolution (3840 X 2160) 4K Ultra HD Captures for Patreon Supporters HERE

 

 

 
Box Cover

CLICK to order from:

Available individually:

     

or as part of the The Alfred Hitchcock Classics Collection 2 with Saboteur / Shadow of a Doubt / The Trouble with Harry / Marnie and Family Plot:

     

Bonus Captures:

Distribution Universal - Region FREE - 4K UHD


 


 

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