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

ADDITION: Masters of Cinema Blu-ray (June 2022): Masters of Cinema have transferred Hsing Lee's Execution in Autumn to Blu-ray. It is cited as being "from a stunning 2K restoration of the original film elements undertaken by the Taiwan Film Institute". It looks very strong; heavily textured, an earthy green palette and subtle balanced contrast. There are instances of depth and this 1080P restoration exports a very film-like presentation in the 2.39: 1 aspect ratio. It is clean and highly pleasing.

NOTE: We have added 32 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Masters of Cinema use a linear PCM mono track (24-bit) in the original Mandarin language. Execution in Autumn has few aggressive sequences mostly in the form of beatings and some yelling. These have a modicum of depth sounding flat and authentic. The score is by Ichirô Saitô (Ugetsu Monogatori, The Life of Oharu, Floating Clouds, The Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice, and some of the Zatoichi series) sounding clean, sparse and supportive in the uncompressed transfer providing some impressive dramatic and contemplative cues. Masters of Cinema offer optional English subtitles on their Region 'B' Blu-ray.

The Masters of Cinema Blu-ray offers a new 3/4 hour video piece by Asian-film go-to Tony Rayns. He discusses the film language of Hsing Lee, the uniqueness of this a Taiwanese production and its differences from the "Wushu"-centric Hong Kong scene in the same early 70's time period. As usual, I found his comments give astute observations and fine, less-published details of the production, performers etc. There is also a split-screen restoration demo showing the vast improvement over the video for Execution in Autumn - the first time available in an English-friendly digital edition. The package is a limited edition with its O-card slipcase (2000 copies only) and includes a liner notes booklet featuring new and archival writing. 

The diverse director Hsing Lee's Execution in Autumn was selected as the Taiwanese entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 45th Academy Awards - winning Golden Horse awards held annually in Taiwan (Best Feature Film, Best Director, Best Lead Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Cinematography for Chen-ing Lai.) It sits in the middle of the director's oeuvre that includes Brother Liu and Brother Wang on the Roads in Taiwan from 1959, 79's The Story of a Small Town and 1986's The Heroic Pioneers. He has always been a champion of Taiwanese directors gaining exposure into the mainland China film market with notable success and was the recipient of a Lifetime Achievement award in 1995. I am very keen on Taiwanese cinema and this is the first of his films that I recall seeing. Actor Hui-Lou Chen was in some notable martial arts films like The Four Hands of Death, Bloody Monkey Master and Fists of Fury II. Execution in Autumn often shows an unsympathetic portrayal of the characters but has a philosophical undercurrent with themes of morality, judgmental ethics, and fatalism with the ironic quote “We all have to die, but we must die in peace and honor?”.  I am thrilled with the Masters of Cinema Blu-ray. They continue to bring these under-exposed works to the physical media marketplace. This is a wonderful film and I am so glad I have it in this exceptional package. Strongly recommended!

Gary Tooze