Long Day's Journey Into Night Blu-ray

We have started a Patreon page with the hopes that some of our followers would be willing to donate a small amount to keep DVDBeaver alive. We are a tiny niche, so your generosity is vital to our existence.

We are talking about a minimum of $0.10 - $0.15 a day, perhaps a quarter (or more) to those who won't miss it from their budget. It equates to buying DVDBeaver a coffee once, twice or a few times a month. You can then participate in our monthly Silent auctions, and have exclusive access to many 'bonus' High Resolution screen captures - both 4K UHD and Blu-ray (see HERE).

To those that are unfamiliar, Patreon is a secure/verified third-party service where users can agree to a monthly donation via credit card or PayPal by clicking the button below.

Search DVDBeaver

S E A R C H D V D B e a v e r

Directed by Sidney Lumet
USA 1962

Playwright Eugene O'Neill sold Random House the text of his intensely autobiographical 1941 play on the proviso that... the play not be produced during O'Neill's lifetime. Two years after the playwright's death in 1953, the play was given its first Broadway staging and won a Pulitzer Prize. Set in 1912 New England, the story takes place in the summer home of aging actor James Tyrone (Ralph Richardson) and his family. Tyrone, patterned after Eugene O'Neill's father James O'Neill, has long abandoned any aspirations to be a truly great actor, choosing instead to tour in the same weary stage vehicle year after year. Thanks to an earlier act of stinginess on Tyrone's part, his wife Mary has turned into a rambling morphine addict, with little or no contact with reality. Oldest son Jamie is a troublemaking alcoholic, envious of the writing talent of sickly younger brother Edmund (the Eugene O'Neill counterpart). The long's day journey concludes with a hellish night in which the three Tyrone men sit about drunkenly as Mary Tyrone hallucinates about her younger, happier days. Katharine Hepburn emerged from a three-year retirement to essay the back-breaking role of Mary Tyrone; Ralph Richardson exhumed all the "ham" of his student-actor days to portray the pathetic James Tyrone; Jason Robards Jr., a man seemingly put on this earth to interpret O'Neill, repeats his Broadway role as Jamey; and Dean Stockwell adds one more superb characterization to his gallery of portrayals as the tubercular Edmund.

***

Adapted directly from the play by Eugene O Neill (considered the Nobel laureate's magnum opus), Long Day's Journey into Night is a four-act study of addiction and recrimination that the playwright claimed was written "in tears and blood".

Taking place over a single, fateful day in the summer of 1912, the Tyrone family (modelled after O'Neill's own) confront their bitter failings and long-held resentments. Patriarch James (Ralph Richardson) is a renowned stage actor who s never forgotten his squalid Irish childhood, and has forsaken artistic ambition for commercial success. His wife Mary (Katharine Hepburn) has developed a morphine addiction, his eldest son Jamie (Jason Robards, Jr. ) is a violent alcoholic and failed actor, and his youngest (and clearly favoured) son Edmund (Dean Stockwell) is a nervous young man in poor health. All of them have something painful to say, and their silence is even worse.

Directed by Sidney Lumet (Serpico, The Offence), whose instinctive understanding of adaptation and near-telepathic rapport with actors made him the perfect director for the material (Lumet had previously adapted O Neil's The Iceman Cometh into an acclaimed TV drama, also starring Jason Robards).

Posters

Theatrical Release: May 1962 (Cannes Film Festival)

Reviews More Reviews DVD Reviews

Comparison:

Olive - Region 'A' - Blu-ray vs. Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray

Box Cover
Distribution	Olive - Region 'A' - Blu-ray	Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray
Runtime	2:50:43.233	2:50:20.335
Video	1.78:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 24,185,378,636 bytes Feature: 24,110,555,136 bytes Video Bitrate: 17.00 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video	1.85:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 47,375,437,386 bytes Feature: 45,129,207,168 bytes Video Bitrate: 30.99 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video
	NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.
Bitrate Olive Blu-ray:
Bitrate Masters of Cinema Blu-ray:
Audio	DTS-HD Master Audio English 870 kbps 1.0 / 48 kHz / 870 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 1.0 / 48 kHz / 768 kbps / 16-bit	LPCM Audio English 2304 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 2304 kbps / 24-bit Commentary: Dolby Digital Audio English 320 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 320 kbps
Subtitles	None	English (SDH), None
Features	Release Information: Studio: Olive 1.78:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 24,185,378,636 bytes Feature: 24,110,555,136 bytes Video Bitrate: 17.00 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video Edition Details: • None) DVD Release Date: October 30th, 2012 Standard Blu-ray Case Chapters: 9	Release Information: Studio: Masters of Cinema 2.35:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 37,471,315,571 bytes Feature: 30,857,963,520 bytes Video Bitrate: 31.93 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video Edition Details: • Brand new feature-length audio commentary by author Scott Harrison • Brand new and exclusive video essay by Lee Gambin (31:10) Trailer (3:36) • PLUS: a collector s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas and Philip Kemp DVD Blu-ray Release Date: March 16th, 2020 Standard Blu-ray Case inside cardboard sleeve Chapters 12

Comments:

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

ADDITION: Masters of Cinema Blu-ray (March 2020): Masters of Cinema have transferred Sidney Lumet's film adaptation of Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night to Blu-ray. It is on a dual-layered disc with a very high bitrate (70% higher than the US 1080P release) and easy best the Olive Blu-ray from 2012. Firstly the Masters of Cinema is in the proper 1.85:1 aspect ratio as opposed to Olive 'opening-up' the frame to a bastardized 1.78:1. Even in the small captures you can see the richer black levels of the UK release.

On their Blu-ray, Masters of Cinema use a linear PCM mono track (24-bit) in the original English language. It is an advancement, over the 16-bit Olive, in the film's audio and score by André Previn (One, Two, Three, Dial 1119, Cause For Alarm!, The Fastest Gun Alive, Elmer Gantry, Long Day's Journey Into Night) is sounding a bit deeper and richer. Masters of Cinema offer optional English (SDH) subtitles (see sample below) on their Region 'B' Blu-ray.

The Masters of Cinema Blu-ray has a brand new feature-length audio commentary by author Scott Harrison. He discusses both the film and the stage play in a relaxed and steady fashion as it lasts the entire 2-hours 50-minute running time. He finds this film version 'the most honestly performed' as any adaptation that he has seen. He feels that it comes the closest to putting flesh on the text characters. He mentions the few differences from the screenplay and much more. It is very good... but, like the film, long. There is also an excellent brand new 1/2 hour video essay by Lee Gambin discussing some of Sidney Lumet's films that were based on stage plays - this core focus includes Long Day's Journey Into Night, Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge, Childs Play, The Offence, The Wiz and Deathtrap as well as Equus although making thematic connections to 12 Angry Men (adaptation of the television drama), leading him to direct The Fugitive Kind (based on Tennessee Williams classic play), The Iceman Cometh (more Eugene O'Neill) etc. I thought it was fabulous. There is also a trailer and the package has a collector's booklet featuring new writing on the film by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas and Philip Kemp.

This is a very long film but a great one. For those with the patience and willing to invest the time - Long Day's Journey Into Night is extremely rewarding and recommended - especially for fans of (or those who studied) the Eugene O'Neill stage play! It's a film I am very happy to own on Blu-ray and one to watch and appreciate the depth of the performances. The Masters of Cinema wins on every front - a/v and extras. It is the one to own.

***

ON THE OLIVE (October 2012): A Long Day's Journey Into Night has a lower bitrate via the Blu-ray transfer from Olive Films - because the film is almost 3 hours fitting on a single-layered disc. The black levels are fine and there are plenty of scenes of depth. Detail is strong and reasonably consistent. The Blu-ray supplies a pleasing image.

Andre Previn's piano theme is haunting and crisp via the DTS-HD mono track at 870 kbps. There is no depth but the high-end sounds quite wonderful. The film is dialogue-driven and has no discernable flaws. There are no subtitles and my Momitsu has identified it as being a region 'A'-locked Blu-ray.

No supplements - not even a trailer which is the bare-bones route that Olive are going with their releases.