Review by Gary Tooze

Production:

Disc:

Video (both packages):

Audio:

LPCM Audio Miscellaneous languages1152 kbps 1.0 / 48 kHz / 1152 kbps / 24-bit

• Four additional films by director Claude Lanzmann with optional English subtitles: On disc 3: A Visitor from the Living (1999, 1:08:03); Sobibór, October 14, 1943, 4 p.m. (2001, 1:42:10); The Karski Report (2010, 48:42) and on disc 4; Last of the Unjust (3:39:08)
• 300-PAGE BOOK containing writing on all of the films

Bitrate:

 

Masters of Cinema Disc One TOP vs. Masters of Cinema Disc Two BOTTOM

 

The Last of the Unjust

Description: Over a decade in the making, Claude Lanzmann’s nine-hour-plus opus is a monumental investigation of the unthinkable: the murder of more than six million Jews by the Nazis. Using no archival footage, Lanzmann instead focuses on first-person testimonies (of survivors and former Nazis, as well as other witnesses), employing a circular, free-associative method in assembling them. The intellectual yet emotionally overwhelming Shoah is not a film about excavating the past but an intensive portrait of the ways in which the past is always present, and it is inarguably one of the most important cinematic works of all time.

The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present – for the first time on Blu-ray in the UK – Claude Lanzmann's landmark documentary about the Holocaust, Shoah, alongside the four films he made through 2013 on the subject.

Lanzmann spent twelve years spanning the globe for surviving camp inmates, SS commandants, and eyewitnesses of the "Final Solution". Without dramatic re-enactment or archival footage – but with extraordinary testimonies – Shoah renders the step-by-step machinery of extermination, and through haunted landscapes and human voices, makes the past come brilliantly alive.

Shoah [1985], at 550 minutes, is a work of genius alone, an heroic endeavour to humanise the inhuman, to tell the untellable, and to explore in unprecedented detail the horrors of the past. It is one of the most powerful and important, and greatest, films of all time.

A Visitor from the Living [1997] is based on an interview conducted by Lanzmann with Maurice Rossel during the filming of Shoah. A member of the Berlin delegate for the International Committee of the Red Cross from 1942, Rossel was the only member of the organisation to have visited Auschwitz in 1943, and to have also paid a trip to the "model ghetto" of Theresienstadt in June 1944.

Sobibór, October 14, 1943, 4PM [2001] recounts the prisoner uprising that took place in the Sobibór death camp in Poland. Only 50 prisoners ultimately evaded capture, while the rest were sent to their murders in the gas chamber.

The Karski Report [2010] is Lanzmann's brief film on Jan Karski, the Polish resistance figure who also featured in the final section of Shoah, and which recounts Karski's powerful testimonial given to Franklin D. Roosevelt and Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter on what he witnessed during a trip to the Warsaw Ghetto and to the extermination camp Belzec.

The Last of the Unjust [2013], at 218 minutes in length, moves between 1975 and 2012, detailing Lanzmann's mid-'70s Rome interviews with Benjamin Murmelstein, the last President of the Jewish Council in the Theresienstadt ghetto, and the filmmaker's own return to the location 37 years later — providing an unprecedented insight into the genesis of the "Final Solution".

***

 

 

The Film:

J. Hoberman's Capsule Review in the Village Voice HERE

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

The restoration of Shoah looks much improved on Blu-ray from Criterion.  The previous DVDs (New Yorker and MoC) looks very flat and green in comparisons.  This is housed on two dual-layered disc with a reasonable bitrate and textured grain is highly pleasing. Colors lean to appearing more realistic and there are instances of depth. It also seems that there is significantly more information (notably on the right edge) in the, original, 1.37:1 frame via this HD rendering. This Blu-ray is clean and has no discernable flaws - it supplies a vastly improved presentation via the restoration and 1080P transfer.

The new Masters of Cinema 1080P differs from the Criterion. Colors are richer, skin tones warmer and the greenish overhang is gone. It even shows a bit more grain. It looks great in-motion and is a superior image to their US counterpart.

CLICK EACH BLU-RAY CAPTURE TO SEE ALL IMAGES IN FULL 1920X1080 RESOLUTION

1) New Yorker Video - Region 1 - NTSC (Reviewed HERE)  TOP 2) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray - MIDDLE 3) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

1) New Yorker Video - Region 1 - NTSC (Reviewed HERE)  TOP 2) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray - MIDDLE 3) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

1) New Yorker Video - Region 1 - NTSC (Reviewed HERE)  TOP 2) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray - MIDDLE 3) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

1) New Yorker Video - Region 1 - NTSC (Reviewed HERE)  TOP 2) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray - MIDDLE 3) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

 

More Blu-ray Captures

1) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray  TOP 2) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

1) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray  TOP 2) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

1) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray  TOP 2) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

1) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray  TOP 2) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

1) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray  TOP 2) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

1) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray  TOP 2) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray  - BOTTOM

 

Clean audio in an an authentic linear PCM 1.0 channel mono track in original French (with English, German, Hebrew, Polish and Yiddish) at 1152 kbps. There are optional English or English (SDH) subtitles and my Oppo has identified this Blu-ray as being a region 'A' -locked.

Same liner PCM mono audio as on the Criterion. In brief testing my ears could not distinguish a difference. The Masters of Cinema also has optional English or English (SDH) subtitles, but the UK Blu-ray disc is region 'B'-locked.

Extras :

We lose the 1.5 hours worth of interview extras on the Criterion, but keep the three Lanzmann films (also in the Criterion); A Visitor from the Living [1997], Sobibór, October 14, 1943, 4PM [2001] and The Karski Report [2010] all on a separate Blu-ray disc. Masters of Cinema additionally include the monumental 3 1/2 hour The Last of the Unjust [2013] on its own Blu-ray (a 4th in the package). It moves between 1975 and 2012, detailing Lanzmann's mid-'70s Rome interviews with Benjamin Murmelstein, the last President of the Jewish Council in the Theresienstadt ghetto, and the filmmaker's own return to the location 37 years later — providing an unprecedented insight into the genesis of the "Final Solution". Masters of Cinema also add a 300-page liner notes book containing writing on all of the films.

 

Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray Disc 3

 

Both Blu-rays have:

 

 

But only Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray has:

 

 

Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray

 

 

BOTTOM LINE:
Brilliant, draining documentary that justifies its lauded place in cinema archives. Criterion have gone to town with this Blu-ray package making it the definitive for this epic work. Truly one of their most incredible efforts and we can easily recommend to all.

Masters of Cinema have advanced upon the Criterion with an incredible package offering different, richer, video, and go further in terms of supplements. Truly the definitive package of this draining film experience. Our strongest recommendation!  

Gary Tooze

June 10th, 2013

January 20th, 2015