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

 

ADDITION: Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray August 15': I never obtained the Image Entertainment Blu-ray from 2008 - if it ever truly existed, but you can see  a huge improvement by the Criterion over the old SD. Notable are the colors - especially skin tones - which return to normalcy (the SD looks quite green beside it). There is excellent detail and plenty of depth in the 1080P transfer. It looks very impressive in-motion. It is advertised as a 'new, restored 4K digital transfer, supervised and approved by director Bruce Beresford'.

 

Criterion go with a linear PCM mono track at 1152 kbps. There is some battle aggression with gunfire and explosions. The film, though not having a specified score - has music in the form of traditional British, Irish and Afrikaans as well as Edward Elgar's Land of Hope and Glory. It sounds excellent and authentically flat. There are optional English subtitles on the region 'A'-locked Blu-ray disc.

 

Criterion include a lot of extras. We get the audio commentary from 2004 featuring director Bruce Beresford pointing out production details as well as historical facts regarding the man and the story. There are also new (2015) interviews with Beresford for a dozen minutes recalling the production if his landmark Australian film, 8.5 minutes with cinematographer Donald McAlpine recalling his pivotal early work in Breaker Morant, and 10-minutes with actor Bryan Brown who recalls his international breakthrough performance as Lieutenant Peter Handcock in the film. We get a 2004, 16-minute, interview with actor Edward Woodward about his career and Breaker Morant. There is another new piece about the Boer War with historian Stephen Miller running 16-minutes. The Breaker is a 55-minute 1973 documentary profiling the real Harry “Breaker” Morant, and it comes with a 2010, 5-minute, statement by its director, Frank Shields. Lastly is a trailer and the package has a liner notes booklet with an essay by film scholar Neil Sinyard.

 

Another wonderful Criterion Blu-ray package of an important and masterfully realized film. We give this a very strong recommendation!

 

***

ON THE DVD: Strong dual-layered, progressive and anamorphic transfer from Image Entertainment on this, presumably, new print (restored?) that is also being offered in Blu-ray on February 5th HERE. I never owned the Fox/Lorber (Wellspring) 'Masterworks' edition, which now appears to be out-of-print, or I would have compared. I strongly suspect this newer edition to be superior in terms of image quality. It exhibits exceptional detail at times and it is no wonder this will be bumped to 1080 resolution. It does however have a shade of edge enhancement. Night scenes tend to look a bit 'unusual' and there is some noise present, but it is minor. There are some barely visible speckles and considering it is almost 30 years old looks very good overall. Hopefully the captures below will bear this out to some degree.

The unremarkable audio is consistent and clear - it is supported by optional English (CC) or Spanish subtitles. Extras include a 40 minute documentary on The Boer War - very historical but interesting for those keen (it must have been taken from television but I don't know exactly where). There is also a 30 second promotional radio spot. There are no trailers or liner notes.

The film is powerful and those into military courtroom dramas (evoking Kubrick's Paths of Glory or Ford's magnificent Sergeant Rutledge) with flashbacks, will certainly feel at home. Performances are top notch and this is so enjoyable I'm definitely seduced into obtaining the Blu-ray. Wowser.  

Gary W. Tooze