ADDITION: (October 2016) Masters of Cinema - Region 'B' - Blu-ray: Masters of Cinema have come out with a fabulous Blu-ray release. As with the Criterion - it is, likewise, advertised as a "Digital restoration of the film, supervised and approved by director Ken Loach and director of photography Chris Menges". It's far more technically robust than the Criterion with more than 50% the bitrate and this superiority shows in-motion and the image being slightly tighter which you can see in the foreground of the compared capture. The improvement in static captures may seem minute but I played them side-by-side and the MoC was easy to identify as the better video transfer.

MoC also use a linear PCM mono track at 24-bits. At United Artists' request the original actors redubbed parts of the film in post-production to 'soften' the Barnsley dialect for international audiences. The Masters of Cinema defaults to the original audio as recorded during films, like Criterion, they include this alternate soundtrack on their Blu-ray release. They include a third audio option; an isolated music - John Cameron (Night Watch, 1988's Jack the Ripper, The Ruling Class) and effects track without dialogue. It sounds flawless. The Masters of Cinema offers optional English (SDH) subtitles and is region 'B'-locked.

MoC load their Blu-ray disc with great new supplements - we get 1.5 hours of exclusive new video interviews with actor David Bradley (20:15), producer Tony Garnett (26:22), director of photography Chris Menges (8:07), Penny Eyles - continuity (5:26), composer John Cameron (8:41), actor Bernard Atha (11:21), and kestrel advisor Richard Hines (31:29) as well as an hour's worth of excerpts from the 2006 Kes reunion panel at the Bradford Film Festival, featuring Ken Loach, Tony Garnett, writer Barry Hines and actor Colin Welland and a hour 10-minutes of a1992 on-stage interview at the NFT with Ken Loach, interviewed by Derek Malcolm. Whew! There is also an original theatrical trailer and the package has a liner notes booklet featuring new writing on the film and archival material.

This may be Masters of Cinema's most complete Blu-ray release this year! It advances over the Criterion in every category - better video, more audio options (with the isolated effect/music) and over 3 hours of extras! Kes remains a brilliant, and heart-wrenching, film experience! The Masters of Cinema BD has our highest recommendation! It will be on my year-end poll!

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ADDITION: (April 2011) Criterion - Region 'A' - Blu-ray: With the lackluster MGM DVD Kes was a perfect choice for Criterion to release. But we can now identify just how poor the PAL transfer was when compared beside the new 1080P Blu-ray which is described as 'Newly restored digital transfer, supervised and approved by director Ken Loach and director of photography Chris Menges, with the filmmaker’s original production soundtrack'. Colors leap to life (almost unnaturally so), contrast dramatically escalates and detail tightens - not to mention the large amount of additional information now available in the 1.66 frame on the Blu-ray. This is apparent on all 4 sides but mostly notable on the side edges.

We are given the option of the filmmaker’s original production soundtrack via an uncompressed linear PCM mono track or the International post-synched track via standard Dolby Digital. Audio is a bit of a sore spot for some with Kes - but the inclusion of the DUB as well as optional subtitles should resolve any translation issues. Criterion Blu-ray disc is coded for region 'A'.

On the supplements - we are given quite a lot starting with Making Kes is a 45-minute video piece that features interviews with director Ken Loach, producer Tony Garnett, cinematographer Chris Menges, and actor David Bradley. Fall of 2010. The Southbank Show is from 1993 - an arts episode of the British program profiles director ken Loach. It features interviews with Loach, producer Tony Garnett, filmmakers Stephen Frears and Alan Parker, writer Jim Allen, and actor Ricky Tomlinson, among others. Cathy Come Home is a seventy-seven minute television drama (reviewed on out-of-print BFI DVD HERE) , an early film by director Ken Loach and producer Tony Garnett, was made for BBC's anthology series The Wednesday Play in 1966. It shows the visual grittiness and socio-political commitment that would be the hallmark of the work of Loach and Garnett throughout their careers. Also presented is a 2011 afterword (11:33) by film writer Graham Fuller. We also get a trailer and a 20-page liner notes booklet featuring an essay by Fuller.

Tremendous release by Criterion - probably an easy 'blind-buy' for many. This is a ginormous improvement over the MGM which is selling at an 81% reduction in price - however still the Criterion is the only way to go here and it has our highest recommendation! 

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ON THE MGM DVD (2003): 'The stingy MGM DVD shows some weaknesses - non-anamorphic and moderately hazy in spots - but is progressive and sports optional subtitles. Audio is unremarkable but close, I'll wager, to the way it was produced. Set to sell to a German audience as well - it has an optional Deutsche DUB (and subs). Good news again that I don't see excessive manipulation and the image is fairly clean.

The DVD inferiorities don't take away from the magnificence of the film one iota. This borders on essential cinema folks - a riveting and memorable piece of cinema. If there was a superior DVD version - we would probably recommend but this is it for now - and we've certainly seen worse. 

Gary W. Tooze