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

ADDITION: Criterion Blu-ray (June 2021): Criterion have transferred Howard Hawks' Bringing Up Baby to Blu-ray. It is advertised as a "New, restored 4K digital transfer". The 1080P image distinguishes itself from the SD transfers with a very healthy amount of grain textures. The contrast is superior with more pronounced black levels. It loses a shade of information on the right and top edges - gaining more on the bottom and left sides of the frame. Detail significantly tightens in the higher resolution but still has the inherent softness of the original production. I don't think it can look much better in this format - it's on a dual-layered disc with a max'ed out bitrate.

NOTE: There was a poor quality Japanese Blu-ray that came out in 2019 HERE.  

NOTE: We have added 74 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Criterion use a linear PCM mono track (24-bit) in the original English language. There are modest effects and the sound is authentically flat and a bit hollow. The, uncredited, score by Roy Webb (They Won't Believe Me, Crossfire, Clash by Night, I Married a Witch, This Is Cinerama, Easy Living, The Window, Fixed Bayonets, Journey Into Fear, I Walked with a Zombie etc.) keeps pace with the screwball antics. Some will recognize I Can't Give You Anything but Love sung a cappella by Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant. Criterion offer optional English subtitles on their Region 'A' / 'B' Blu-ray.

The Criterion Blu-ray include the 2005 audio commentary featuring filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich where he talks about his conversations with Hawks, the sophistication of Bringing Up Baby, other screwball comedies, how Cary Grant's character resembles Harold Lloyd, he mentions Chaplin, filming at night, the difficulties of making a comedy with an animal (identifying rear-projection shots) and he frequently has a good laugh while he's watching. There are gaps but it still has value and with the indulgence (or re-listen.) I enjoyed the new 19-minute video essay on actor Cary Grant by Scott Eyman, author of Cary Grant: A Brilliant Disguise. He discusses the actor's early career. Criterion include a new 11-minute interview about cinematographer Russell Metty with cinematographer John Bailey recorded in March 2021. In it, Bailey discusses Bringing Up Baby director of photography Metty, along with several scenes from the film. There is also a new dozen-minute interview with film scholar Craig Barron on special-effects pioneer Linwood Dunn. Barron discusses the career of visual-effects pioneer Dunn, including his work on Bringing Up Baby. There is a new, 22-minute, selected-scene commentary about costume designer Howard Greer featuring costume historian Shelly Foote. Foote discusses the career of designer Greer and examines some of the garments he created for Bringing Up Baby. Included is Howard Hawks: A Hell of a Good Life, a 1977 documentary by Hans-Christoph Blumenberg. In November 1977, filmmaker Blumenberg shot the last interview with director Howard Hawks, who died the following month. An intimate visit with Hawks at his home in Palm Springs, California, the resulting film premiered at the Berlin Film Festival in February 1978 before airing on West German television later that year. It runs shy of an hour. There is a 36-minute audio interview with Grant recorded on October 6th, 1969, after a screening of Bringing Up Baby as part of a 'Hollywood in the Thirties' film series presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. In it, Grant answers questions from the audience about the film and his career. There are audio excerpts from a 1972 conversation between Hawks and Bogdanovich for 1/4 hour recorded in Palm Springs, in 1972. Lastly, is a trailer and the package has a liner notes booklet with an essay by critic Sheila O’Malley and, for the Blu-ray, the 1937 short story by Hagar Wilde on which the film is based.

One of the most enjoyable of the Screwball comedies - one might aptly say "quintessential" for the genre. Howard Hawks' Bringing Up Baby has slapstick and romance, less frenetic than His Girl Friday but timeless in its joy of unfettered Susan Vance (Katharine Hepburn) seeking fun... and a man - in the guise of button-down David Huxley (Cary Grant) - eccentrically stuck in his own world. Great dialogue, some famously improvised lines, and... a leopard. It seems we've waited so long to have this pure classic on Blu-ray. Thanks Criterion. Our highest recommendation!

Gary Tooze