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

ADDITION: Janus Contemporaries Blu-ray (August 2025): Criterion have transferred Maura Delpero's Vermiglio to Blu-ray. This 1080P transfer enhances the film's painterly aesthetic, emphasizing the hazy, melancholic beauty of the remote village setting and allowing the natural light and seasonal shifts to shine through with remarkable clarity and depth, making it an ideal showcase for home viewing that rivals theatrical quality. The HD presentation boasts complex, deep colors across snowy landscapes, rustic interiors, and period costumes, with natural skin tones and impeccable fine detail in fabrics, faces, and environmental textures, all presented without noise, compression artifacts, or instability. It's as flawless as you might imagine a 2024 film to look on digital.

NOTE: We have added 52 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Criterion use a DTS-HD Master 5.1 surround track (24-bit) in the original Italian language. Sound design amplifies "off" noises - wind, household clatter, diegetic music like Chopin, Schubert, Vivaldi or local songs - enhancing the interdependent community feel. Matteo Franceschini's sparse score and diegetic music, such as the Vivaldi (The Four Seasons - Summer: I - Allegro non molto) from a gramophone, are reproduced with fidelity and subtle low-end texture, ensuring the track thrives in quiet moments and transports viewers into the era's raw, unadorned reality without any distortion or imbalance. Janus Contemporaries offer optional English subtitles on their Region 'A'-locked Blu-ray.

The extras on this Janus Contemporaries Blu-ray release are modest - standard for one of their series editions. Supplements are headlined by "Meet the Filmmakers," a new dozen minute video interview with director Maura Delpero discussing her entry into filmmaking, the story's development from family lore, location shooting, authenticity, and visual inspirations. Also included is the film's theatrical trailer along with a fold-out leaflet featuring an essay titled "Vermiglio: Slow Thaw" by Michael Joshua Rowin, which offers thoughtful analysis of the film's themes of isolation, family dynamics, and historical context.

Maura Delpero's Vermiglio stands as a poignant and meticulously crafted Italian drama, marking her sophomore feature following the acclaimed Maternal (2019.) Set in the remote Alpine village of Vermiglio during the final throes of World War II in 1944-1945, the film draws from Delpero's family lore. Inspired by a dream involving her late father as a child handing her a story, Delpero constructs an intimate epic that eschews overt spectacle for subtle, observational storytelling, capturing the rhythms of rural life amid encroaching historical tumult. The film's structure, divided into four seasons, mirrors the cyclical, nature-dependent existence of its inhabitants, contrasting their isolated world with the linear disruptions of war, while emphasizing themes of endurance, transformation, and the quiet rebellions within tradition. Thematically, Vermiglio delves into the insidious reach of war on personal spheres, portraying it not through battles but via psychological ripples - desertion, PTSD, and disrupted family bonds - that infiltrate the village's precarious isolation. Motherhood and female identity emerge as profound motifs, with Adele's endless childbearing symbolizing sacrifice and resilience, and daughters like Lucia and Ada navigating yearning, resentment, and self-discovery within conservative confines, often compounded by faith. Overall, the Criterion Blu-ray edition stands as a worthy addition to any collection, balancing intimacy and epic scope in a package that invites repeated viewings and reflection on a bygone era. I loved Vermiglio as much as I did Janus Contemporaries' Godland by Hlynur Pálmason. Magnificent world cinema. A very strong recommendation.

Gary Tooze