While the video on the 2016 Shochiku blu-ray (made from the new 4K restoration) is mostly* pristine, the audio is utterly devoid of all vitality.
All frequencies above ~5 kHz are gone in an attempt to rid the track of its high-frequency distortion. There are plenty of age-related issues present on the BFI track, the most intrusive of which is probably the crackle that underlies all dialogue, but its removal should have been done delicately (i.e. conservatively) or not at all. High-pass filtering has also removed bass frequencies, so male voices and especially the music--listen to the final notes of the score as the film ends--sound utterly dreadful.
Tuesday 13 September 2016
All dialogue, music, and sound effects are affected.
How anyone in the business believes this sounds better is beyond me.
But when Criterion inevitably uses the same master to produce some future blu-ray and the disc is eventually reviewed, I'm sure it'll receive positive feedback on the audio front, commending its lack of hiss and improvement in depth.
The old Criterion DVD was sourced from the same master as the BFI blu-ray. Its audio sounds like the BFI.
--
*Most of the film looks like this:
...which is to say fantastic.
But one sequence looks like this:
...showing evidence of heavy DNR. This lasts for 30 seconds, so I assume some dupey element had to be used for just this one bit. I don't understand why its grain had to be scrubbed away and replaced with fine noise to match the rest of the film, though. Not to this extent, at least.
For the hell of it, here are two stability comparisons with the new restoration: 1, 2
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