The Story of the Last Chrysanthemum (1939)

The audio track on the new Shochiku blu-ray of the recent 4K restoration has been heavily processed in an attempt to scrub it clean of high-frequency hiss and crackle. Ironically, what's left sounds dirtier and grungier than before, the low-frequency distortion now much more prominent in the mix.

Voices are far less natural, music no longer sounds like music, and it's difficult to discern exactly what's going on in the film without relying exclusively on subtitles.

The Artificial Eye blu-ray's audio track sounds superb. From my experience comparing Shochiku's other recent audio clean-up jobs, I must conclude that both audio tracks were probably from the same analogue source, and that the differences here should be attributed to irresponsible digital processing.

[Comparisons moved to new post]

The little gaps in the AE track are actually silence, usually during scene changes (suggesting that the AE team had to do some sync work), but none are truly noticeable.

Here's a direct comparison for your viewing displeasure:

(The video is from the Shochiku disc only.)