Notorious (1946)

Criterion booklet:

The original monaural soundtrack was first restored in 2001 from a 1954 35mm acetate release print and a 35mm nitrate fine-grain master. Additional restoration work was performed by the Criterion Collection for this release, using Pro Tools HD and iZotope RX.

If these are the best extant sound elements for this film, that'd be a real shame -- because it sounds pretty dire to me. I do like the Criterion blu-ray most, though.

The 2001 Criterion DVD, the 2017 Carlotta DVD, and the Criterion 1990 LaserDisc sound pretty similar, with the latter having significantly more ticks and pops and slightly more detail. These three all have a thin, 'pinched' quality to them, and less bass character than the Criterion blu-ray. Whether or not this is the result of EQ, I don't know -- but the Criterion blu-ray sounds consistently more natural throughout.

I'm generally pretty against EQing the thinness out of these old films, but that's because doing so usually makes the rest of the film sound odd. But here it works, if that was indeed what was done, and I'd say the majority of the film sounds better for it.

All four of these have roughly the same amount of hiss and high-frequency extension, but the MGM blu-ray is audibly worse.