West Side Story (English, French, German, Blu-ray disc)

Reviews

"Eye-popping colour in this Blu-ray release" by Dirk Joubert - 29 July 2017

When 20th Century Fox first released this 50th Anniversary edition of WEST SIDE STORY in 2011, they made a mistake on the release disk which ONLY movie buffs and musical enthusiasts like me would notice. Unfortunately for them, there are thousands of people like me and they complained very loudly. So much so, that Fox agreed to correct the mistake and issue a new replacement disk free of charge to anybody who had bought the movie. This they did in 2012. To somebody who has never seen the movie or young people who were not exposed to the manner in which a movie of this magnitude was shown in a cinema it would pass unnoticed. But for those of us who are buying it to recreate our movie experiences of 50 years ago, it is cinematic blasphemy! The restorers replaced a cross-fade from the graphic art in the overture to the opening title with a fade to black. This breaks the continuity and ruins the sensational Saul Bass graphic design. You can watch the comparison on YouTube if you are interested to see what I’m talking about. So for any movie buffs out there wondering if this is the corrected version. YES, IT IS! However, the bad news is that the correction is almost as bad as the original mistake. The fade to black has been replaced with a fade to green and then immediately to blue (it should have gone directly to blue). NOT good! But this is a minor criticism. This reworked Blu-ray presentation is just sensational! The colours are eye-popping, from Bernados red shirt against the red wall to the mauves and purples of the rooftop scene and rusts and browns of the dance at the Gym. And the whole movie is as crisp as new toast. The digitally restored soundtrack is an absolute marvel and the surround-sound makes ample use of the rear speakers giving you that true "enveloped in sound" sensation. The second disk is jam-packed with great bonus material, a lot of it is new so it was not available on the original DVD release. You can also use the "Pow! The Dances of West Side Story" mode and automatically jump from dance to dance. This is a MUST have for any serious collector of movies.