Film Credits

Screenplay by: Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, Howard Koch

Directed by: Michael Curtiz

Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet, Dooley Wilson, Marcel Dalio, S.Z. Sakall, Joy Page

Review

Many people find Voyager's CAV-only "Criterion Collection" releases a wonderful addition to their collection, not only because of the first-rate print and transfer quality, but because of all the exciting extras that pop up on their discs. For those of you who either aren't interested in using your special effects functions, don't care about the extra features, or simply find the CAV edition out of your price range, you'll be glad to know there's an alternative. Voyager just reissued four popular CAV-only titles in lower-priced CLV editions: Casablanca, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Silverado and Some Like it Hot.

The first one I'll take a look at is Casablanca, originally released by Voyager just over two years ago in a lovely CAV edition (reviewed February 1990, issue #7). This new CLV edition employs the same transfer as their CAV edition - a 35mm nitrate archival fine-grain master archival negative to a digital video master - and the image quality of both editions is identical. Contrasts are stunning and the picture is overall sharp and clean; some scenes are soft and/or a little grainy, and there's one nasty splice on side one at 57m39s. The opening credits are banded (windowboxed) very slightly on all four sides, but the remainder of the film appears full screen.

The digital RCA mono soundtrack is also identical to that present on the original CAV edition, being in marvelous shape but with a slight hiss betraying it's age. The analog track also retains the original dual audio formatting, featuring the soundtrack on analog 1 (left) and a decent audio essay by Ronald Haver on analog 2 (right). Due to the dual-audio nature of the disc, it has not been CX-encoded.

For the original CAV edition, Ronald Haver also supplied a rather lengthy cover essay on the film. That essay is reprinted here, but as the CLV edition doesn't have a gatefold jacket to continue the cover essay onto, an insert sheet is included instead. Casablanca was pressed at Pioneer and contains 23 listed chapter markers.

Review

• Mastered from a 35mm nitrate archival fine-grain master archival negative to digital video master
• Audio commentary by Ronald Haver (analog 2, right)
• Insert sheet