Read my review of KANSAS CITY CONFIDENTIAL
This public domain title arrives in an AVC encoded 1080p edition from Film Chest. It was sourced from a good 35mm print. The restoration process has left the image clean of dirt and damage, while retaining a fairly consistent sharp picture. The black levels are like ink and contrast is balanced well.
The sound comes in Dolby 5.1 and 2.0 options. The non-lossless 5.1 track is not immersive, because the original sound design was in mono. The 2.0 soundtrack is much closer to the original. That said, the dialogue heavy film has all its elements balanced cleanly. The track source is pretty much free of pops or damage and the hiss is not overbearing. The only real noticeable problem would be the highs and lows don't have the perfect range.
A good way of looking at the quality of this release is to cop are it to a similar release. I recently reviewed Film Chest's Blu-ray release of Orson Welles' THE STRANGER. The restoration process equally cleaned up the picture, but left it far softer than this crime tale. The white balance and gray scale range are much better here too. As for the soundtrack, KCC certainly came from a better source. As I said about that release, this might not be the absolute best you could get, but for the price it's certainly worth it.
The special features are minimum. There is the theatrical trailer and a restoration demo.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
