DVD details for for
Sjunde inseglet, Det (1957)

Michel Hafner (20 September 1999):
Ingmar Bergman's classic masterpiece Sjunde inseglet, Det (1957) is now available on a new DVD from Criterion. The booklet states that this is a fully digital new transfer from a new first generation interpositive. The digital version of the film has been cleaned up further with digital restoration methods. That sounds very promising. How does the resulting DVD look? In one word, very good.
The film master used, above mentioned interpositive, is in good shape. The digital clean up has removed a lot of speckles, scratches and the like (there is a demonstration clip on the DVD with before/after comparisons). There remain some minor problems, though. Not all speckles and scratches are gone. A couple of shots show stationary hairs, some others slight banding (negative damage). But these are minor points. The film element looks gorgeous for a film this age. Image steadiness is good.
Contrast rendition is first rate and exemplary for a reissue of a classic movie of any vintage. It rivals good 35 mm prints. The new digital transfer has worked wonders here. Sharpness is also very good and close to optimal in many shots. The noise and grain level is mostly low. A couple of shots (especially sky shots at the beginning) are a bit too grainy for my taste, but I was never distracted. Video artifacts are minimal. There are no over-enhanced edges, no objectionable aliasing and no noise suppression artifacts. There is a minor problem with slightly flickering fine image detail that is visible on high resolution progressive display systems. I'm not sure if it's a compression problem, a problem with the film scanning in the teleciné or a noise processing problem. I'm rating it as a compression problem for now. The average bit rate of about 8.0 MBit/s is high and takes full advantage of dual layer technology. There are no compression glitches. If there are visible artifacts it's the fine image detail problem mentioned above.
My overall verdict for this DVD is very positive. It looks significantly better than many current DVDs of much more recent films taken from the archives and hurried to the market the cheap way, to cash in and not much else (such as the dreadful Paramount reissues of Witness (1985) and Gallipoli (1981)). This DVD has been created from carefully restored suitable film elements and mastered to high quality standards. The resulting image quality is eye popping and will please on any kind of display system. High marks to Criterion! I can recommend this DVD without hesitation. Avoid the dreadful English soundtrack though. It's almost unlistenable compared to the Swedish original. Use the English subtitles instead if you don't understand Swedish. The commentary by Bergman biographer Peter Cowie is insightful and competent and an asset to this DVD edition. Don't miss it.