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The Beatles / A Hard Day’s Night blu-ray with new 5.1 soundtrack

By Paul Sinclair

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US cinephiles The Criterion Collection will reissue The Beatles‘ 1964 film A Hard Day’s Night on blu-ray and DVD in June this year.

This new edition features a 4K digital film restoration approved by director Richard Lester and of particular interest to music fans is the fact that it comes with two soundtrack options: mono and a new 5.1 surround soundtrack created by Apple Records, both of which are in uncompressed DTS-HD Master Audio on the blu-ray.

The release is full of bonus content and extras (see below), many of which are exclusive to the ‘dual format’ edition (basically the blu-ray version which comes with a DVD) so that’s the one to go for.

The bad news for fans outside the US is that Criterion discs are always region locked to North America, so you need to ensure you have a multi-region player to enjoy the spoils.

A Hard Day’s Night on blu-ray/DVD is out on 24 June 2014.

Blu-ray + DVD with exclusive content

DVD

A Hard Day’s Night – Disc Features:
Director Approved Edition:

  • • New 4K digital film restoration, approved by director Richard Lester, with two audio options—a monaural soundtrack and a new 5.1 surround soundtrack made by Apple Records—presented in uncompressed monaural and DTS-HD Master Audio on the Blu-ray (dual
  • • Audio commentary featuring various members of the film’s cast and crew (dual-format only)
  • • In Their Own Voices, a new piece combining interviews with the Beatles from 1964 with behind-the-scenes footage and photos
  • • You Can’t Do That: The Making of “A Hard Day’s Night,” a 1994 documentary program by producer Walter Shenson
  • • Things They Said Today, a 2002 documentary about the film featuring Lester, music producer George Martin, writer Alun Owen, cinematographer Gilbert Taylor, and others (dual-format only)
  • • New piece about Lester’s early work, featuring a new audio interview with the director (dual-format only)
  • • The Running Jumping and Standing Still Film (1959), Lester’s Oscar-nominated short featuring Peter Sellers and Spike Milligan (dual-format only)
  • • Anatomy of a Style, a new piece on Lester’s approach to editing (dual-format only)
  • • New interview with Mark Lewisohn, author of Tune In: The Beatles: All These Years—Volume One (dual-format only)
  • • Deleted scene (dual-format only)
  • • Trailers
  • • PLUS: An essay by critic Howard Hampton

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16 Comments

16 thoughts on “The Beatles / A Hard Day’s Night blu-ray with new 5.1 soundtrack”

  3. Pingback: The Beatles / A Hard Days Night / Restored European Blu-ray with 5.1 | superdeluxeedition

  6. Criterion releases are most often issued in the UK by Eureka. I’d look to Eureka as the most likely UK label to put this out. Usually it’s four to 6 months later…..

  8. It’s gonna cost around $40 to get it in from Amazon US. That’s not a bad price to pay for a Blu-ray Criterion edition of such a great movie.
    I passed on the last Blu-ray version after seeing/hearing at a friends. His set-up was much more advanced than mine but overall it was pretty bad.

    Let it Be, if released, would be the most divisive release in the catalogue if they did attempt it. The audio has morphed so much over the years, so much of the rehearsals have leaked out, i can’t imagine anything they put out, especially in Macca’s lifetime, that would satisfy the hordes.

  11. It’s possible but Criterion usually keep the extras they use to themselves. But I can see a 5.1 version Region 2 version coming out for sure, at least in time for the Christmas market.

  12. But surely there’ll be some release in the UK? These extras are brilliant, I can imagine some sort of slimmed down version coming out instead…

  13. If Apple Records have made a surround sound mix of The Beatles for this, it’s quite possible they’re working on other surround sound mixes too.

    Expect Blu-Ray audio discs to be announced before too long!

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