 |
DVD Title |
Lupin the III: The Castle of Cagliostro |
International Title |
Lupin
the Third: The Castle of Cagliostro |
DVD Length |
Original Length |
102 Minutes |
100 Minutes |
Company |
Year of Manufacture |
Manga Video |
2006 |
Language |
Subtitles |
Japanese, English,
Spanish, French |
English |
Region |
Number of Discs |
1 |
1 (Double Sided) |
Aspect Ratio |
Sound |
1.85:1 |
5.1 Surround, 2.0 Surround, 2.0 Mono |
Extras |
. |
Menus (English) |
. |
Chapters (12) |
. |
Trailers: Lupin the Third: Castle of
Cagliostro, Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie
(US DVD), Karas: The Prophecy (US),
Blood: The Last Vampire (US), Ghost
in the Shell: S.A.C. 2nd Gig (US), Tactics
(US) |
. |
Interview with animation director Yasuo Ohtsuka
(25 Minutes) |
. |
Complete Storyboards (99 minutes) |
. |
Photo Gallery (15) |
 |
|
Captures |
|
Review |
First off, yes Manga Video has shamelessly
copied the general look of Disney's Studio Ghibli
releases, complete with a red banner at the top
and a similar cardboard sleeve that comes packaged
over the amaray case. However, how does this release
stack up to Disney's efforts in the region 1 market
and Manga Video's own 2000 release of the title
(The
Castle of Cagliostro)? Unfortunately,
the video presentation is actually a grade down
from the previous effort in some respects, although
this disc sports an excellent audio presentation
and a good sized collection of supplemental content,
which is located on the flip side of the disc.
|
Video: |
 |
Why Manga Video? Honestly, the video presentation
on this disc isn't bad by any stretch; however,
I was expecting a stark improvement over the 2000
release while this disc instead took several steps
backwards in some respects. First off, on the
positive side, the video here looks much sharper
than the previous release while artifacting has
been reduced, although it's still noticeable in
some parts. Also, in terms of grain present, both
releases tend to be fairly even in this respect,
although the 2006 release looks like it had minor noise reduction applied.
On the other hand, the disc's biggest detractor
is the travesty that was done to the movie's opening
credits. For this release, Manga Video took out
the fully animated segment here and literally
replaced it with a "slide show" of grainy
screen captures with English
text and logos placed over it. This might
not have been so bad if that sequence wasn't originally
so brilliant in itself, showing both Lupin and
Jigen traveling across countries toward Cagliostro.
The ending of the movie was also altered, although
this time the only thing that was changed was
"The End" was removed and the end song
is looped several times to accommodate the English
credits (which look badly compressed and hard
to read).
Another unfortunate aspect of this release is
that the colors aren't nearly as vibrant as the
2000 release. Something which is very apparent
in a side-by-side comparison, such as the following
three examples:
2000
vs. 2006
2000
vs. 2006
2000
vs. 2006
The difference really is night and day. Of course
the sharpness and reduction of artifacting does
help this release a lot in its video presentation;
however, I don't think it was too much to have
expected the overall video quality to have been
an improvement over its predecessor, instead of
succeeding in some respects and failing in others.
Castle of Cagliostro is presented
in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and is
Anamorphic for widescreen TVs.
|
Audio: |
 |
This release really shines over its predecessor
in the audio department. In total, there are five
tracks present. Of those five, the two English
dubs (same dubbing as the 2000 release for reference)
are the only surround presentations, which are
5.1 and 2.0 respectively. Unfortunately, these
don't sound like pure surround tracks, which is
especially noticeable on the songs as the audio
sounds identical across the English and Japanese
tracks. In other words, the dubbed portions and
some of the "new" audio effects sound
to be enhanced for surround, but not the music
or other parts taken from the Japanese audio track.
Speaking of, the Japanese mono track here is in
excellent shape, a vast improvement over the slightly
muddled and distorted Japanese track that appeared
in the 2000 release.
This disc also comes with two more mono audio
tracks, one dubbed in Spanish and the other French.
Unfortunately the audio on these is more muddled,
not sounding as clear as the Japanese or English
tracks but still pretty good regardless.
The audio can be accompanied by, removable, English
subtitles that correspond to the Japanese track.
|
|
Extras: |
 |
Manga Video has packed this release with extra
content, although sadly most of it isn't all that
interesting. To that point I must unfortunately
admit that the best extra here is acutally the
original Japanese trailer, which is in excellent
condition. The other standout extra is the storyboard
feature, which runs 99 minutes long, same as the
movie. This extra is accompanied by the film's
Japanese track with English subtitles (removable),
and is a full length rendering of what the movie
looked like when it was story boarded. How many
people are interested in this is hard to say,
a similar feature is found on all of the recent
Hayao
Miyazaki DVDs from Disney, although its
inclusion is welcome.
Another supplemental feature is an interview
with animation director Yasuo Ohtsuka, which runs
for an impressive 25 minutes. Unfortunately, the
interviewer didn't appear to do his homework for
this session, as questions like if Ohtsuka was
a fan of Lupin before making the film are stated...
even though Ohtsuka was behind the character's
very first television show. The interview in general
also has very little to do with the Castle
of Cagliostro, as most of the conversation
tends to drift toward the Lupin character in general
or just modern animation. Overall, it's interesting
in parts, although tends to overstay its welcome
for its long duration.
The last extra, not counting the English adverts
for other Manga Video titles, is a short photo
gallery for the film. Some of these are concept
art, which is nice to see although all of it is
badly cropped in order to fit inside a tiny
display window (...why was this done?). The
rest of the shots appear to be just screen captures
or possibly promotional stills. It's hard to say,
really, as the presentation is so small, but all
of the segments are directly from sequences in
the film.
On a final note, the sound on the menus here
is sadly unbalanced. For example, menus like the
"Audio Setup" have background music
that's incredibly loud, especially compared to
the audio level of the main feature, which is
just jarring and makes the title feel rushed.
|
Overview: |
 |
Bottom line, this is still, despite all of
my complaints, a fairly good release. However,
its definitely disappointing in some respects
and not quite the vast improvement over the earlier
release that I was hoping for. If someone has
never owned the movie on DVD before, then this
is a great disc to get started with the magnificent
film. However, if one already owns the 2000 release
then it's hard to suggest picking the newer version
up except to completists or if they happen to
locate this disc at a very reasonable price. Those
with widescreen TVs will of course be advised
to pick this up, though, considering that this
is the first region 1 release of the title that
supports an Anamorphic widescreen presentation.
|
- Anthony Romero |
Buy
this DVD |
|