A richly layered and textured film that plays more like a novel than a movie. Almost entirely flawless. Every time you watch it, you get something new and pick it apart in fresh ways.
The 4K restoration is largely excellent, but I’m extremely conditioned to the last restoration circa 2007/2008. I’ve seen that one a million times. That restoration, supervised by Gordon Willis, was essentially bathed in yellow and red. No other tones. According to Willis, that’s his intention, but it doesn’t look good and I have a hard time believing he wanted everything to look like a magenta-stained yellow-tinted Blu-ray.
This 4K disc feels much more artful in its application of colour. It still feels like The Godfather, but it looks much more like 70s film stock. Grain is supple throughout, which is nice.
The one issue with the restoration is that it quickly reveals which sequences or shots they don’t have a good film reel for. The Godfather is 50 now and has never been in a good state. Once in a while, it shows.
4⁄5 for the restoration work, 5/5 for the movie.
The previous Blu-ray is still a great disc, if you have that and were thinking about upgrading. This restoration feels like it wiped a layer of Vaseline off it, though. It’s a massive improvement that my wife immediately noticed and commented on several times. But it’s a shame nobody is alive anymore who could really tell us how this looked in 1972. I don’t think any home video release has nailed it yet.