Some pictures of the Criterion Collection release of The Infernal Affairs Trilogy (2002/2003) by Hong Kong directors Andrew Lau / Alan Mak, a crime drama series with a really well written and engaging narrative that dare I say is the exception rather than the norm for most Hong Kong films ( for the first 2 films in the series, at least ).

Another stand-out feature of the series is the great photography; one of the directors Andrew Lau honed his craft as a cinematographer for other well known filmmakers like Ringo Lam, Wong Jing and Wong Kar-wai before helming his own movies. In addition, DP Christopher Doyle also served as a visual consultant.

Here are some pictures of the blu-ray set and its contents;

DIRECTOR-APPROVED THREE-BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

– New 4K digital restorations, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks
– Audio commentaries for Infernal Affairs and Infernal Affairs II featuring codirectors Andrew Lau Wai-keung and Alan Mak and screenwriter Felix Chong Man-keung
– Alternate ending for Infernal Affairs
– New interview with Lau and Mak
– Archival interviews with Lau, Mak, Chong, and actors Andy Lau Tak-wah, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Anthony Wong Chau-sang, Kelly Chen Wai-lam, Edison – Chen Koon-hei, Eric Tsang Chi-wai, and Chapman To Man-chak
– Making-of programs
– Behind-the-scenes footage, deleted scenes, and outtakes
– Trailers
– New English subtitle translations
– PLUS: An essay by film critic Justin Chang

On a completely layman’s level of understanding and purely by eyeballing, I could not discern a huge difference in the image quality of the 4K restored versions of the three films in this collection as compared to older copies of the films I already own. That’s not to say that the image quality is bad; but for anyone planning to acquire this set with expectations that the fidelity of the video will be significantly better, they are likely to be disappointed.

For the supplementary materials, the interview with both the directors recorded by Criterion especially for this release is the most illuminating and interesting for me. For example, Alan Mak mentioned that John Woo’s Face/Off was one of the inspiration before Infernal Affairs; he had found the idea/concept of the protagonist/antagonist switching physical identities rather absurd, but he wanted to explore the mental aspects of that idea in a film, which became the basis behind Infernal Affairs.

Most of the other making of programs featured in the set were made to promote the film during their releases and I found them to be mostly fluff, and not particularly well edited.

I acquired this set at a discount during Amazon’s 2022 Black Friday sales, so it was great value for money, but for those who already own versions of the films and are thinking of an upgrade, you might want to wait for a discount before you pull the trigger.

Buy From Amazon CA | Amazon JP | Amazon UK | Amazon FR | Amazon IT | Amazon DE | Amazon ES

You might also be interested in these items :