Millenium Actress is my favourite Satoshi Kon film, so I finally put out some cash and purchased the blu-ray, motivated in part by this excellent “Satoshi Kon – Editing Space And Time” video which reminded me of Satoshi’s cinematic brilliance.

This is a strictly barebones release, with none of the excellent supplementary materials ( storyboard book, postcards, a 2nd making of disc ) that came with the deluxe DVD boxset. The only materials on the disc besides the film itself is an audio commentary and a couple of theatrical trailer/TV spots.

The quality of the video is great; images are sharp and crisp, and colors are dynamic and vibrant ( within the context of the film’s original color palette ). Definitely a step up or two from the dvd.

And now for the bad news. There are no English subtitles, which is really dumb as it was present in the Japanese dvd release. How hard is it to carry that over to this new print ?

This effectively renders an otherwise masterful anime unwatchable for non Japanese speakers, very uncool, Bandai Visual.

Given that the chances of a US blu-ray release is relatively slim ( this film probably isn’t as popular or well known as Paprika to warrant a release ), fans of Satoshi Kon wishing to enjoy this amazing film in HD video will find it difficult to do so.

Update Dec 2019 – Millenium Actress is now available on this English blu-ray. Purchase links below :

Amazon purchase link for the Millennium Actress blu-ray ( Japanese edition ) here.

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