The Killer

First things first - don't watch the film dubbed into English. Even if you can see past Chow Yun Fat's character, you can't cope with the bad translation - not even bad amusing. I don't know who thought it necessary to place English dialogue on scenes, just because you can't see the actors' lips moving, but they're a bally fool. Watch it in the original Cantonese, and be thankful the subtitles have been translated half decently.

The sound quality of the Cantonese and English audio tracks is pretty good. Better sounding gunshots in some of the scenes would have been nice, but for the most part the 5.1 audio will be appreciated.

The remastered print is the biggest selling point of this DVD for fans. It's crisp and bright, with no noticeable scratches, or artifacting. Check out the deleted scenes, or earlier video releases of The Killer, to see just how great this remastering is. Hong Kong Legends deserve immeasurable praise for having made The Killer look as good as it possibly could be.

They also deserve praise for putting together an excellent selection of extras. The three interviews are just the right length, and don't stick rigidly to talking about the film, allowing for some interesting insights, in particular from Kenneth Tsang. Bey Logan's audio commentary is jam packed with facts and opinion. He's eloquent and engaging throughout, even though his encyclopedic knowledge can be a little overwhelming at times. Even the trailers for other films feel like they've been included because you might be interested in them, rather than just to sell more DVDs.

Only one of the five deleted scenes is longer than about fifteen seconds, and even that isn't worth watching, other than to see the quality of the remastering. The top level of the navigation menus is a little confusing, having titles such as "Fire", "Aim", "Reload" and "Wiretap", instead of play, scene selection, audio setup and extras.

These are just minor flaws in what is a great DVD of a great film.