We are grateful to Kino International and to video producer Bret Wood for putting together what can confidently be called the best home video edition of this great film available today. The 35mm source print for the Kino video transfer appears to originate from the same original print used for the video edition produced by Kevin Brownlow and David Gill for Thames Television, which was released in America on HBO/Image laserdisc and VHS in 1989. Print scratches and flaws in both editions appear to be the same. There is a fine patina of emulsion scuffing in some shots of the original release print, and at times there is more prominent print damage that does occasionally distract the viewer such as dust, emulsion speckling and chipping, and long vertical aperture scratches. However, the print is largely in very good condition, featuring sharp image details and a broad range of greytones, reproduced in the Kino edition in retrained sepia and color tones.

An A-B comparison of DVD and laserdisc clearly shows that the Kino video transfer on DVD tops the Brownlow-Gill transfer on laserdisc in several respects. The Kino transfer cropping reveals a little more image at the top and bottom of the picture and quite a bit more at the right side when compared to the Brownlow-Gill edition. The street shots in the Kino transfer beginning at 32:09 and 33:41 clearly show the character Evil Eye, in the far right portion of the picture, leaning against a wall watching Lucy across the street. Yet in the Brownlow-Gill transfer he is all but totally cropped out of the picture, logically compromising the shot. We are considerably impressed with the sharp detail definition of the Kino transfer on DVD compared to the softer transfer of the Brownlow-Gill laserdisc (which may in part be the result of an late 1980s analog PAL format conversion to NTSC format). This new Kino transfer is also a vast improvement over the 1999 David Shepard-produced DVD edition of Broken Blossoms, which was considerably compromised by a contrasty video transfer with deep, over-saturated shadows.

For us, the only shortcoming in the Kino edition was the new music score by Joseph Turrin, which was performed on synthesizers and digital piano. Our mild objections to the new score is nothing more than nitpicking since the tasteful Turrin score is a well-composed and well-recorded musical complement to the film, but we still hold on to our sentimental preference for the orchestral arrangement by Carl Davis of the original 1919 music score available in the Brownlow-Gill edition. The original score’s ominous musical approach avoids the slightly-overstated heavy-handedness of Turrin’s score during the Battling Burrows sequences. We also prefer true orchestras to synthetic orchestras. Our objection is not so much with the use of synthesizers per se (we certainly understand the economic reasons for using synthesizers to score home video editions of silent films) but with the artificial voices and timbres of synthesizers, which seem technologically and esthetically out of place accompanying most silent era films.

DVD editions of silent films have mostly been bare-bones affairs — chapter stops and little more. However, Kino producer Bret Wood has compiled a number of extras accompanying this DVD edition. The special features includes an introduction and epilogue to Broken Blossoms by Lillian Gish taken from the Paul Killiam-produced weekly television series The Silent Years, shot on film in (we think) the 1960s. Among other tidbits, Gish recalls how she developed the bit of acting business where she uses her fingers to push the corners of her mouth into an artificial smile to please her abusive father. To fill out the original television time slot, the epilogue includes lengthy exerpts from Romola (1924), starring Lillian Gish, Dorothy Gish and William Powell. The disc’s special features also includes the complete text (in 27 frames) of the Burke short story on which the film was based, notes on the music score by and a bio of composer Joseph Turrin (in 8 frames, photo included), and exerpts from Photoplay interviews with D.W. Griffith on leading ladies (in 3 frames). All text is very readable on any size television screen. A highlight in the special features is the performance by Joseph Turrin of the song “Broken Blossoms” by Robert Edgar Long and Louis F. Gottschalk, presented with on-screen music notation and just-readable lyrics duplicated from the original sheet music. Even the main menu shows the care given to this DVD edition. A simple motion and sound loop of Lillian Gish as Lucy quietly sitting on the London docks, with lapping water, distant gulls and a nautical bell, graces the main menu screen.

For years we have been an enthusiastic proponent of the Brownlow-Gill edition of Broken Blossoms on home video. But now we highly recommend this new Kino home video edition, that is head and shoulders above any other, for its sharp, pleasing new video transfer, the handful of DVD extras, and for its clearly recorded and sophisticated music score in Dolby Digital stereo.

USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
Canada: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD edition from Amazon.ca. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

This original Kino DVD edition is virtually identical to the 2002 edition reviewed above.

USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 1 NTSC DVD edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
Canada: Click the logomark at right to purchase this Region 1 NTSC DVD edition from Amazon.ca. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

An A-B comparison of this DVD and Image Entertainment’s 1989 laserdisc version of David Gill and Kevin Brownlow’s presentation of Broken Blossoms reveals deficiencies in the video transfers of both the DVD and laserdisc editions. In addition to the darkness of David Shepard’s DVD version, that transfer overcrops the bottom of the picture by about 5 percent. The DVD does reveal more picture information, on the other hand, on the top and the sides of the frame. The result is that heads are nearly always in the frame, but many close-ups of Lillian Gish (who was, we think, deliberately shot low in the frame to give the effect of her being smaller than an adult) seem too low in the resultant framing. In the laserdisc edition Donald Crisp’s head is occasionally cut off at the hairline but the framing seems more natural. Toward the end of the film the DVD framing is vertically almost identical to that of the laserdisc, with the same additional amount of picture as seem earlier on both sides of the frame. The DVD could have considerably improved by slightly shrinking and windowboxing the picture to ensure a maximum viewable area on all televisions. From the final boxing sequence onward, the DVD projection rate increases and runs slightly faster than the laserdisc transfer.

The laserdisc version features a clearer, brighter video transfer. Background and shadow details are fully visible. The trade-off is that the laserdisc version has less detail in brighter areas such as faces and light clothing. At times, the laserdisc picture is overexposed compared to the DVD, with details lost in a — at times — too-bright transfer. The laserdisc has a softer picture quality, partially due to the laserdisc’s smaller number of picture resolution lines and also, we think, the result of downconverting an original PAL videotape transfer to NTSC. Ultimately, despite these minor shortcomings, we feel that the best home video presentation of Broken Blossoms remains Image Entertainment’s out-of-print laserdisc version (catalog number ID6861HB). The stereo music soundtrack adaptation by Carl Davis of Louis F. Gottschalk’s 1919 score adds immensely to the dramatic impact of the film. The DVD features a low-fidelity mono orchestral score that is serviceable.

Copies of the out-of-print laserdisc may possibly be found at auction on eBay, but for DVD collectors we recommend the Kino editions above.

USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 1 NTSC DVD edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
Canada: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 1 NTSC DVD edition from Amazon.ca. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

North American collectors will need a region-free PAL DVD player capable of outputting an NTSC-compatible signal to view this edition.

United Kingdom: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 2 PAL DVD edition from Amazon.co.uk. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

North American collectors will need a region-free PAL DVD player capable of outputting an NTSC-compatible signal to view this edition.

United Kingdom: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 2 PAL DVD edition from Amazon.co.uk. Support Silent Era.

This budget DVD edition has been mastered from a very-good 16mm reduction print, and is accompanied by the orchestral soundtrack from a 1930s sound rerelease of the film. The source print has a reasonable range of greytones, but shadows remain dark, as in most prints of the film, and image details are soft. Because the video transfer has been made from a sound print that runs at 24 frames a second, the action moves unnaturally fast, accounting for the difference in running time compared to the silent-speed editions noted above.

A faint Alpha Video logo appears in the upper right-hand corner of the main title card. Thankfully, it doesn’t appear throughout the film.

This inexpensive edition is watchable, but we still recommend the 2001 Kino edition noted above.

USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.
Canada: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition from Amazon.ca. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

The film is likely accompanied by a soundtrack compiled from preexisting recordings.

USA: Click the logomark to purchase this Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition from Amazon.com. Your purchase supports Silent Era.

Other silent era LILLIAN GISH films available on home video.

Other silent era RICHARD BARTHELMESS films available on home video.