This DVD-R edition has been mastered from a very-good color-tinted 35mm nitrate print. A moderate but distractingly apparent amount of speckling and dust is present in the source material, which also is marred with light emulsion damage, schmutz, a few splices and light filmstock wear. The print may be missing its final seconds, as a finale title card (incorrectly) identifies the film as “A James Cruze Tiffany Production.”

The older analog full-frame video transfer is a little dark in its shadows, but is of reasonable quality in tonal ranges and image detail. Later in the film, the transfer is lighter in its highlights resulting in lost picture details, namely in faces.

The picture compression of the digital master is perhaps higher than it could have been, rendering a picture that is very-good on standard equipment but a little rough on HD equipment, with some horizontal elements like eyelids, mouths and table edges flickering between horizontal NTSC scan lines. Overall, the picture quality is only marginally better than could be rendered from an excellent 16mm reduction print.

The film is accompanied by an abruptly-edited compiled score of prerecorded film music from the 1930s that is functional but uncompelling. Despite its shortcomings, we recommend this home video edition of this small studio production.

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