Thanks to Master Thief, I have corrected an error on the Akira Kurosawa DVDs page — the BFI release of High and Low is 2.35:1, not 2.55:1 as I had claimed following the research I did when writing the page. I don’t personally have a copy of the BFI disc, so I based my assumptions on various reviews that all claimed the film to be in 2.55:1, but following Master Thief’s remark I asked BFI about it, and they confirmed that it is indeed 2.35:1, which is also the original “Toho-Scope” aspect ratio.
The contact at BFI had something else to tell us as well, namely that “It’s my understanding that there are a small number of early Kurosawa titles to see release, but I can’t confirm titles or release dates at this time.” Time will tell which movies BFI is planning to release, and whether the rumoured “Early Kurosawa” box set that someone mentioned last autumn might indeed see the light of day.
Well the Reviews were right and BFI are wrong!
Check out these screen shots comparing the BFI with the Criterion:
http://kurosawa.jokerman.net/highlow.html