Other Releases Available:

Releases Reviewed:

There are far too many releases for Carnival of Souls out there for me to try to cover them all. It's positively soul-crushing, but I'm here to keep your soul from being crushed! I'll try to hit a few of the most notable versions I've noticed. You can get it for next to nothing, and you can spend some cash on it.

You can buy it by itself and in numerous different multi-packs including at least one Blu-ray set. The most notable of these is the 50 pack of "Horror Classics."

I've only see the Horror Classics version.

Video:

1.33: There is no widescreen version. It looks decent for such an old movie though I have no doubt that the enhanced transfers would be far better. This one is a bit fuzzy and has some trash in the image though not nearly as much as some of its peers.

Audio:

1.0 mono: It's fair quality, dated without question but acceptable.

Packaging:

This particular disc is housed in a cardboard sleeve contained in a Velcro-fastened box. You can read about the set as a whole in great detail in the Horror Classics (50 pack) guide.

Extras:

There are no extras of any kind.

Other Editions:

The Ultimate Horror Classics Blu collection seems to be part of a slowly growing trend (or perhaps attempt at a trend) of using Blu's storage capacity to fit a lot of movies on a single disc. 18 public domain films (some very common, some fairly rare) reside on a single disc in standard 480i definition (no HD here). The best I can say for these is that they seem to occasionally present the original image ratios and may be very slightly improved quality over some of the cheaper DVD budget packs. Otherwise they offer nothing special aside from being exceptionally self-space friendly. They offer no extras and can be somewhat hard to find.

The most notable stand-alone release appears to be the Criterion Collection which is a 2 disc offering. It boasts a new digital transfer, theatrical and extended versions of the film, and numerous extras including a commentary, at least a couple of documentaries, over 45 minutes of outtakes, a look at the filming locations, and several features based around the Centron Corporation.

The Mike Nelson Collector's Edition offers a color version plus the original black-&-white along with a restored and enhanced transfer. It lists no extras.

There's a RiffTrax comedy version available as well.

Otherwise the offerings appears to be no different than the 50 pack version.

Final Thoughts:

The 50 pack is a good way to get a sampling of a lot of movies for very cheap. It offers an acceptable if unimpressive presentation. If you're really a fan, the Criterion release is the way to go with the Mike Nelson release being a median of higher movie quality (assuming the enhanced transfer is done well) without the cost of all the Criterion bells and whistles.