The Castle of Cagliostro - Releases

Releases

In 1979, Toho released the original theatrical version. In 1991, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer created a subtitled version for American theatres. MGM/UA Home Video released the film on VHS in 1992 (dubbed by Carl Macek's Streamline Pictures), and Best Film and Video Corportion released it on VHS in 1993, again using the Streamline dub. Manga Entertainment in Australia and the UK purchased the license for the movie, using the Streamline dub. Then Manga Entertainment purchased the license for the movie from MGM in 1995 and has been in Manga's North American, Australian and English catalogues since then. Manga Entertainment lost the license in Australia to Manga's Distributor in 2007 to Madman Entertainment, whose DVD release featured the Streamline dub with anamorphic widescreen video and artwork exclusive to both the Australian and UK releases. Manga's previous version of Castle of Cagliostro in Australia was eventually pulled from Manga's and Madman's catalogues. In 2000, Manga Entertainment created an all-new dub.

Streamline's dub, while lauded for the overall acting talent of the voice cast, has been widely criticized for its retiming of the opening credits to remove all traces of Japanese writings, as well as for liberties taken with the translation of its dialogue.

Manga's new dub of Cagliostro has been praised for its overall faithfulness to the original Japanese dialogue, but criticized for its addition of profanity in some scenes. In addition, Manga's original DVD release has been criticized for lacking an anamorphic transfer (unlike the 1992 MGM/UA release of the Streamline dub) or any extras apart from previews for other Manga Video releases, and in the way its English titles are hard-matted onto the film's video image, obscuring parts of the screen behind them.

Optimum Releasing re-released Cagliostro in the UK after Manga Entertainment lost its license in the UK. The new DVD features an anamorphic widescreen print with the original Japanese audio track as well as the Streamline dub, both in stereo.

Manga released a new special edition DVD of Cagliostro in 2006. The disc is double-sided with the movie on side A and the extras on side B. It includes a new digital transfer; Manga's English dub in 2.0 and 5.1 surround plus Japanese, Spanish, and French language tracks in mono; the complete movie in storyboard format, accompanied by Japanese audio with English subtitles; an original Japanese trailer; a sketch and still gallery; a 26-minute interview with animation director Yasuo Ōtsuka, and animated menus. The movie is presented in 16:9 anamorphic widescreen; however, the opening credits, which feature Lupin and Jigen slowly making their way across Europe to the song "Fire Treasure", have been heavily re-edited to remove the Japanese credits, instead using selected still-frames of scenes that appear without Japanese writing. The English-translated names are superimposed over these stills. (This modified credits sequence is also present on the 2007 Australian DVD release by Madman Entertainment.) The DVD packaging of this special edition is strongly reminiscent of that of Disney's Studio Ghibli film releases.

In December 2008, the film was released on Blu-ray in Japan. Its video format is MPEG-4 AVC and its digitally-remastered audio is improved over that of the DVD. Optimum Releasing, now named StudioCanal, will release a Blu-ray and DVD bundle of the film on November 12, 2012 in the UK.