5/5 1975 KUBRICK FILM
  by Dr. Feelgood (USA)
One interesting aspect of this film, is the way in which the story, of Redmond Barry, is told, through narration, and film visualiztion, as presented by Kubrick. The character, Barry, not a likable person, and one of Ryan O'Neal's best performances, does manage to gain the audience's sympathy, despite his obvious flaws.

5/5 The most realistic movie I have ever seen
  by Leah Ray (Rome-on-the-Potomac)
I have not seen BL since it came out, at which time I watched it in the theater at least ten times. I was appalled, thrilled, baffled and fascinated. I remember it as the most realistic movie I've ever seen, and not most of all in the sense of its exquisite mise-en-scene and famed candelit scenes. So in what way realistic? We watch a man -- a very ordinary, rather shoddy man -- live his life. At the end of the movie, he dies. That's all that happens. What makes the movie almost unbearably powerful is that it has no point and no moral; it might be said to have no point of view. Even Barry Lyndon has no apparent point of view about his life. There is no satisfaction at the end. The only meaning to be found in Barry Lyndon's life is what the viewer imposes on it. This ethical vacuum creates intense discomfort and a pressing need to fill it with an interpretation. Therein is the beauty and the satisfaction of it, if any. Some viewers and critics rejected BL as empty and boring; others supplied their own reading of it; for me, and I can't speak for anyone else, the agonizing pleasure of the movie lay in the tension it created between meaning and non-meaning. For the duration of the movie, I experienced both the shock of the void and the drive to fill it with a narrative; holding my mind in that space, yielding to neither the urge to flee nor the urge to moralize, was mesmerizing and transformative.

5/5 A little watched masterpiece
  by The Wizard (UT.)
Stanley Kubrick, was perhaps, our greatest film maker. And 'Barry Lyndon', was one of his greatest efforts. Not too well received, by critics or fans, it is perhaps my favorite Kubrick film. Meticulous, slow-moving, every frame could be freeze-framed and mounted on the wall. It is one of the most gorgeous looking films in the history of cinema. Take a break from the fast paced shoot-um-ups, and settle down with this film. It will take your breath away.

4/5 Beautiful
  by William R. Warren Jr. (Ellensburg, WA USA)
A technological tour de force, no less than every film to come before from Stanley Kubrick. But this one has a sense of "no urgency" (as opposed to "no sense of urgency") and it's easy to see Kubrick looking back for a moment and breathing a sigh of relief ..."Well, I got THAT out of the way!" ... and realizing he was at the summit and he was the only one there, took some self-indulgent time to make love to his cameras again, coaxing them to do things they had never been intended for.

This was good time for Stanley, and he shows it.

5/5 Beautiful
  by Robert Buchanan (Wisconsin)
A film as visually magnificent and painstakingly photographed as "Barry Lyndon" deserves a fine transfer from a pristine print, and this DVD is as as good a presentation as one could expect from the format. This edition is presented in the matted 1.66:1 theatrical format instead of the 1.37:1 aspect ratio in which Kubrick shot it and intended for televised broadcast and VHS editions. However, this edition is NOT anamorphically enhanced for 16x9 display. If that's what you want, you're better off waiting for it on a Blu-Ray edition. Leon Vitali has suggested in interviews that the 1080i version will not be anamorphic; let's hope that he's mistaken!

Forty-seven chapters of the film can be selected from eight lists of titles. English, French, Spanish and Portuguese subtitles are available, and all of these are competently translated and rendered. It should be noted that the French dubbed dialogue track from the 1999 Kubrick Collection edition is not featured on this disc, or on the second edition of the Kubrick Collection.

A listing of the many awards that the film garnered is available, as though we need be reminded of Kubrick's and Alcott's superior efforts. The fatuous theatrical trailer is also on disc for those who want to watch one of the dullest trailers in film history: a slapshod pastiche of the film's most immediately recognizable scenes narrated by some bore who reads positive reviews of it that were hurriedly scribbled out by film critics. Ugh!