Epic Western movies available on 4K Blu-ray, ranked by transfer quality.
dir. Budd Boetticher
S-Tier Criterion 4K. Another Boetticher Ranown Cycle entry.
Criterion Collection · 4K + Blu-ray
S-Tier Criterion 4K. Budd Boetticher Ranown Cycle western.
dir. Kevin Costner
S-Tier Warner Bros. 4K. Costner's self-financed three-hour western saga. Most people are holding off on chapter one and waiting for the complete set whenever the rest of the saga actually materializes.
Warner Bros. · 4K + Blu-ray
dir. Robert Altman
S-Tier Criterion 4K. Altman's anti-western with Warren Beatty and Julie Christie. The film is famous for looking and sounding terrible, which is intentional. Altman applied a muddy effect to the image and the audio is notoriously hard to hear. The Criterion 4K is actually the first time it's looked properly filmic in all its grimy glory. A popular comfort movie, weirdly enough, despite the murky sound.
dir. Simon Wincer
S-Tier Shout Factory 4K. Tom Selleck in an Australian western. The 4K revealed that a young kid in the film is Ben Mendelsohn, which blew people's minds.
Shout! Factory · 4K + Blu-ray
dir. Sergio Leone
Leone's epic lives in the top tier of reference discs alongside Dune and Lawrence of Arabia. The transfer does justice to the widescreen desert photography and the Morricone score hits different in lossless.
dir. Jane Campion
A domineering but charismatic rancher wages a war of intimidation on his brother's new wife and her teen son, until long-hidden secrets come to light.
dir. Jacques Audiard
Oregon, 1851. Hermann Kermit Warm, a chemist and aspiring gold prospector, keeps a profitable secret that the Commodore wants to know, so he sends the Sisters brothers, two notorious assassins, to capture him on his way to California.
Arrow Video · 4K + Blu-ray
dir. Anthony Mann
Lin McAdam rides into town on the trail of Dutch Henry Brown, only to find himself in a shooting competition against him. McAdam wins the prize, a one-in-a-thousand Winchester rifle, but Dutch steals it and leaves town. McAdam follows, intent on settling his old quarrel, while the rifle keeps changing hands and touching a number of lives.
dir. George Stevens
Wealthy rancher Bick Benedict and dirt-poor cowboy Jett Rink both woo Leslie Lynnton, a beautiful young woman from Maryland who is new to Texas. She marries Benedict, but she is shocked by the racial bigotry of the White Texans against the local people of Mexican descent. Rink discovers oil on a small plot of land, and while he uses his vast, new wealth to buy all the land surrounding the Benedict ranch, the Benedict's disagreement over prejudice fuels conflict that runs across generations.
dir. David Mackenzie
A-Tier Lionsgate 4K. Jeff Bridges and Chris Pine in a modern Texas crime film. The West Texas photography works well in HDR.
Lionsgate · 4K + Blu-ray
dir. Fred Zinnemann
A-Tier Eureka Entertainment 4K. Gary Cooper in the classic western. The Eureka disc is the Region B option.
Eureka Entertainment · 4K + Blu-ray
Kino Lorber's 4K scored a perfect 5.0, which almost never happens. Two commentary tracks and a loaded special features package. Excitement was genuine from western fans who consider this one of the greatest ever made. The transfer should be gorgeous given the Technicolor source material and Stevens' meticulous visual style.
Kino Lorber · 4K + Blu-ray
dir. Ralph Nelson
After a cavalry group is massacred by the Cheyenne, only two survivors remain: Honus, a naive private devoted to his duty, and Cresta, a young woman who had lived with the Cheyenne two years and whose sympathies lie more with them than with the US government. Together, they must try to reach the cavalry's main base camp. As they travel onward, Honus is torn between his growing affection for Cresta.
dir. Michael Crichton
Delos is a futuristic amusement park that features themed worlds populated by human-like androids. After two patrons have a run-in with a menacing gunslinger in West World, the androids at Delos all begin to malfunction, causing havoc throughout the park.
dir. John Sturges
C-Tier Kino Lorber 4K. Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas at the O.K. Corral.
Kino Lorber
dir. John Landis
A trio of unemployed silent film actors are mistaken for real heroes by a small Mexican village in search of someone to stop a malevolent bandit.
Final Cut Entertainment · 4K Ultra HD
Two men with questionable pasts, Glyn McLyntock and his friend Cole, lead a wagon-train load of homesteaders from Missouri to the Oregon territory...
dir. Arthur Penn
When vigilante land baron David Braxton hangs one of the best friends of cattle rustler Tom Logan, Logan's gang decides to get even by purchasing a small farm next to Braxton's ranch. From there the rustlers begin stealing horses, using the farm as a front for their operation. Determined to stop the thefts at any cost, Braxton retains the services of eccentric sharpshooter Robert E. Lee Clayton, who begins ruthlessly taking down Logan's gang.
Rimini Editions · 4K Ultra HD
