Frank Capra‘s Arsenic and Old Lace (’44), a broad macabre farce set in a Brooklyn rooming house, began as a hit Broadway play that opened in January 1941. (Here’s Brooks Atkinson’s N.Y. Times review.) Capra’s film shot sometime in late ’41 or early ’42, and was originally slated to open on 9.30.42. But the contract with the play’s producers stated that the film would not be released until the Broadway run ended. The play ran for for three and a half years (or until the summer of ’44), so the film wasn’t released until 9.1.44.

I first watched the Capra flick as a kid, and found it okay. I streamed a 480p version two or three years ago, and while I enjoyed Raymond Massey‘s performance (in the part created on the New York stage by Boris Karloff) and Peter Lorre‘s, I found it hyper and strenuous. It charges you up at first, but then it gradually wears you down. And how many thousands of times has the play been performed in high schools?

Criterion is releasing a “new 4K digital transfer” Bluray version on 10.11.22. It’ll look better than ever before, I’m sure, but would want to shell out $31 and change for a copy? Not I.