1952 version lacks title screen and credits; title and statement of responsibility partially from container and from 1955 version.

Originally screened with a dubbed-Italian soundtrack in Rome, Italy, in 1951, and later released with its original English-language soundtrack in Europe (1952), and in the U.S. and U.K. (1955).

Based on the play by William Shakespeare.

Accompanying insert comprises film credits, information about the transfers, and an essay by film critic Geoffrey O'Brien.

Full screen (1.37:1).

Special features: Disc 1. Simon Callow [In this interview, filmed by the Criterion Collection in 2017, Simon Callow, actor and author of the multivolume biography Orson Welles, discusses the production of Othello, especially Welles's relationship with actors Micheál MacLiammóir and Hilton Edwards] ; Ayanna Thompson [The question of race is central to Othello. In this interview, filmed by the Criterion Collection in 2017, George Washington University professor Ayanna Thompson, author of Passing strange : Shakespeare, race and contemporary America, discusses the complicated history of white actors portraying Othello the Moor.] ; Joseph McBride [This 2014 interview features Joseph McBride, author of What ever happened to Orson Welles?] ; François Thomas [In this interview, recorded by the Criterion Collection in 2017, film scholar François Thomas, coauthor of Orson Welles at work, discusses the different versions of Welles's Othello.] -- Disc 2. Commentary [Recorded for the Criterion Collection in 1994, this commentary features filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich and scholar Myron Meisel.] ; Return to Glennascaul [This 1951 short film featuring Orson Welles was made by actors Micheál MacLiammóir and Hilton Edwards while on a brief hiatus from the production of Othello] ; Souvenirs d'Othello [This 1995 Canadian documentary features an extensive interview, in English and French, with Suzanne Cloutier (Desdemona) about the making of Othello.] -- Disc 3. Filming Othello [The last completed feature of any kind by Orson Welles, this 1979 documentary dives into the production of Othello and includes an extended conversation between Welles and actors Micheál MacLiammóir and Hilton Edwards].