The New Beverly just ran a 35mm print from 2008, still in very good condition and with excellent color. Eclair’s restoration, on the UHD from Carlotta, has completely messed-up color. In screencaps here, you can see how it’s now tinged yellow and blue. Snow and geisha makeup should be white, not urine-colored. HD Numerique has a comparison between the UHD and Criterion BD here. Eclair’s skin tones veer purple (yikes!). In every instance, the Criterion disc has color that is a good approximation to the print that I just saw.
Since the print was from 2008, I do wonder whether it was a film-out of the master Criterion used on their 2009 Blu-ray. That would explain the close color approximation. Not to excuse Eclair’s signature tint on their 4K restoration, but I’m just not confident that an old DVD era “high definition transfer” has accurate colors either.
These old repertory prints are not usually film-outs, but from whatever negatives were in use at the time. In other words, all photochemical (meaning, much less opportunity for revisionism). Film-outs in 2008 still generally looked like they came from video files – soft, dull, and lifeless. I vividly remember how bad the 2007 HD-sourced 35mm re-release of “The Red Balloon”/”White Mane” looked. This print of “Senses” was beautiful.