Angenieux M1 50mm f/0.95 - A Cult Classic

Lens Review

Angenieux M1 50mm f/0.95 – A Cult Classic

June 27, 2025

In the era of the Leica M8 with its cropped APS-H sensor, there was once a gem known for its extraordinarily fast aperture—the Angenieux 50mm f/0.95 Paris Type M1. I’ve always had a soft spot for ultra-fast lenses like the Canon 50mm f/0.95 and the Noctilux f/0.95. As I delved deeper online, I found limited information about this lens, but I was fortunate enough to try it out. If you don’t mind the dark corners, this lens offers a unique, cinematic vibe with rich tones, subtly colour grading your images without any retouching.

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Founded in 1935 by Pierre Angenieux, a French engineer, the company quickly became renowned for its innovative approach to optics. This lens, crafted in the early 1960s by Angenieux, was one of the earliest kinds of ultra-fast lenses. Upon viewing images captured with this lens, it’s apparent that it’s not designed for full-frame. It’s a cine lens intended for the Super35 format and doesn’t cover the full-frame 43mm image circle, providing only 37mm coverage and creating a tunnel vision effect at the corners. Among all cine lenses, its colour palette is particularly appealing to me.

Deep, Rich Tones

The blues and greens are spectacular. When shooting extensively with Leica glass, the difference becomes immediately noticeable. It produces appealing skin tones under various conditions and makes colours pop against a mixed background. This is the magic of an Angenieux lens and a prime reason why people invest heavily in this look. At wide open, it provides a rich flavour with perfect softness for post-editing and colour grading.

Bokeh, Bokeh, and More Bokeh!

I’ve tried three f/0.95 lenses to date: the Canon 50mm f/0.95 Dream Lens, the Leica Noctilux 50mm f/0.95 ASPH, and the Angenieux 50mm f/0.95 M1. The Angenieux offers an extremely smooth bokeh fall-off, although some might describe it as messy, with a lot going on in the background, where each bokeh circle tends to overlap others like repeated stamping on paper. It’s not a lens I use regularly, but it is best suited for portraits. The Angénieux M1’s bokeh is similar to the Noctilux’s, featuring barrel distortion and a quick, sharp falloff at the frame’s end. In contrast, the Canon’s bokeh, with its Gauss lens design, appears busier and less uniform when wide open, which can be more distracting.

Lens Modification

Originally with a 67mm filter thread, this lens was modified by Miyazaki San in Japan. However, the infinity focus was off, and the rangefinder coupling seemed misaligned, preventing me from testing it with film. Modifications can be done by various repair masters, and if you’re interested, I can provide the contact for my local technician. I shot all the sample images here with my Leica M10-P.

Final Thoughts

Despite only briefly using this lens, I found its usability limited due to unreliable rangefinder coupling (it’s only because of this copy), necessitating constant use of live view. Its usability for bokeh is significant, but highlight recovery is fairly limited at f/0.95. Using smaller apertures like f/5.6 and f/8 still reveals very obvious dark corners unless you decide to crop the image. This aspect makes it challenging for street photography or even normal portraits. While it may hold historical and collectible value and its prestige in the ultra-fast lens world, I prefer the sharp images of the Noctilux 50mm f/0.95 and the softness of the Canon 50mm f/0.95 for practical use and covering the full frame image circle. Thus, I haven’t used this lens extensively, but each time I do, the colours are undeniably stunning. It might appeal to those looking for something special or collectors with cash to spare, but for practical reasons, I still favour my Leica lenses. It’s definitely a cult lens, best suited for the cinematic world.

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