Raging
Bull 4K
(1980/MGM/UA*)/Silent
Enemy (1930/Flicker Alley
Blu-ray)/The Virgin
Suicides 4K
(1999/Paramount/*both Criterion 4K Ultra HD Blu-rays w/Blu-ray)
4K
Ultra HD Picture: A- Picture: B Sound: B/B-/B Extras:
A-/B-/B Films: A-/B-/B
Now
for new classic film releases worth going out of your way for...
Another
Martin Scorsese classic gets the ultimate in Ultra High Definition
treatment as Criterion issues what is now the definite edition of his
1980 classic with Raging Bull 4K (1980) featuring the
ever-remarkable performance by Robert De Niro as boxer Jake La Motta.
We have covered two older Blu-ray editions and one DVD edition,
showing the film has slowly found a larger audience over the years,
though still not enough as far as I am concerned.
You
can read about the 30th Anniversary Edition Blu-ray we covered (now
12 years ago!) at this link:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/10681/Fire+In+The+Amazon+(1991/Anchor+Bay+Blu-ray
The
film just continues to age well and after all this time, remains one
of the greatest biopics of all time. The performances are all
amazing down to the stunning lengths De Niro went to to play La Motta
in different periods of his life. The chemistry between the actors
as amazing as ever, even if we are more familiar with them now then
when the film was first released, and yet, I still hear odd
criticisms of the film. One was that it was not a realistic boxing
film, which missed the point that it is a character study, yet the
boxing remains intense, even when it gets surreal. Especially
considering the mostly bad boxing films we've seen since, it has been
more than vindicated in that regard. You just have to see the film
to believe it, if you can handle the realism and honesty, now with
its 4K release you can really experience its impact in a way only
previously possible with a mint 35mm or maybe 16mm print that was
made correctly.
The
2160p HECV/H.265, 1.85 X 1, black and white (save one spot of color,)
HDR (10; Ultra HD Premium)-enhanced Ultra High Definition image is
often stunning, with Scorsese's use of monochromatic film so diverse,
that only Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove can rival it. Black and
white has made a comeback of sorts recently, but some films have been
better at it than others. This is also a film that remains one of
the greatest character study films of all time and certainly one of
the greatest ever made about the Italian-American experience.
The
1080p 1.85 X 1 digital High Definition on the Blu-ray is better than
the previous Blu-ray editions, as well as all the older video formats
(DVD, Laserdisc, VHS, etc.) coming from the new 4K master, but you
(again) have to see it in 4K to really see it.
The
DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 2.0 Stereo mix has some moments that sound
older, but like the image, some of that is intended and this comes
from the original magnetic soundmaster, still with its Dolby Pro
Logic surround encoding, so be sure to play it back that way if you
have a home theater system. It has never sounded so good and this
time, I could hear sound and even vivid sound I never heard on this
film before.
Extras
are expanded including some new
items and include another thick, high quality booklet on the film
with tech info, stills, illustrations and essays by poet Robin
Robertson and film critic Glenn Kenny, while the disc versions add
(per the press release):
NEW
video essays by film critics Geoffrey O'Brien and Sheila O'Malley on
Scorsese's mastery of formal techniques and the film's triumvirate of
characters
• Three
audio commentaries, featuring Scorsese and editor Thelma Schoonmaker;
director of photography Michael Chapman, producers Robert Chartoff
and Irwin Winkler, casting director Cis Corman, music consultant
Robbie Robertson, actors Theresa Saldana and John Turturro, and
sound-effects supervising editor Frank Warner; and boxer Jake La
Motta and screenwriters Mardik Martin and Paul Schrader
• Fight
Night, a making-of program featuring Scorsese and key members of
the cast and crew
• Three
short programs highlighting the longtime collaboration between
Scorsese and actor Robert De Niro
• Television
interview from 1981 with actor Cathy Moriarty and the real Vikki La
Motta
• Interview
with Jake La Motta from 1990
• Program
from 2004 featuring veteran boxers reminiscing about La Motta
• and
an Original Theatrical Trailer
H.P.
Carver's Silent Enemy (1930) likely wanted to duplicate the
massive, surprise success of Nanook Of The North, was actually
made in the Canadian Northwest (Paramount had a particularly solid
presence in Canada) and tries to capture the lives of the
Chippewa/Ojibway Native North American tribe. The film comes up with
fictional situations (based on written accounts of French visitors,)
but sadly, they were dying as the film was being made since the
disease Europeans had brought with them were starting to plague the
members of the tribe and many did not live long after the film
arrived.
What
is made here includes some beautiful footage of a people and the
lands they lived on for very long periods of time and becomes an
experience to see that sometimes even exceeds what the makers
intended by the production to begin with. We have seen some other
silent films that offer similar struggles-with-nature scenarios and
we still see them today (like that recent Leonardo DiCaprio film) so
you could consider this a minor classic of sorts for such filmmaking.
It also proves once again that silent cinema is much stronger than
lingering stereotypes of it would have you believe. Silent Enemy
is a great example of a silent film that took risks and tried
something somewhat new and sometimes different.
The
1080p 1.33 X 1 black & white/tinted digital High Definition image
transfer can show the age of the materials used, but it is in
surprisingly good shape and that the nitrate film materials (and
likely some acetate dupes) have survived in such good shape is
incredible, but work has also been done here to clean, further
restore and preserve the film. In many sections, save the fact that
it was hand-cranked and originally produced in silent speed, you
could not guess the film is as old as it is. The tint colors are not
bad and look authentic, though tinting always cuts down the
definition and detail somewhat, it looks the way one would expect for
such a film.
This
silent film has one spoken piece at the very beginning, but the rest
of the two PCM 2.0 Stereo track has
two soundtracks to choose from: an original orchestral score composed
by Siegfried Friedrich and a new orchestral score compiled and
performed by the Mont Alto Motion Picture Orchestra. I like the
original more, as it just flows better for me, but the new one is not
bad.
Extras
include an excellent series of interviews by legendary film scholar
Kevin Brownlow with the film's Producer W. Douglas Burden, here as an
audio commentary track that works well, a paper pullout with tech
info, stills and excerpt on the film by Brownlow from 1979 and the
disc also adds an Image Gallery of promotional and production
materials.
That
is a very impressive package overall, especially for a silent film
form the time and we are again lucky it survived.
Last
by absolutely not
least, Sofia Coppola's remarkable feature-film debut is also back and
now in Ultra High Definition. The
Virgin Suicides 4K
(1999) gets a fine upgrade, even though the regular Blu-ray Criterion
edition was pretty impressive as discussed in our coverage of that
release here:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/15161/Phantom+Thread+(2017/Universal+Blu-ray+w/DV
It
also has the same cover art, which I like. The new 4K is much closer
to the 35mm film print I saw when it first opened 33 years ago and
this means better Video Red, White and Black, plus the ability to
show the wider-range of color and lighting choices Coppola and
Director of Photography Ed Lachman achieved in what remains one of
the best visual captures of the 1970s still in a feature film to this
day.
Thus,
the 2160p HECV/H.265, 1.66 X 1, HDR (10; Ultra HD Premium)-enhanced
Ultra High Definition image is a great step up from the previous
Criterion Blu-ray, even if it does not use Dolby Vision. Detail and
depth are also better and subtle
detail increases that the other disc just cannot capture.
The
1080p 1.66 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on the Blu-ray
is the exact same one as the stand-alone Blu-ray we reviewed before
and still looks good, but not as much as the 4K. You also get the
same, excellent DTS-HD
MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless mix and extras as the previous
Blu-ray, so the 4K is now the way to go with this underrated film.
-
Nicholas Sheffo
