Chato's
Land (1972/United
Artists/MGM/Twilight Time Limited Edition Blu-ray)/Stranger
On The Third Floor
(1940/RKO/Warner Archive DVD)/Too
Late For Tears
(1949/Republic)/Woman On
The Run
(1950/Fidelity/Flicker Alley Blu-rays w/DVD Sets)
Picture:
B-/C/B- & C/B- & C Sound: B-/C/C+ & C/C+ & C
Extras: C+/D/B/B Films: B-/C+/B/B
PLEASE
NOTE:
The Chato's
Land
Blu-ray is now only available from our friends at Twilight Time, is
limited to only 3,000 copies and can be ordered while supplies last,
while the Stranger
On
The Third Floor
DVD is now only available from Warner Bros. through their Warner
Archive series. All can be ordered from the links below.
Up
next is an underrated Revenge Western and three lesser-known Noir
films...
Michael
Winner's Chato's
Land
(1972) is a Revenge Western with a twist, Charles Bronson is the
title character, a Native American facing racism and hate everywhere,
which gets to a boiling point when he has to shoot a white racist who
goes too far. The shock slowly builds into a lynch mob determined to
get back at the 'redskin' led by an old school fighter (Jack Palance)
and a like-minded group, some of whom are friends (James Whitmore,
Richard Basehart and the underrated Simon Oakland in a particularly
nasty, dark turn) go after him. However, they underestimate him from
the start and when they get involved in the gang rape of a Native
American woman, Chato has new plans for his hunters... turn them
into the hunted.
This
is one of Bronson's best performances, rarely speaking English when
he talks at all, with the rest being in Native American language(s)
and he is totally convincing in the role as he rarely has been in his
long career. The supporting actors don;t back off the thankless
sides of their rotten characters and except for a few false notes,
this is a tight 100 minutes that is also one of the best serious
Westerns of the 1970s. Even if you don;t like Westerns, you should
see this one at least once.
Extras
include a nicely illustrated booklet on the film including
informative text and another excellent, underrated essay by the great
film scholar Julie Kirgo, while the Blu-ray disc adds an Isolated
Music Score track of Jerry Fielding's classic music (some pieces of
which he repurposed for episodes of Kolchak:
The Night Stalker
a few years later) and an Original Theatrical Trailer.
Boris
Ingster's Stranger
On The Third Floor
(1940) has Peter Lorre in the title role, though he is not always in
this mystery tale that features elements that would turn up in more
serious forms in the Film Noir era that would arrive the following
year. Some of the moments are uncanny here, though to say this is a
Noir is pushing it, yet it should be said that the Mystery genre
(including some movie series with lead detectives like Charlie Chan
and The Saint) was already showing visual signs of what we now
consider Noir due to the darkness used on purpose to establish their
mystery plots.
Technically,
the limited speed of black and white films stocks (whether from
Kodak, Ansco, Agfa, DuPont and other companies) also established that
look until the late 1950s, when monochrome stocks started to get
faster. Still, they would be as dark, even in a sometimes-comedy
like this where a reporter (John McGuire) swears he saw a man (Elisha
Cook, Jr.) commit a murder and his testimony sends the man away, but
was he wrong? A similar murder happens while the jailed man is
waiting for execution, but now the reporter is a new suspect. Who is
doing the killing?
The
humor, insistence on mystery and ending disqualify the film as a
Noir, but it is at least proof that something more complex and darker
was on the way and Lorre's interesting turn is a good sign. Everyone
should see this one once, as its not bad.
There
are no extras.
Byron
Haskin's Too
Late For Tears
(1949) is the genre director's underrated Noir originally issued by
Republic Pictures, but landed up an orphan film until it became one
of two Noirs recently saved and restored by UCLA and Flicker Alley.
Lizabeth Scott and Arthur Kennedy are a married couple driving along
one night when a mysterious driver going the opposite direction,
throws something into the back seats of their car. Is it a bomb or
hate message? No, it's a briefcase with $60,000 cash! She wants to
keep it and spend it all, but he's more cautious, which shows a split
in their relationship right there. Of course, someone always shows
up when that kind of money is involved, but she is not going to let
it go, no matter the cost to her or anyone else.
Dan
Duryea co-stars in this gem with twists and turns that will surprise
you and impress seven decades later and counting. Some moments are
real howlers and the parts about the dark side of human nature are as
relevant as ever. This is definitely worth going out of your way
for.
Extras
include a feature length audio commentary track by
writer, historian, and film programmer Alan K. Rode, Chance
Of A Lifetime: The Making of Too Late For Tears
featurette featuring Eddie Muller, Kim Morgan, and Julie Kirgo
examines the behind-the-scenes story of the film's original
production, Tiger
Hunt: Restoring Too Late For Tears
chronicles the multi-year mission to rescue this 'lost' noir classic
and the disc case includes a 24-Page Souvenir Booklet with rare
photographs, poster art, original lobby cards, and an essay by writer
and noir-expert Brian Light.
Norman
Foster's Woman
On The Run
(1950) is
an also excellent tale of what happens when a man (Ross Elliot) takes
his dog for a walk and witnesses a murder, which includes getting
shot at. The police show up to investigate, but he's run away, so
they go to his wife (Ann Sheridan) to figure out where he is. She's
on the outs with him, practically separated, making the lead
detective (Robert Keith) unhappy, especially as she is uninterested
in cooperating. An annoying reporter (Dennis O'Keefe) is also trying
to get her to help, but she doesn't trust him either.
Then,
she starts to see something else is going on, looks into her hunches
herself and and starts to get more involved than she ever expected.
From here, Foster really lets the action kick in, making it another
must-see Noir and Sheridan in rare form. Go out of your way for this
one too!
Extras
include a feature length audio commentary track by author, cinema
historian, and ''noirchaelogist'' Eddie Muller, Love
is a Rollercoaster: Woman on the Run Revisited
making of featurette on the film from script to noir classic, A
Wild Ride: Restoring Woman on the Run
is about the difficult & sometimes unreal restoration of the
film, Woman
on the Run: Locations Then and Now
is a 'virtual tour' around San Francisco hunting down the many
locations used during the production of the film including what did
and did not survive, NOIR
CITY
is a short documentary directed by Joe Talbot about the annual NOIR
CITY film festival presented by by the Film Noir Foundation at San
Francisco's historic Castro Theatre and the disc case includes a
24-Page Souvenir Booklet with rare photographs, poster art, original
lobby cards, and an essay by the one and only Eddie Muller.
The
1080p 1.85 X 1 digital High Definition image on Land
has print issues here and there, but looks pretty good for the most
part despite not being a brand new restoration, capturing the nature
of the outdoors very nicely. Color is consistent for the most part.
The
1080p 1.33 X 1 black & white digital High Definition image
transfers of Tears
and Run
Blu-rays come from surviving materials, so despite some very hard
work in fixing and saving both films, there are more than a few
places where you can tell you are seeing second-generation footage.
This is what we expect from orphan films, so we're lucky we have them
at all. With that said, I have never seen the films looking better.
The 1.33 x 1 DVD versions are passable and on the soft side, but then
so is the
1.33 X 1
black & white on the Floor
DVD, so even non-orphan films (Noir or not) can have flawed prints
and transfers.
The
DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 1.0 Mono lossless mix on Land
is not perfect, but what we expected for a theatrical mono film its
age and it is the best sonic presentation on the list, followed by
the PCM 2.0 Mono on the Tears
and Run
Blu-rays, older by a fee decades and luck to survive. The DVD
versions and Floor
DVD tie
for last place with lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono presentations that
are on the weak side.
To
order the Chato's
Land limited
edition Blu-ray, buy it and other collectible releases while supplies
last at these links:
www.screenarchives.com
and
http://www.twilighttimemovies.com/
… and
to order the Stranger
On
The Third Floor
Warner Archive DVD, go to this link for it and many more great
web-exclusive releases at:
https://www.warnerarchive.com/
-
Nicholas Sheffo
