Geronimo:
An American Legend
(1993/Sony/Columbia/Twilight Time Limited Edition Blu-ray)/Maborosi
(1995/Milestone Blu-ray)/The
Tracker (2002/Umbrella
Region Free Import Blu-ray)/2
Weeks In Another Town (1962/MGM/Warner
Archive Blu-ray)/Woman Is
The Future Of Man
(2004)/A Tale
Of Cinema (2015/MVD/Arrow
Blu-ray)
Picture:
B/B-/C+/B/B Sound: B/B-/C/B-/B Extras: C+/B/A/C-/B Films:
B/B-/C+/B-/C+
PLEASE
NOTE:
The Geronimo
Blu-ray is now only available from our friends at Twilight Time and
is limited to only 3,000 copies and can be ordered while supplies
last, The
Tracker
Blu-ray is now only available from our friends at Umbrella
Entertainment as a Region Free Blu-ray and the 2
Weeks In Another Town
is now only available from Warner Bros. through their Warner Archive
series. All can be ordered from the links below.
Walter
Hill's Geronimo: An American Legend (1993) gets the a great
Blu-ray presentation courtesy of the good people at Twilight Time.
This is a film that I remember seeing in my youth and it's nice to
see it now in this new HD transfer.
Geronimo
is epic in scope and features an A list cast which includes Jason
Patric, Robert Duvall, Gene Hackman, Wes Studi, Matt Damon (before he
was a huge star), Rodney A. Grant, and Kevin Tighe.
The
film was written by John Milius (Apocalypse Now, Conan)
and Larry Gross and is a great look at the famed Apache leader.
Geronimo (played here by Last of the Mohicans' Wes Studi) is a
badass strategist and is a noble man that even his enemies come to
respect. As the Apaches have forcefully agreed to settle on a U.S.
Government approved reservation, an uprising begins that shakes the
foundation of our country. The film spans decades of the warrior's
life and has impeccable production design captured nicely here.
Presented
in 1080p high definition with a 2.35:1 widescreen aspect ratio and a
English 5.1 DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) and English 2.0 (with Pro Logic
surrounds) DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) lossless tracks, this is no doubt
the best this film has looked as it hasn't been released on Blu-ray
before this. The original theatrical sound was 70mm 6-track 5.1
magnetic sound with Dolby SR (Spectral Recording, their most advanced
analog system) noise reduction, so this disc offers that at its best
yet. The film has a orange tone to it and appears to have been
recently color corrected to its advantage. The score is also
featured here only a isolated track (as listed below) that adds to
the cinematic experience.
Special
Features include...
Isolated
Music Track with a score by Ry Cooder
Original
Theatrical Trailer
and
a Collectible Insert Booklet with a great essay by Julie Kirgo
Hirokazu
Kore-eda's Maborosi
(1995) is finally on Blu-ray after all these years. The slow, quiet,
leisurely drama about a a young mother/wife dealing with the return
of a repressed pass was the first film of the successful director and
we previously reviewed the DVD version in the U.S. of the film at
this link...
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/15197/Maborosi+(1995/New+Yorker+DVD
This
time, with the name placed the opposite way, Milestone has issued
this upgraded Blu-ray edition, but there are some issues we'll get to
in a minute. As for the film, it did not stay too much with me
(though I did not review it), but I can see why people are still
talking about it and still respect it. I just felt it was uneven
myself and though I can appreciate the love some people have of the
film, it was not as much for me.
So
we come to the picture and the issues with it. Though Blu-ray can do
1080p picture quality, this version is somehow a 1080i
1.85 X 1
digital High Definition image presentation, so detail can be odd at
times and we get fine detail issues. More oddly, the film is one of
the few to be totally shot on
Fuji 35mm color negative film, rarer now that (unlike
out-of-bankruptcy Kodak), they no longer make movie film. Stocks
included 50 ASA/ISO film that is used for strong daylight and is hard
to expose, but gives you great color, color you can see on the old
New Yorker DVD. So why is this new 'supervised' transfer so dark and
dulling down the color in odd ways?
Hard
to say, but that is not the way the film originally looked in some
presentations and if they were going to go this route, having both
versions might have been nice. The result is a disservice to the
Fuji film, audience and great moments the film previously had
visually. At least the new PCM 2.0 Stereo mix is better than the
lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo version form the old DVD, but only by
so much since we get plenty of silent moments throughout.
Extras
include a feature length audio commentary track with film scholar
Linda Ehrlich, the Birthplace video documentary with
star Makiko Esumi.
It's
1922. Four men set off in the in the Australian outback to hunt down
a criminal, a native man accused of murdering a white woman. A
sheriff, his rookie, a veteran (Grant Page) and his slave/tracker.
They face unexpected challenges and dangers, but everything depends
on their black tracker (David Gulpilil) and as they journey further
into the frontier the greatest danger however... might be their trust
in each other in Rolf de Heer's The
Tracker (2002).
So
those four men set off into the desert tracking an accused criminal,
but what is his story? Is he truly a criminal or is he running for
freedom? The sheriff will stop at nothing to bring the criminal in,
he teaches the rookie that white men must force others to fear and
obey them. He torturers other natives and even chains and whips his
own tracker to force him to work harder. Eventually, he even
abandons the veteran, leaving him for dead saying he only slowed them
down. Eventually, the sheriff begins killing natives and the rookie
is forced to make a moral choice of siding with either with his boss
or the tracker. The tracker has his own secrets and shows out on the
frontier it is not the law of white man that rules, but natives have
their own rules and forms of justice.
This
was simple yet profound movie, it was not about the overall story but
more about each of the characters stories. It showed the how white
man's laws and justice aren't really justice when they willing to
commit more murders to bring another man to justice.
The
1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer was
shot with anamorphic Lomoscope lenses, but this transfer has softness
issues that make this look like an older HD Master with motion blur
issues throughout, while the DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless
mix is quiet, yet on the weaker side, so the presentation disappoints
and we believe could play better.
Extras
include interviews, outtakes, on locations, premieres at various film
festivals and music clip.
Finally
we have Vincente Minnelli's somewhat underrated 2
Weeks In Another Town (1962)
with Kirk Douglas as an actor who suffers a nervous breakdown and
lands up in an institution for a while until he gets an offer from an
old friend to help with an Italian Euro production (popular at the
time, even if they were plastic, pretentious and over-bloated,
depending on the film) to go and film on it for a while. This
reunited him with an old flame (Cyd Charisse as a trophy wife), an
old filmmaker friend (Edward G. Robinson) and a new love interest
(Dahlia Lavi, soon to be popular thanks to the Spy genre) and the
results will be wild.
We
reviewed this on DVD and even covered the limited edition CD
soundtrack, so to have a Blu-ray now is interesting. It looks,
sounds and plays better than ever, though with some reservations, yet
it deserves rediscovery for how blunt it is about filmmaking.
However, with recent scandals that turned out to be very ugly, parts
sadly seem like some form of 'the good old days' unfortunately.
As
they did with the DVD, Warner has taken this MGM A-list film and
issued it on Blu-ray through their Warner Archive series and its
great to have the upgrade.
The
1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer can show the
age of the materials used, but this is far superior a transfer to all
previous releases of the film and the MetroColor looks as good as it
can, though shot in CinemaScope in its latter years when new scope
format were replacing it with better picture quality, clarity and
definition.
The
sound is sadly a DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 2.0 Mono lossless mix for a
film that was originally a 4-track magnetic stereo sound with
traveling dialogue and sound effects, but MGM trashed stereo masters
in one of the worst moves ever and even the older CD has harmonic
distortion issues, so the fact that this sounds even this good is
impressive.
The
only extra is an Original Theatrical Trailer, but it deserves
something more down the line. Definitely give this one a look,
especially if you are a film fan.
A
favorite of Martin Scorsese are the interesting Japanese works of
Hong Sangsoo, Woman is the Future of Man (2004) and Tale of
Cinema (2005). Both films tell very natural stories of love and
the complications that arise along the way. Nothing too stylized or
super crazy over the top here, just grounded realism.
In
Woman is the Future of Man, two men are in love with the same
woman.. kind of like Chasing Amy but not quite as complicated.
And A Tale of Cinema intertwines two stories one of a
suicidal man who forms a pact with a friend and the other about a
Filmmaker who pursues an actress and ends up falling in love with
her. (thus his life is the projected reality of his film).
Presented
in 1080p high definition on Blu-Ray discs with a 1.85:1 widescreen
aspect ratio and both Korean language Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo lossy
and DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 2.0 Stereo lossless tracks, both films
look fantastic on disc and have been nicely restored as one would
expect.
Special
Features...
Newly
filmed introductions to both films by Asian cinema expert Tony Rayns
Interviews
with Kim Sangkyung, Lee Kiwoo and Uhm Jiwon, the stars of Tale of
Cinema
Introduction
to Woman is the Future of Man by director Martin Scorsese
The
Making Woman is the Future of Man, a featurette on the film's
production
Interviews
with the actors of Woman is the Future of Man
Original
trailers
Stills
gallery
Reversible
sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Scott
Saslow
and
FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collector's booklet featuring new
writing on the films by Michael Sicinski.
To
order the Geronimo:
An American Legend
limited
edition Blu-ray, buy it and other great exclusives while supplies
last at these links:
www.screenarchives.com
and
http://www.twilighttimemovies.com/
To
order The
Tracker
Umbrella
import Blu-ray, go to this link for it and other hard-to-find
releases:
http://www.umbrellaent.com.au/
...and
to order the 2
Weeks In Another Town
Warner Archive Blu-ray, go to this link for them and many more great
web-exclusive releases at:
http://www.wbshop.com/
-
Nicholas Sheffo, Ricky Chiang (Tracker)
and James
Lockhart (Geronimo,
Woman)
https://www.facebook.com/jamesharlandlockhartv/
