American
Hustle 4K
(2013/4K Ultra HD Blu-ray w/Blu-ray*)/The
Burglars
(1971/Blu-ray/*both Sony/Columbia)/Sympathy
For The Underdog
(1971/MVD/Toei/Radiance/Blu-ray)
4K
Ultra HD Picture: B+ Picture: B/B & B-/B- Sound: B/B- &
C+/B- Extras: B-/D/B Films: B-
If
you like crime, mystery, action and everything from revenge to
heists, than these films are for you...
David
O. Russell's American
Hustle 4K
(2013) is back for a Tenth Anniversary upgrade in 4K and it is very
impressive. This new 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray/Blu-ray set will please
fans especially and is now the best way outside of a really good 35mm
print to see the film. You can read more about it at this link of
our previous coverage of the film:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/12637/American+Hustle+(2013/Sony+Blu-ray+w/DVD
This
release also repeats all of the extras of the previous edition, then
adds 15 more minutes of Deleted and Extended Scenes and a Digital
Movie copy. Though it has minor issues, the film holds up very well
and its look and cast continue to be very striking. Why the studios
are having difficulty making intelligent films like this people like
and continue to talk about is a shame, but here's one of them.
Henri
Verneuil's The
Burglars
(1971) is a French heist thriller that takes place in Athens, Greece
that happens to be a co-production of Columbia Pictures with
Jean-Paul Belmondo leading a team that uses some (then, but still
interesting) slick technology to steal a cache of beautiful, valuable
green emeralds. Omar Sharif is the investigator who is hunting the
jewels down and anyone who has them. Trying to cross Rififi
(co-star Robert Hossein from that film is part of this film's cast)
and Topkapi
with Charade
and a few James Bond films minus any spies, the results are pretty
good and hold up well.
The
cast is fine, locations great and the highlight a half-hour into the
film is an elaborate car chase headed up by the amazing team led by
the legendary Remy Julienne, he would work on more than 300 films
including Fantomas,
Army
Of Shadows,
the original Italian
Job,
the original Day
Of The Jackal,
S*P*Y*S,
The
Valachi Papers,
The
Saint Lies In Wait,
King
Of Hearts,
Elektra
One,
Matchless,
The
Violent Four,
Stuntman,
The
Serpent,
Truffaut's Day
For Night,
The
Night Caller,
Dirty
Hands,
French
Connection II,
Dracula
& Son,
Bobby
Deerfield
and all five James bond films of the 19890s, including and starting
with For
Your Eyes Only.
That's just a strong sample of the work and it remains some of the
best in cinema history and he really gets to show off here. A second
fine such sequence happens later.
Verneuil
was already an established filmmaker with many hits and successes
before this with films like Any
Number Can Play,
Guns
For San Sebastian,
The
25th Hour,
The
Sicilian Clan
and Weekend
At Dunkirk
with Belmondo before this, then went on to helm more smart,
interesting films like The
Night Callers,
The
Serpent
and Body
Of My Enemy.
Belmondo was in more of them. Hope they all get released or
released in upgrades soon for the few that were already remastered.
Dyan Cannon also stars.
There
are sadly no extras, but its great for the film to finally get some
HD respect. Sharif would deal with green emeralds being stolen all
over again in another heist in the film Green
Ice
with Anne Archer and Ryan O'Neal. You can read about that film at
this link:
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/16432/Green+Ice+(1981/Via+Vision/Imprint+Region+Fre
Last
but not least is one of the best yakuza films ever made, Kinji
Fukasaku's Sympathy
For The Underdog
(1971, the same year as Burglars)
with a group of older gangsters get back together when their
decade-jailed leader (Koji Tsuruta) finds out his old turf has been
taken over by semi-legitimized rival gangsters, which leads them to
go to Okinawa, where power and law are up in the air on criminal
issues to get revenge and get back what he thinks he is owed. His
crew joins him.
Graphic,
violent and frilled with all kinds of dark humor, the pace and energy
are still impressive and will remind one of some of Scorsese's
gangster genre work, but the film is an entity on its own, leaving
many such Japanese New Wave films behind, cut like a French New Wave
film and also more than ready and able to compete with big budget,
big screen films lie the 1967 James Bond film You
Only Live Twice,
one of the biggest and best movie production ever made in Japan to
this day and a huge international hit only a few years before this
went into production.
The
chemistry between the actors is very convincing, making you more than
believe they've known each other for eons, the screenplay just keeps
moving along at a brisk pace that makes sense and Fukasaku is easily
one of Japan's most underrated directors. Though a few parts are
dated, others are parts we have seen dozens of times by now and you
get a subplot or two that are not bad if not spectacular, I just wish
the film were a little longer and could keep its pace up. Especially
if you like such films, this is highly recommended.
Extras
(per the press release) include
a Feature Length Audio Commentary by yakuza film expert Nathan Stuart
(2024)
Interview
with Fukasaku biographer Olivier Hadouchi (2024)
Visual
essay on Okinawa on screen by film historian and author Aaron Gerow
(2024)
Trailer
New
and improved English subtitle translation
Reversible
sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Time
Tomorrow
and
a Limited Edition Booklet featuring new writing by Bastian
Meiresonne and an archival review of the film.
Now
for playback performance. The 2160p HEVC/H.265, 2.35 X 1, Dolby
Vision/HDR (10; Ultra HD Premium)-enhanced Ultra High Definition
image on American
Hustle 4K
far outdoes the previous Blu-ray, new Blu-ray and any other video
version, looking the best since I saw it in a fresh, new 35mm film
print back when it was first released. The 1080p 2.35 X 1 digital
High Definition image on the Blu-ray is almost the same as the older
Blu-ray and looks like the same pressing down to the menus, but this
one is slightly clearer, though neither can match the amazing 4K
performance.
The
4K edition offers a new Dolby Atmos (Dolby TrueHD 7.1 mixdown for
older systems) upgrade that gives the sound more separation and
clarity, but lacks the warmth of the DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1
lossless mix on both copies here, so it is only a solid alternative
and not an improvement over the original audio. Either way, both
choices are nice to have.
The
1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfers on the two
versions of Burglars
are a little different, with the shorter, English version slightly
faded throughput and only looking so good, but the original, longer
version has great warmth, color and depth that might remind one of a
dye-transfer,
three-strip Technicolor print. This was shot in real anamorphic
Panavision and that helps it look good too. Director of Photography
Claude Renoir is not only a veteran of the films of Jean Renoir, but
also lensed films like The
Spy Who Loved Me,
The
Game Is Over,
Barbarella,
The
Adventurers,
The
Madwoman Of Chaillot,
Paul
and Michelle,
The
Serpent,
French
Connection II)
uses the very widescreen frame to its fullest extent and the impact
is a plus. The DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 2.0 Mono lossless mix is as
good as the film will ever sound in the longer version and it sounds
fine, though slightly weaker in the shorter U.S. Version. Ennio
Morricone recorded the music score and it sounds good here, though I
wonder if he recorded it in stereo too.
The
1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Sympathy
can show the age of the materials used, with the opening text telling
us of the 35mm negative having some damage and fading. The damage is
hardly there and they have done a great job of bringing back the
color the best they could, but there are still signs of fading
throughout and detail can be on the soft side, though that might also
be form the older, dated anamorphic lenses used to shoot the film.
The PCM 1.0 Mono lossless track sounds good for its age, though I
wish it were 2.0 Mono, but it is well restored without any major
issues. The combination is also good for a film that was almost
lost.
-
Nicholas Sheffo
