The Man Who Fell To Earth - Special
Edition (2 DVD set)
Picture: B-
Sound: B Extras: C+ Film: A-
The Man Who Fell To Earth (1976)
is one of the greatest smart Science Fiction films ever made, proving Nicolas
Roeg (along with is work on Francois Truffaut’s Fahrenheit 451 in 1966)
is one truly genius filmmaker. This is
a classic, at least in science fiction, if not beyond genre into advanced
narrative filmmaking itself. Bowie is
an extra-terrestrial being with an advanced study and knowledge of earth,
arrives in the United States to exploit its Capitalist system with the goal of
bringing water back to his dying planet and the family he left behind. When he intends to achieve this by
industrial innovations too phenomenal not to be noticed, he gets more than the
wrong kind of attention, jeopardizing his mission and himself.
If only it were even that simple. There is the school professor (Rip Torn) who
becomes involved in the oddest ways, the corporate brain (Buck Henry) who has
his life transformed by the arrival of Mr. Newton (Bowie), the sad girl (Candy
Clark) who becomes his girlfriend, and Captain James Lovell as himself. Screenplay by Paul Mayersberg, from the
novel by Walter Tevis, is an exceptional piece of writing. Roeg breaks all sense of space and time
literally with it, making it a complex work with few equals. The film's producers are Michael Deeley and
Barry Spikings. Deeley would later
produce on Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner eight years later. This film likely prepared him well for that.
This is the second time this film has been issued
on DVD. The first, issued by Fox
Lorber, had a recycled letterboxed transfer that was not even anamorphic. It was also analog, had bad reds, and
overall was problematic. Anchor Bay
offers an anamorphic 2.35 X 1 transfer for the first time. For those who held onto their Criterion
Special Edition LaserDisc set for better picture quality, they can rest
easy. This transfer offers major
improvements. Reds are more stable;
there is less grain, more depth, more naturalistic fleshtones, better color
scale, a cleaner print, better clarity, more picture information, more accurate
letterboxing, brighter whites, and darker blacks. Gray scale is also improved.
The cinematography by Anthony Richmond, B.S.C., is very memorable as
well.
The sound is also hugely improved. The Criterion LaserDisc claimed stereo, but
it was very feeble 2.0 PCM CD sound that as practically monophonic, while the
Dolby Digital 2.0 on the Fox Lorber DVD was mono. Anchor Bay offers a very impressive remix in both Dolby Digital
6.1 EX and DTS ES, light years ahead of any audio ever offered for the film
before. Not only are sound effects and
music opened up wide, but also dialogue is much clearer than ever before. The EX effect is interesting without being
gimmicky, much like what Anchor Bay just did with their DTS ES reissue of
George Romero’s Day of the Dead (1985), from their new Divimax
series. This set could be seen as a
test run of sorts for that series.
Though the film has been nicely remixed for 6.1 sound, it could have
been interesting if Anchor Bay could have afforded the royalties to add David
Bowie’s abandoned music for the film, which later became his classic album Low. The recently deceased John Philips of The Mamas
and The Papas did the score instead and it is some of the most interesting work
of his career.
The second disc of the set offers a stills gallery,
some brief cast/crew biographies, several trailers and TV promos, and a
brand-new retrospective of the film.
“Watching The Alien” runs 24 minutes and is very good, loaded with
excellent information about the making of the film. It does not, unfortunately, include other extras found on The
Criterion Collection LaserDisc set.
Those included deleted scenes, screenplay analysis, stills of costumes,
production & behind-the-scenes not found in this DVD’s documentary, some
items out of Roeg’s notebook of the production of the film, and especially the
audio commentary by Roeg, Bowie and Buck Henry. That’s a shame, since Criterion has the exclusive rights to at
least the commentary, but this edition is the equal of that with its other
extras. It also well-outperforms the
old LaserDisc set in sound and picture.
Sadly, with rights bouncing back and fourth all the time, this is an all
too common story in home video, but The Man Who Fell To Earth is one of
those important films that affords several special editions, when most films
never see a single one.
The other reason this film is so effective is how
it boldly shows the dark side of our world for what it is and lives for what
they are. The sad sate of the Science
Fiction genre today is built in part on a strong denial of those things, while
pretending to have a brain. Roeg is
part of an short, elite list of true architects of cinema and The Man Who
Fell To Earth marks a time when he really got the best possible talents
together and pulled off a film that is still way ahead of its time.
- Nicholas
Sheffo
