Cool Hand Luke (1967/Warner Blu-ray)
Picture:
B Sound: C+ Extras: B Film: B
When Paul
Newman recently passed away, he had retired from acting after changing it
forever by showing (along with Marlon Brando and a small handful of other
actors) that the school of method acting was no fluke, changing the art of
acting and cinema forever and it took a long time for most to take Newman
seriously as one since he was such a big star and even sex symbol. To understand how great he was, you can look
towards his very best work and it will speak volumes to this. One of his greatest performances and films is
Stuart Rosenberg’s Cool Hand Luke
(1967) now available on Blu-ray from Warner.
It
defines a great moment early in his career where he was a great figure of the
counterculture making cutting-edge films that hold up decades later in
performances that are unmatched. With
films like this, Newman was a new kind of star with a certain sense of natural
joy that had something behind it, from his smile to his attitude. It offered so much that he could only be a big
screen star and the result was one of the greatest careers in cinema history.
Here, he
is the title character, a former soldier bored with his life, drifting around,
not finding anything and when he decides to cut off the top of parking meters,
lands up in jail and the road work detail.
It is a tough Southern institution and has all kinds of rules, but Luke
could care less and is about to give that institution a ride it will not
forget.
While giving
one of the greatest performances of his career, Newman is backed by one of the
best casts a film ever had in one of the greatest films he’d ever make and
definitely one of Hollywood best films of the 1960s. That cast includes George Kennedy, J.D. Cannon,
Strother Martin, Lou Antonio, Jo Van Fleet, Clifton James, Dennis Hopper, Harry
Dean Stanton, Wayne Rogers, Ralph Waite, Anthony Zerbe and an uncredited Joe
Don Baker. Add the lesser-know
performers and the result is so rich that at the time, most were unknowns and
are totally convincing as men trapped in this hellish situation.
The Donn
Pearce/Frank Pierson screenplay (based on Pearce’s book) is amazing in never
wasting a moment, expecting the audience to pay attention and get involved, is
loaded with classic dialogue and classic moments and is a joy to watch from
beginning to end. When “movies were
still movies” and had the freedom and range to deliver, they were great, big
and meant something more than toy tie-ins and bad jokes. They were about people, living and subtler
truths with healthy cynicism and substance.
Cool Hand Luke is one of the
great must-see Hollywood classics from the last Golden Age of filmmaking and
one that deserves serious rediscovery.
This Blu-ray should help that cause.
The 1080p
2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image was shot in real anamorphic 35mm Panavision
by the great Conrad L. Hall, A.S.C., who shot several of Newman’s Westerns and
other great films like Fat City, Electra Glide In Blue and Road To Perdition and was a master of
the scope frame. Note the wide use of
compositions, use of the telephoto lens (like nothing until Stanley Kubrick’s
1975 epic Barry Lyndon) and the way
he uses the very edges of the frame.
Then he is able to make the most intimate of shots work. Though this is the best this has ever looked
outside of a film print, that print is grainy and this transfer is a bit soft,
indicating it is an older HD master. In
addition, the film was originally issued in three-strip dye-transfer
Technicolor prints and this is not one of those prints, but is clean for what
is a lesser EastmanColor copy. The Dolby
Digital 1.0 Mono is fine for what it is, but especially with a Lalo Schifrin
score, even a simple stereo upgrade would have been nice, but who knows where
all the sound elements are despite the case’s claim they have them. Otherwise, this plays well enough for being a
variant for the original monophonic sound.
Extras
include the originals theatrical trailer, feature length audio commentary by
Historian/Newman biographer Eric Lax and a new documentary entitled A Natural-Born World-Shaker: Making Cool Hand Luke. Except for the absence of any poster art,
promo stills, press material and lobby cards as a stills section, that is a
strong set of extras. Hope Warner
continues such solid back catalog work.
For more
on Newman’s career, try these links:
The Hustler (1961)/The Color Of Money (1986)
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/5851/The+Hustler+++The+Verdict+–+Col
Hud (1963)
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/550/Hud
Butch Cassidy & The Sundance
Kid (1969)
Blu-ray
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6956/Butch+Cassidy+&+The+Sundance+Kid
DVD
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/4144/Butch+Cassidy+&+The+Sundance+Kid
The Sting (1973) DVD
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/2791/The+Sting+-+Legacy+Series
HD-DVD
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/4858/The+Sting+(1973/HD-DVD)
Fat Man & Little Boy (1989)
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/1002/Fat+Man+&+Little+Boy+(Widescreen)
Road To Perdition (2002)
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/618/Road+To+Perdition+(DTS+Widescreen)
Cars (2006) Blu-ray
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/6186/Cars+(Blu-ray/Disney+-+Pixar)
DVD
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/4582/Cars+(Disney/Pixar+DVD-Video+set
- Nicholas Sheffo
