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Posted: |
Mar 31, 2015 - 8:44 PM
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By: |
Richard-W
(Member)
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Good news.
I've never been able to suspend disbelief in the Lone Ranger; I know too much about the Texas Rangers, western history and frontier life to accept that a Texas Ranger would be caught wearing a white hat and powder blue clothes, or that he would ride a white stallion and firing silver bullets. People would have shot him off his horse from a half mile away with their Winchesters soon as they saw him coming. But this version is down-to-earth and tells the story more believably than any other, I think, and I've seen them all. It is directed by William A. Fraker, who also directed the classic MONTE WALSH (1970) and who photographed so many great films, including BULLITT (1968), ROSEMARY'S BABY (1968) and TOMBSTONE (1993). There were a lot of production problems that were widely reported at the time, and some drastic last-minute pre-release cutting that resulted in abrupt jumps in the film where there used to be substantial footage. The narrative is coherent, but it's obvious that footage is missing. Let's hope Shout Factory can find the missing footage and perhaps put it in the supplements.
I bought the region B blu-ray a couple of years ago when a domestic release didn't seem to be in the cards. It looks okay. I hope this will be a new hi-def transfer. I'd buy it again. It's entertaining. I recommend the film, especially if you like westerns.
In comparison, it makes the Disney reboot look like the twisted distorted crap that it is.
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Posted: |
Aug 15, 2015 - 3:36 PM
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By: |
MusicMad
(Member)
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I bought the Blu-Ray solely to hear John Barry's score. I'd seen a few minutes of the film many years ago during a (rare) TV broadcast. I recall reading that the Gaumont cinema in Birmingham published the fact that this film was the first, in the cinema's long history in the city, to be shown one afternoon without one fee-paying member of the public - a sign of the times in 1980/81.
Having just watched the film I can see why it is so derided and it's hard to explain just where it all goes wrong, but script, direction and actors fight for first place.
As for Mr. Barry's music ... well, not every score can be perfect and I believe he wrote more than his far share of perfect scores. Not that this one doesn't work ... far from it. At times, especially the long set piece for the ambush, it is so right that the only thing wrong are the visuals and dialogue.
But for an iconic US Western hero character (albeit traditionally scored by a theme of European origin) the lack of Copland-esque musical landscape is telling.
I have no hesitation in suggesting that John Barry's musical score is easily the best thing about this film ... but that doesn't make the viewing a great experience. I'd still love to own a full-score CD release though and I'm pleased to note that there is plenty of music material in the film to warrant a full release - and I'll happily take the vocals, too. In the meantime, at least we have this wonderful Blu-Ray (or DVD) release which features dedicated music and song/narration scores.
Mitch
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