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Released by: Mill Creek Entertainment
Released on: May 14, 2013.
Director: Burt Reynolds, Theresa Russell, Sean Connery, Christopher Walken
Cast: Michael Crichton
Year: 1989/1971
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The Movie:
The latest in Mill Creek's series of low cost Blu-ray double features of major studio catalogue titles features headliners Burt Reynolds and Sean Connery in a pair of thrillers well worth your while. Here's a look…
Physical Evidence (1989):
Directed by Michael Crichton, the film stars Burt Reynolds as a former detective named Joe Paris. When an extortionist named Jake Farley is found dead, seemingly murdered by strangulation, circumstantial evidence points to Paris as the killer. Though he tells anyone who will listen that he is an innocent man, the fact that he can't provide a reliable alibi doesn't make him look good.
Paris' case is handed off to a public defender named Jenny Hudson (Theresa Russell) who is only too aware of the fact that there were plenty of other people out there who would have wanted Farley dead. She can't quite seem to put together the pieces of the puzzle needed to clear Paris, however, and when witnesses aplenty start disappearing and/or shutting their mouths, it starts to look like maybe certain parties in the police department could have set Joe up to take their fall.
Set to a score by Henry Mancini, the movie is well paced and nicely shot and it makes for a decent ninety minute time killer. It never quite takes off the way you hope it will and at times it feels very pedestrian but Reynolds is able to carry the movie almost entirely on charm. Crichton's direction is fine, but very average showing little of the knack for crafting genuine suspense that he demonstrated with films like Westworld and Coma. Russell is okay in her role, fun to look at if fairly cardboard in terms of character development.
This one plays out more or less like you'd expect it to but if you're a Burt Reynolds fan, it's worth seeing. He's good in the lead and has enough to do aside from looking like Burt Reynolds to make his performance noteworthy. Ned Beatty and Kay Lenz also have decent supporting roles.
The Anderson Tapes (1971):
Considerably more interesting is this 1971 film directed by directed by Sidney Lumet. Connery plays a slick professional thief named Duke Anderson who, when we meet up with him, has just finished ten years behind bars. Now a free man, he catches up with his girlfriend, a prostitute named Ingrid (Dyan Cannon), and moves into her fancy apartment where he soon realizes that opportunity is all around him.
He puts together a team made up of The Kid (Christopher Walken), Tommy (Martin Balsam), Everson (Garrett Morris) and a reluctant mobster named Sock (Val Avery). Setting in motion a scheme to rob as many people in the building as he can, he doesn't realize that there are cameras all over the place put in place by a secret government agency that appears to be keeping tabs on them.
An interesting precursor to Lumet's later Dog Day Afternoon in that it's shot in a very realistic style, The Anderson Tapes lets Connery command the screen in that way that only Connery is able to do. He uses charm and leadership skills to talk his cronies into joining him on what is essentially a really foolish idea for a heist, and it's interesting how the script makes this all work. He plays to the strengths and weaknesses of different parties and once it's all in place, we see the efforts of Anderson and his team contrast with those of the law enforcement officials on the other side of the spectrum.
While the idea of surveillance is common place these days, what with the NSA having been revealed to be tracking phone records and internet use and security cameras having played a pivotal role in capturing those involved in the 2013 Boston Marathon attacks, the idea behind all this is certainly dated. Look past that tough and appreciate the performances from all involved, Connery in particular, and the style which Lumet employs. It's a low key production in a lot of ways, which is interesting given the absurdity of Anderson's plan, but it's quite a slick little movie with a fun story and a great bunch of actors on screen doing their thing. Throw in a great score from none other than Quincy Jones and this one is a great thriller, one absolutely worth revisiting.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Both movies are presented in 1.78.1 widescreen in AVC encoded 1080p high definition. Physical Evidence looks quite nice, showing good detail and very nice color reproduction. The Anderson Tapes doesn't look quite as solid, though it's still pretty decent - detail isn't quite as strong and it looks a little dirtier than the first feature. Both transfers are solid overall, however, showing far better texture and detail than standard definition would allow for and appearing to be free of any noise reduction or digital tweaking of any kind.
Both films receive DTS-HD 2.0 sound mixes, there are no alternate language options offered though removable subtitles are provided in English and French for each of the two features. Range is limited on both tracks but dialogue is fine across the board and the levels are fine. The improvement that the Blu-ray offers over DVD releases isn't quite as obvious here as it is with the visuals but you'll notice it. These are unremarkable but perfectly acceptable tracks.
Outside of some basic menus, there are no extras on this disc to speak of.
The Final Word:
Mill Creek's Blu-ray double feature release of Physical Evidence and The Anderson Tapes looks quite good and sounds alright and the fact that it's available at a ridiculously low cost makes it easy to overlook the complete lack of supplements. The movies are both worth a watch as if neither is a classic they're both at least good solid entertainment.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
