The Killers - Criterion Collection
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DVD details
Actor: Claude Akins, Hall Brock, John Cassavetes, John Copage, Virginia ChristineBrand: Image Entertainment
Primary Contributor: Angie Dickinson
Primary Contributor: Lee Marvin
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; English (Subtitled)
Format: Black & White, DVD-Video, NTSC, Special Edition
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 196 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-02-18
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Criterion
DVD Reviews of The Killers - Criterion Collection
DVD Review: Not Super But Notable For A Few Things
Summary: 4 Stars
I always thought the best part of the `46 "The Killers" was the opening scene in the diner with two of the toughest guys in the film noir genre: Charles McGraw and William Conrad. After that, it went downhill but is still quite passable as a film noir.
It's also nice to see Ava Gardner in her prime. Take a look: there is a woman with some true sex appeal! Also fun to admire was the cinematography, which usually is good in film noirs. This is why I purchased the Criterion DVD version of this movie and the 1964 version. They usually offer the best transfers.
This was Burt Lancaster's first major role and he looks and sounds different from the Lancaster most of us know through his great films of the 50s on up.
Most of the story is told in flashback as an insurance salesman (Edmund O'Brien), who is the real star of the film turns detective in trying to find out why "Swede Anderson" (Lancaster) had been murdered. The story is okay, not super but worth watching for Ava and the photography.
As for the 1964 version, I found cast more intriguing than the story A bunch of well-known 1960s actors dot this film, with lesser-known but familiar faces also in here. He's not in the lead, but the most famous, of course, is former U.S. President Ronald Reagan. The stars of the film are the always- intense Lee Marvin, Clu Culager, John Cassevetes, Angie Dickinson, Claude Aiken and Norman Fell. I would like to have witnessed rehearsals for this film!
The story starts off with a bang - it gets your attention - and then gets stupid with an annoying romance between Cassavetes and Dickinson (complete with affected dialog) and then finishes very strong in the last 35 minutes. The ending is excellent. I guess you could label this a '60s version of film noir, especially since it is something of a re-make of the 1946 noir of the same name.
DVD Review: 1946 Trumps 1964
Summary: 5 Stars
It's interesting that Criterion packaged the original fim adaptation of "The Killers" along with it's remake, or in this case, the reimaging. This is a case, however, where the original in terms of artistry outdoes the remake. Director Robert Siodmak's 1946 version is innovative in terms of style merging noir and cinema verite. The byzantine script takes many interesting twists and turns that add up to a satisfying experience. Burt Lancaster, as the doomed Swede, with little dialogue manages to light up the screen and herald him as a force to be reckoned with. Ava Gardner, as the sultry Kitty Collins, makes for a lethal femme fatale. Lancaster and Gardner may get top billing here but the film's real star is Edmond O'Brien as the dogged insurance investigator who's trying to sort out all the strands of the mystery that is the murder of the inconsequential Swede. Don Siegel's 1964 remake, if it existed in a vacuum, would be an OK film but, alas, it has to be unfortunately compared to the far superior original. Siegel's film breaks no cinematic ground. One interesting conceit here is that the inquisitor role has shifted to the hired gunmen played by Lee Marvin and Clu Gulager. Marvin, as always, in his trademark hardbitten style is terrific. Ronald Reagan, in his final big screen role, is compelling as the film's heavy. John Cassavetes and Angie Dickinson, however, are no substitute for Lancaster and Gardner. I recommend this set highly, however, as an example of changing film styles.DVD Review: Thoughtful Hired Guns
Summary: 4 Stars
Ernest Hemingway was a prolific short story writer and I have argued in the past elsewhere in this space that perhaps some of these were his best literary efforts. Needless to say, a writer whose command of a sparse and functional style is going do very nicely when Hollywood comes a-calling. In this case the short story was indeed short. A couple of hired killers come into a lunch counter looking for someone on the run. He doesn't show and that is the end of the story. Although we presume his fate is foresworn. But not for Hollywood. In this remake of the 1946 film that starred Burt Lancaster the hired killers (played by Lee Marvin and Clu Gulager) remain but they are thoughtful (and greedy). They want to know why Johnny North (the guy on the run) does not run and stands for the hit. As befits a 1960's film they want to get the motive and will get it come hell or high water. Naturally, there is a woman (a young Angie Dickerson) involved that leads old Johnny astray. From there the film goes through a series of flashbacks to figure out how Johnny became the fall guy. The original is a little closer to Hemingway's sense of the dynamics that lead to the patsy's fatalism but this is an interesting take, as well.
DVD Review: A first-rate crime noir from 1946; a flawed and dated crime story from 1964
Summary: 4 Stars
The Killers (1946) - How do you make an interesting movie when the character the movie ostensibly is all about is just a dumb lug, as interesting as a boiled potato? The Swede stumbles into one situation after another, willing to believe in true love or lies. For me, director Robert Siodmak and screenwriters Anthony Veiller, Richard Brooks and John Huston (the last two uncredited) solve this problem three ways.
First, there is the great look and style of the movie. I think it's impossible to say one movie looks better than all others, especially when it comes to noirs, but The Killers nails as well as any the dark, foreboding feel of cheap hotel rooms, shadowy streets and close-ups of white, worried faces. Second, all the flashbacks in this movie create the sense of a complex jigsaw puzzle slowly being solved. The story not only becomes complicated and interesting, it's great fun to see what the next piece in the puzzle is going to show us. And what helps make all those puzzle pieces interesting is the cast of characters who take turns in the flashback spotlights. There's not a dud actor in the lot. And third, for me, is the sourness of the ending. No, not the last scene of a smiling Edmond O'Brien jauntily leaving his boss's office. It's the revelation of what a nasty piece of work Kitty Collins really was and how far out of her league was the Swede. He was just a big, thick-eared guy who, in other circumstances, might have gone straight, but he didn't have a chance when he saw Kitty that first time at the party sitting next to the piano player. I don't think this was what Rodgers and Hammerstein had in mind when they wrote about seeing a stranger across a crowded room.
Besides, "I did something wrong once" is a great line to power a crime movie with.
What also struck me is the simplicity of the logic behind Jim Colfax' decision to unleash the two hit men onto the Swede. At first, it seemed so much smarter just to let things coast by. But Colfax's reasoning holds up if you think about it, and that logic powers the action of the movie. What doesn't hold up is the motivation of the two hit men's behavior in the diner. How much easier it would have been to walk in, sit down and order a couple of cups of coffee. Then mention they were in town to pay back some money to the Swede but they don't have his address. Anybody know where he lives? Someone would have said, "Why, sure. He lives at Ma's boarding house just a couple of blocks from here." I know, this more practical approach would have gutted the foreboding and nervousness of the movie. I'm not advocating this, just suggesting that it's a little bothersome when a great plot device has a flaw.
The Killers (1964) - You know there's a problem when the extras on the DVD disc are more interesting than the movie itself. The excerpts from the memos written by whoever worked at Hollywood's Department to Avoid Naughty Situations are great fun. What is sadder are the memos and notes from director Don Siegel pointing out the weaknesses in the 1946 version and how they needed to be avoided...then seeing how he managed to turn out a movie considerably less interesting than the original.
Siegel was making a TV movie, then saw it released on the big screen when the violence seemed to be too extreme for home viewing. The movie has that flat, clear look that says "television." The back-screen projections are even worse than Hitchcock's. The racing sequences seem to go and on, looking both artificial and silly...actors who wear racing goggles end up looking as out of place as politicians who let themselves be photographed wearing helmets. The Sixties look has dated the movie mightily. When I saw the two bad guys, Lee Marvin and Clu Gulager walking around with their sunglasses on, I thought I was watching an Ackroyd/Belushi skit. (Marvin quickly set me straight on that.)
On the plus side, depending on how much you respond to vicious bullies, Lee Marvin does a fine job. The last third of the film, starting when the robbery takes place and then into the last two flashbacks and the conclusion, picks up a nice head of double-crossing steam. The last fifteen minutes or so, starting when Marvin and Gulager show up in Ronald Reagan's office, are so good I wished the whole film had reached that level. I suspect that without this movie sharing the same title as the 1946 film, and without Criterion resurrecting it to accompany the 1946 film, Siegel's version would be forgotten.
The Killers (1946) is a first-rate movie. The Killers (1964) is not. It's amusing to be able to see them side-by-side. Both have first-rate film transfers and a multitude of extras. Thanks, Criterion.
DVD Review: Film Noir "The Killers" reviewed by Chroesus
Summary: 4 Stars
I could not wait to view this set of DVD's. I found both versions to be
well acted divergent takes on a classic noir theme. The one bad step that
leads to more mis-steps and a long dark spiral with plenty of crime drama
and action to boot.
The sixties era version took a bad rap in many of the reviews I read but
I found the Lee Marvin performance action packed and entertaining all the
way thru. It lacked the noir atmosphere but managed to preserve almost all
of the mystery and depth of charactor the original had.
The original movie is a classic noir, told partly in flashback, a boxer
struggles against fate. A bad break ends his career early. His own flawed
character leads him to a femme fatelle and a decent into darkness.
Without giving too much away for those who have never seen it, an inves
-tigater is intrigued and follows his footsteps into the dark underworld
of crime, deceit and fate.
The extras are pretty good too. They give the viewer a look into two in-
triging eras of film making in distinctly divergent styles...well worth the price.
Description of The Killers - Criterion Collection
Studio: Image Entertainment Release Date: 02/18/2003 Run time: 196 minutesThe Killers (1946)
This 1946 adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's short story adds well over an hour of new material to the original tale. The reason is, while director Robert Siodmak, star Burt Lancaster, and an outstanding supporting cast are faithful to Hemingway's work, his story only takes up about 15 minutes of screen time. Burt Lancaster plays the doomed man sought by hired guns in a small town. Hemingway's bruisingly concise dialogue makes an early sequence set in a diner quite unnerving, but after the killers dispense with their prey, Siodmak turns to an insurance investigator (Edmond O'Brien) who looks into the reasons behind the murder. An exemplary film noir (complete with a fickle femme fatale played by Ava Gardner), The Killers is all mood and fatalism.
The Killers (1964)
The 1964 remake (of sorts) by Don Siegel builds another whole world around Hemingway's narrow, if intense, premise. The two assassins of Siegel's film (Clu Gulager, Lee Marvin) go in search of their intended victim--a teacher (John Cassavetes) at a school for the blind--and find that he not only recognizes his fate when they show up, but seems entirely resigned to it. Curiosity leads the killers to seek out the party who hired them and discover why Cassavetes's character didn't run or fight. Soon the facts tumble into place--the dead man had once been a top-drawer racer who fell for a glamorous woman (Angie Dickinson), the latter gradually pulling him into the orbit of a criminal villain (a convincingly evil Ronald Reagan)--and the film becomes increasingly dark and dangerous. Originally shot for television but rejected for its violence, Siegel's film is a blistering experience of swimming against the currents of fate for one's survival--and losing. --Tom Keogh
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