CLINT EASTWOOD
4K TRIPLE-PLAY REVIEW
DIRTY HARRY (1971)
THE OUTLAW JOSEY WALES (1976)
PALE RIDER (1985)
4K Ultra HD + Digital
Label: Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: R
Duration: 102 Minutes
Audio: English Dolby Atmos (TrueHD 7.1) DTS-HD MA 2.0 Dual-Mono with Optional English Subtitles
Video: HDR10 2160p Ultra HD Widescreen (2.35:1)
Director: Don Siegel
Cast: Clint Eastwood, Andy Robinson, Harry Guardino, Reni Santoni, John Vernon.
Dirty Harry (1976), directed by Don Siegel (Charley Varick), stars Clint Eastwood (The Man with No Name Trilogy) as hard-nosed San Francisco cop 'Dirty' Harry Callahan, a anti-hero cop not afraid to take justice into his own hands to clean the streets of scum, even if it means bending the rules, and angering the bleeding-heart liberals of the local bureaucracy like the mayor, played by John Vernon (Curtains). The villain is a deranged psychopath dubbed ''Scorpio" (Andy Robinson, Hellraiser), who starts out killing a woman in a rooftop swimming pool with a sniper rifle, which puts Callahan on the case. Next he kills a 10 year-old boy, then kidnapping a 14 year-old girl and holding her ransom. Callahan is assigned to deliver the ransom, but there's no way this cop is letting that scumbag get off the hook without delivering some old-school vigilante cop justice. Dirty Harry was the blueprint for all vigilante-cop thrillers that came after it, it's after effects reverberate through film still tot his day, it's right-wing fascist cop politics ruffle feathers, but there's no denying the gritty impact of Siegel's film, and Eastwood's iconic vigilante cop Harry Callahan, delivering one iconic line after another, but none more memorable than an early scene where he takes down a group of bank robbers, he has one of them down on the ground, his massive .44 Magnum aimed at his head, the baddies gun just within his reach, he chides, "I know what you're thinking, 'Did he fire six shots or only five?' Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I've kinda lost track myself. But being this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do you, punk?". Ooh, it's so cool, so bad-add, and it's even better the second time around during the finale when he reuses it. Sure, it's right-wing, but even a bleeding heart liberal like myself loves a bit of vigilante escapism, and there are none better than this action-packed, visceral and gritty Siegel/Eastwood team-up.
Special Features:
- Audio Commentary by Richard Schickel
- NEW! Generations and Dirty Harry (6:15)
- NEW! Lensing Justice: The - Cinematography of Dirty Harry (7:54)
- American Masters Career Retrospective: Clint Eastwood: Out of the Shadows (1:26;57)
- Clint Eastwood: The Man from Malpaso (15:07)
- Clint Eastwood: A Cinematic Legacy – Fighting for Justice (17:33)
- Interview Gallery: Patricia Clarkson (2:04), Joel Cox (3:34), Clint Eastwood (5:38), Hal Holbrook (0:42), Evan Kim (2:08), John Milius (3:45), Ted Post (1:02), Andy Robinson (2:03), Arnold Schwarzenegger (3:02), Robert Urich (2:40)
- Dirty Harry’s Way (6:58)
- Dirty Harry: The Original (29:43)
THE OUTLAW JOSIE WALES (1976) 4K Ultra HD + Digital
Label: Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: PG
Duration: 135 Minutes 50 Seconds
Audio: English Dolby Atmos (TrueHD 7.1), DTS-HD MA 2.0 Dual-Mono with Optional English Subtitles
Video: HDR10 2160p Ultra HD Widescreen (2.35:1)
Director: Clint Eastwood
Cast: The Outlaw Josie Wales stars Clint Eastwood, Chief Dan George, Sondra Locke, Bill McKinney, John Vernon.
The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976), directed and starring Clint Eastwood, was based on the 1972 novel The Rebel Outlaw: Josey Wales by author Asa Earl "Forrest" Carter, with an adapted screenplay by Phil Kaufman and Sonia Chernus, Carter is an author well-worth researching, and he's quite problematic. Anyway, in this story set during the end of the civil War, concerns a Missouri farmer, the titular Wales (Eastwood), whose at the start of the film has his wife and daughter murdered by a small troop of bloodthirsty, pro-Union soldiers called the Red Legs, lead by Captain Terrill (Bill McKinney, Cleopatra Jones). after burying his family he joins a group of Confederate rebels, killing union soldiers. At the wars close Wales superior Captain Fletcher (Howard Vernon, Chained Heat) persuades Wales and his group of rebels to surrender, as they have been promised amnesty, only to be betrayed, gunned down in a spray of gunfire, with only Wales, Fletcher and a wounded young gun named Jamie (Sam Bottoms, Apocalypse Now). The wounded Jamie succumbs to his injuries, and Senator Jim Lane forces Fletcher to join Terrill in tracking down Wales, placing a hefty bounty on his head. The bounty attracts a lot of unwanted attention with Wales having to dispatch men he far outmatches when it comes to gunslinging. Headed to Texas he befriends elderly Cherokee Lone Watie (Chief Dan George, Shadow of the Hawk) who joins hi, later rescuing a Navajo woman Little Moonlight (Chief Dan George, TVs Twin Peaks and Northern Exposure) from a pair of two other bounty hunters, and a feisty elderly Kansan woman Granny Sarah Turner (Paula Trueman, Homebodies) and her granddaughter Laura Lee (Sondra Locke, Death Game) from a marauding group of Comancheros. together they decide to head to Granny's dead son's ranch and make a go at it, alongside two more pick-ups, Travis (Sheb Wooley, High Noon) and Chato, who were employees of her late son. they have some trouble with the local Comanche Chief Ten Bears (Will Sampson, Poltergeist II: The Other Side), and the farm is ambushed by Terrill and his men. leading to an action-packed shootout, followed by a poignant final encounter with Fletcher that really drives home the post-Vietnam themes of this revisionist western.
Special Features:
- Audio Commentary by Richard Schickel
- NEW! An Outlaw and an Antihero (17:56)
- NEW! The Cinematography of and Outlaw: Crafting Josie Wales
- Clint Eastwood’s West (29:03)
- Eastwood in Action (7:54)
- Hell Hath No Fury: The Making of The Outlaw Josie Wales (29:15)
- Clint Eastwood: A Cinematic Legacy – Reinventing the West (17:36)
Label: Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: R
Duration: 115 Minutes 44 Seconds
Audio: English Dolby Atmos (TrueHD 7.1) DTS-HD MA 2.0 with Optional English Subtitles
Video: HDR10 2160p Ultra HD Widescreen (2.39:1)
Director: Clint Eastwood
Cast: Clint Eastwood, Michael Moriarty, Carrie Snodgress, Christopher Penn, Richard Dysart, Sydney Penny, Richard Kiel, Doug McGrath, John Russell.
Pale Rider (1985), directed by Clint Eastwood, returned him to the western genre that he made his name on, a tale of frontier vengeance wherein a seemingly mythological and nameless stranger (Eastwood) who rides into a small California gold rush town, dubbed the "Preacher", where he finds himself in the middle of a feud between a crooked mining syndicate run by mining baron Coy LaHood (Richard Dysart, The Thing) and a group of independent prospectors lead by Hull Barrett (Michael Moriarty, Q the Winged Serpent) trying to live out the American dream. LaHood wants the prospectors off their land, and regularly raids their shanty town, using violence an intimidation to wear away at their rigged determination, eventually damning the creek to cut off their water supply. when the Preacher arrives he makes his presence known, single-handedly whooping LaHood's men with an wooden axe-handle, casing the baron to bring in six for-hire lawmen, lead by corrupt Marshal Stockburn (John Russell, Rio Bravo), who cruelly gun down drunken prospector "Spider" Conway (Doug McGrath, Black Christmas) just after he unearths a rock loaded with gold, which leads to a final farce confrontation with LaHood and Stockburn. the mysterious "Preacher" is hinted at being an avenging spirit of some kind, he rides into the rea on a pale horse like Death, one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, just after a young girl named Sarah (Carrie Snodgress, The Fury) prays for a miracle after LaHood's men kill her dog while raiding the camp. A shot of him shirtless reveals six scars from gunshot wounds, and when LaHood describes him to the newly arrived Stockton he seems familiar, but it's also impossible, because he says the man he's describing is dead, but he appears slightly shaken by the prospect. The rugged western setting and mythic pale rider make for an enthralling watch, enhanced in no small part by the brilliant lensing by Bruce Surtees (Night Moves), who captures the rugged terrain of the wooded mountain and it's turning Fall foliage and snow-capped mountains gorgeously, while maintaining the rugged beauty. be in the lookout for Chris Penn (At Close Range) as LaHood's scumbag son Josh, Richard Kiel (Eegah) as a hulking giant working for the LaHood, and Billy Drago (Vamp) as one of the bloodthirsty Stockburn deputies.
Special Features:
- NEW! The Diary of Sydney Penny: Lessons from the Set (7:26)
- NEW! Painting the Preacher: Bruce Surtees and Pale Rider (8:36)
- Clint Eastwood: A Cinematic Legacy – Reinventing Westerns (17:36)
- Eastwood Directs: The Untold Story (1:01:41)
- The Eastwood Factor (1:28:27)
All three films have been gorgeously restored in 4K with HDR10 color-grades that are stunning, filmic through and through, gorgeous colors, solid blacks with depth and clarity that brought a smile to my face. audio options include both Dolby Amos (TrueHD 7.1), as well as the Original Theatrical mixes via DTS-HD MA 2.0 dual-mono, with optional English subtitles. While the Atmos tracks are terrific I still love the "feel' of these 2.0 mixes, and I am glad they are included here, as i do not remember the Blu-ray having the original theatrical audio.
Extras, oh boy, plenty! First the new stuff, each of the three films gets two new featurettes, exploring the themes of the film as well as a dedicated featurette celebrating the cinematography of Surtees. There are also loads of archival extras, including commentaries for Dirty Harry and The Outlaw Josey Wales by Richard Shickle, featurettes galore, archival interviews, and between the three releases we get three hour+ documentaries celebrating the legacy of Eastwood's work in film.
Each of the three films arrives in a black keepcase with a single-sided sleeve of artwork. inside there's a redemption code for a digital copy of the films. the first-pressing of these included a very handsome slipcover with the same artwork as the wraps, but printed with a metallic sheen that looks terrific.
Buy it!
Standard 4K UHD + Digital Versions:
Pale Rider
Dirty Harry
The Outlaw Josey Wales
Limited Edition 4K UHD + Digital SteelBooks:
Dirty Harry
Pale Rider
The Outlaw Josey Wales
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