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(More customer reviews)Beatty plays journalist investigating mysterious deaths of witnesses to a political assassination.
Pakula's dark and paranoid masterpiece was origninally shot by Gordon Willis (Godfathers I II and III, Klute, Zeilig, etc.) in 2.35 aspect. Willis, a master of light and composition, developed frames for this film that are practically abstract. His sense of composition (I'm sure Pakula was part of this) is brilliant: the static formalistic compositions; the use of long lenses to flatten each image into an (almost) isometric projection.
Now, maybe I'm getting carried away here, but "parallax" and "isometric"...? Hmmm... Both are terms related to geometry the "perception" of reality -- which is more-or-less the subtext of this film.
Anyway, after its dissapearance from theater screens this film made numerous appearances on TV (mainly late at night) in a pan-and-scan version. Same with the VHS version. So until the DVD was released, this was the only way I (and most other people) had seen it.
Well twice the frame is twice as good -- now entire sequences can be re-examined and reinterpreted (the ending has elements which appeared seperated in the VHS version).
I found the picture and sound to be good, but I'd hoped for more additional material (a documentary, a making of, an interview or two -- anything). This is certainly one film that deserves the extra attention. However I'm grateful for the 2.35 version.
Bottom line: a real treat for cinephiles, and a great movie for everyone else.
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