6.6 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 2.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
Antihero Harry Palmer having left the Secret Service, is now working as a private eye. He is soon sucked into a web of conspiracy involving a far-right American billionaire, General Midwinter, who plans to wipe out the Communist threat in Latvia using his highly sophisticated computer system.
Starring: Michael Caine, Karl Malden, Ed Begley, Oskar Homolka, Guy DolemanDrama | 100% |
Adventure | Insignificant |
Thriller | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.34:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.35:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz, 16-bit)
None
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 2.5 | |
Audio | 3.5 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
There are just a few too many zeroes in the opening credits sequence of Billion Dollar Brain, where the number is displayed with twice as many zeroes as it should have. Maybe that was just wishful thinking on the part of producer Harry Saltzman, a man who had already raked in untold millions as one of the co-producers of the James Bond films, and who had also added at least incrementally to his bank account with two other spy films featuring Len Deighton’s anti-hero Harry Palmer, 1965’s The Ipcress File and 1966’s Funeral in Berlin. The third and final Palmer film produced by Saltzman was 1967’s Billion Dollar Brain, a somewhat prescient piece detailing an all seeing, all knowing supercomputer (think NSA, only with patch cords, reel to reel tapes and punch cards) and the threat of bioterrorism. The three original Palmer films (two late comers with Caine, not based on Deighton novels, followed decades later) were obviously tooled to be kind of the flip side of what was then the Bond craze. Palmer was a bit more proletarian than the patrician Bond, a kind of working class grunt who just happened to be a secret agent. While he may not have had Bond’s panache and savoir faire, the Palmer films still indulge in genre tropes like Palmer being able to seemingly instantly seduce a gorgeous woman (in Billion Dollar Brain’s case, the delectable Françoise Dorléac) simply by looking at her, but in other ways the Palmer films are at least relatively more real feeling.
Billion Dollar Brain is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber Studio Classics with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.34:1. This has the look of an older master, perhaps even a much older master that may have been prepared during the DVD or early HD broadcast era. The presentation here is rife with artificial sharpening, with regular (albeit admittedly relatively minor) haloing showing up which can be spotted in several of the screenshots accompanying this review. Ironically, despite these efforts most of the presentation looks very soft, with some shots appearing almost fuzzy (see screenshot 10). Colors have faded and are somewhat anemic looking. Detail is generally decent but can occasionally rise incrementally in some close-ups (see screenshot 3). Grain resolution is a bit haphazard at times (something else that may indicate an older master), with some sequences looking nicely organic but others suffering from occasional clumping.
Billion Dollar Brain features a workmanlike lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono mix that proffers clear, clean dialogue, along with good support for Richard Rodney Bennett's moody score. (Perhaps to subliminally cement the Palmer films with the Bond outings, Saltzman had ported over Bond composer John Barry for The Ipcress File, but did not retain him for the subsequent films.) Fidelity is very good throughout this presentation, with no major damage or issues of any kind to cause concern.
Billion Dollar Brain may ultimately be too outlandish for its own good. In fact the oversized computer and cartoonish villains seem more at place in the world of producer Saltzman's other iconic spy, James Bond, than they do in the supposedly more realistic milieu of Harry Palmer. The film is quite scenic and benefits from good performances, but Russell seems to be at odds with the material here, creating a disconnect between the story and its presentation. Video quality is fairly ragged, though for fans of the film who don't mind some anomalies, it's watchable.
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