Bullet to Beijing Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		1.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		0.0
Overall		1.5

Bullet to Beijing Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov September 22, 2024

George Mihalka's "Bullet to Beijing" (1995) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Final Cut Entertainment. There are no bonus features on it. In English, with optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature. Region-Free.

It is odd that Bullet to Beijing does not display the Cannon Group logo. It is so ridiculous yet enjoyable that it genuinely feels like it should have been in the Cannon Group catalog, proudly highlighting the names of its two famous producers, Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus. However, its credits highlight the name of another notorious producer, Harry Alan Towers, who made the type of films Golan and Globus did several decades earlier. Towers also scripted many of them, though his most prolific collaborator, cult Spanish director Jess Franco, shot films in which he frequently made his writings unrecognizable.

Bullet to Beijing was produced and scripted by Towers, which makes perfect sense because it is the type of exotic spy film he loved with a genuine passion. In the 1960s, Towers produced (and frequently scripted) several similar films with equally impressive casts. For example, in Bang! Bang! You're Dead! a.k.a. Our Man in Marrakesh Tony Randal unintentionally becomes a target in an exotic place full of clumsy spies. In Code 7, Victim 5, Lex Barker is hired by a South African millionaire to do a tricky job in another exotic place. In Coast of Skeletons, Richard Todd heads to Africa to investigate a shady American millionaire running a diamond business. Towers was attracted by the exotic and routinely penned stories with characters that visited distant lands, but for obvious reasons he never reached the Soviet Union.

In Bullet to Beijing, Towers does not introduce a unique character, it brings back Harry Palmer, the British spy Michael Caine played in The Ipcress File, Funeral in Berlin, and Billion Dollar Brain. It reunites him with several other characters from the three films, though they are reshaped to fit into a predictably exotic story. However, Bullet to Beijing is difficult to profile as a distant relative of the three classic films with Palmer. Why? Because in it Palmer is no longer a British spy.

Recently sacked by his former employer, Palmer, now an aging freelancer with plenty of bills to pay, agrees to travel to Saint Petersburg and meet Alex (Michael Gambon), a local power player with a job offer for him. Palmer is asked to prevent a North Korean buyer from obtaining a deadly virus known as Red Death, which Alex and his company have genetically engineered after the end of the Cold War. Because Red Death is a binary product, meaning that it can be activated only when two different parts of it are merged, the North Korean buyer is paying for two shipments stolen from Alex. Palmer agrees to do the job and begins working with Alex’s most trusted man, Nick (Jason Connery), who is half-British. Shortly after, Palmer and Nick board a Soviet “bullet train” heading East.

The seemingly endless twists and turns plus the hilariously bad recreation of the lawless post-perestroika environment Palmer and his pal must endure easily transform Bullet to Beijing into a delightful spy farce that feels very Tower-esque. It will not be everyone’s cup of tea, but viewers who enjoy so-bad-it-is-actually-good material will surely be impressed because the cast contributes with unmistakable enthusiasm. Also, the best action footage was shot on location in Saint Petersburg, which has breathtaking canals and historic buildings that seem perfect for period fireworks. (The big boat chase is fantastic. It is very similar to the ones seen in Dick Maas’ firecracker Amsterdamned).

The biggest surprise is the presence of a stunningly lush electronic soundtrack created by Rick Wakeman from the iconic British progressive rock band Yes. Wakeman’s music is played almost non-stop, so Bullet to Beijing quite easily could be mistaken for a 1980s film.

Initially, Bullet to Beijing was set to receive a proper theatrical release. However, a decision was made to replace the theatrical release with a direct-to-video release.

Bullet to Beijing Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.34:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Bullet to Beijing arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Final Cut Entertainment.

Bullet to Beijing is the worst release to reach my desk in well over a decade. It offers a technical presentation of the film that would have been problematic even on a DVD release.

It appears that the release was sourced from a PAL master and incorrectly flagged to display 1080p visuals. However, this creates a frame rate issue that instantly produces stuttering. As a result, every few seconds, a botched frame causes unmissable skips that are part of an ongoing stuttering. I finished the film because I had not seen it in decades and find it quite entertaining, but the viewing experience was a genuine endurance test. Obviously, delineation, clarity, and depth are quite problematic too, so a lot of the panoramic footage can look incredibly disappointing. Color balance is unconvincing. Saturation levels are all over the place and many supporting nuances, especially darker ones, frequently collapse. I did not see any major surface imperfections, such as marks, cuts, etc. A terrible presentation. (Note: This is a Region-Free Blu-ray release. Therefore, you will be able to play it on your player regardless of your geographical location).

Bullet to Beijing Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: English LPCM 2.0. Optional English SDH subtitles are provided for the main feature.

I was quite surprised by the overall decent quality of the lossless track. Rick Wakeman's music is constantly played throughout the film, and it sounded quite well, though in multiple areas there is obvious dynamic unevenness. More than likely, the unevenness is not related to odd conversion issues that are addressed in the video section, but with such a problematic presentation of the film it is very difficult to know with absolute certainly what may have been done right or wrong.

Bullet to Beijing Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There are no bonus features on this release.

Bullet to Beijing Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

If another boutique label announces a proper Blu-ray release of Bullet to Beijing, I will enthusiastically welcome it and prepare a spot for it in my library. This film is so twisty and ridiculously unrealistic that it is great to see at the end of a long and exhausting day. It has a pearl of a soundtrack from Rick Wakeman, too. Final Cut Entertainment's recent Blu-ray release treats it very badly, so make sure to AVOID IT.