7.4 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Set during the fading glory of the Austro-Hungarian empire, the film tells of the rise and fall of Alfred Redl (Brandauer), an ambitious young officer who proceeds up the ladder to become head of the Secret Police only to become ensnared in political deception.
Starring: Klaus Maria Brandauer, Hans Christian Blech, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Gudrun Landgrebe, Jan NiklasBiography | 100% |
Foreign | 54% |
History | 9% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Hungarian: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono
English
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Considering the fact that part of the actual history of Alfred Redl, an officer in Austria in the epochal days leading up to World War I, includes not completely closeted homosexuality in the military, maybe just a bit surprisingly films based on his life were made as early as 1925 and 1931. The 1925 silent Colonel Redl (which I’ve admittedly never seen) evidently (and understandably, given the era of its production) forsook the gay element of the real life Redl’s story and instead focused on his spying tendencies, which several sources cite as the more probable reason for his suicide in 1913. A 1931 film entitled The Affair of Colonel Redl is considered lost but is rather oddly described as a comedy by some online sources, something that may seem downright peculiar given Redl's story. István Szabó’s 1985 version tends to lay the blame (so to speak) of Redl's "issues" on both the homosexuality angle and some socioeconomic differences between the lower class Redl and some of his upper crust fellow military cohorts, as well as a perhaps fanciful connection to Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The problems Redl's homosexuality caused for him were evidently more of a focal point in A Patriot for Me, a 1965 John Osborne play which reportedly provided at least some of the spark for this film. The Osborne play was apparently a huge cause célčbre in London in its day, and perhaps for that reason, it took four years for the play to matriculate to Broadway, where it quickly expired after 49 performances.
Colonel Redl is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber's Kino Classics imprint with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.66:1. Kind of interestingly, neither this film nor Confidence offer the same overt mention of a 4K restoration as Mephisto's cover does, but the closing credits for this film do mention a 2018 restoration by the Hungarian National Film Archive, and there's a 4K credit as well. This is an often pretty sumptuous looking transfer, especially in some of the more warmly lit sequences, where the palette is beautifully saturated, detail levels remain consistently high, and grain resolves naturally. There are some interesting stylistic approaches Szabó, like some blue graded material (see screenshot 5 for an example), but fine detail levels emerge remarkably intact almost all of the time. There's a kind of cool wintry ambience in a lot of the exterior locales, and a few passing shots can look on the hazy side. Occasional very dark moments can look pretty gritty and ill defined when compared to the bulk of the presentation, though other relatively dark moments retain better clarity and detail (see screenshot 19, and then contrast that with screenshot 3, to see some of the variances that crop up).
Colonel Redl features a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono track that offers some stirring source cues as well as a glut of ambient environmental effects in its many outdoor scenes which help to offer some variety from more stagebound dialogue moments. There are some nice standout sequences here, including some of the early training Redl experienced as a youngster at the military academy, and some larger group scenes later in the film, as in some well appointed ballrooms, offer a nice blend of both background clamor and more forward dialogue. Everything is rendered cleanly and clearly on this problem free track. Optional English subtitles are available.
Note: All three of the István Szabó films Kino Lorber has released on Blu-ray (Mephisto, Confidence and this film) offer some of the same supplementary material.
Szabó may have wanted to have his cake and eat it, too, in any number of ways with regard to Colonel Redl, in terms of offering both fact and fiction as well as combining the perceived "sins" of spying and homosexuality as elements in Redl's downfall. This is another rather bracing effort from Szabó which, like Mephisto, offers a compelling lead performance from Klaus Maria Brandauer. Technical merits are solid, and Colonel Redl comes Recommended.
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