Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		3.0

Gone Are the Days Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 8, 2021

Norma Desmond, the aged actress at the center of Sunset Boulevard, offers one of the most legendary lines in the entire annals of Hollywood screenwriting when, in thinking back to her “glory days” as a star in the Golden Age of La-La Land, she says with some authority, “We had faces then.” As delivered by Gloria Swanson, herself already a performer with a lifetime of memories when she took on the role of Desmond, the line has both a startling finality and a kind of wistfully nostalgic air. Though Desmond’s inimitable quote may at least subliminally seem to be about women, there were of course male “faces” galore during the halcyon days of American cinema, and in that regard some might argue that Lance Henriksen’s visage could have made him a matinee idol in his younger days, had he been around during that earlier time period. He's understandably pretty grizzled in Gone Are the Days, but Henriksen's face, a virtual topographical map of experiences, is a focal point of this slow moving but rather interesting western, one which offers a rare starring role for an actor more associated with character parts and supporting performances.

Gone Are the Days is a showcase for Henriksen, and in fact he’s pretty much the only one on screen for the first ten minutes or so of the film. Henriksen portrays aging bank robber Taylon Flynn who is obviously mortally ill as the story opens and who spends much of the rest of the tale swigging down “liquid heroin”. That gives the film a slightly dreamlike, opiate fever dream quality, as both memories and perhaps hallucinations intrude as interstitials at various moments. Gone Are the Days is one of those "near misses" in a number of ways where there is a ton of potential, but where things may not gel perfectly for some viewers. There is an almost mythological subtext suffusing the story, as indicated by (actual real life) town names like Hesperus (Google is your friend), and characters like the so-called River Man (Danny Trejo) who might be inferred to be a wild west version of a barge operator on Styx. It's all redolent in its own way, and yet Gone are the Days tends to dissipate its almost surreal or even magical realist qualities with an absolutely glacial pace and disjunctive narrative style.

Ultimately, this is the story of attempted redemption after a life of tragedy and at least some bad decisions. Taylon decides to go for one last job (sound familiar?), though with at least relatively honorable intentions, since he wants to help his estranged daughter, Heidi (Meg Steedle), who has been consigned by the vagaries of fate (including her abandonment by her father) into a life of prostitution. Also figuring into the story is a mysterious colleague of Taylon's named Virgil (Billy Lush), a lawman named Will (Tom Berenger), and Heidi's pimp Jaden (Steve Railsback). There's an appropriately gritty feel here a lot of the time, but the obviously aimed for emotional impact may be blunted at least in part by a lack of context about Taylon, especially since so many of his memories (and, yes, hallucinations) tend to play out in interstitials lasting about a nanosecond.

Gone Are the Days Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Gone Are the Days is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. The IMDb lists the Arri Alexa having been used (and you can clearly seem them in some of the supplements included on this release), and I'm once again presuming that the DI was finished at 2K. There are some intentional stylistic quirks at play in this presentation which definitely affect detail levels, especially fine detail. Taylon's use of heroin leads to whirly, swirly and askew framings a lot of the time, with "jiggly cam" and image degradation part of the mix. The palette tends to lurch back and forth between a nicely saturated "natural" look and a much more blanched appearance that almost verges on sepia tones at times. A bulk of backlit and/or dimly lit material can also lend murk to certain scenes. All of this said, detail levels are generally quite high, probably expectedly reaching their zenith in the most brightly lit outdoor scenes. The BD-25 would seem to provide more than enough real estate for consistent compression for a relatively short film and not many supplements, but there are a few isolated snippets of banding during some brightness changes.

Gone Are the Days Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Gone Are the Days features an expressive DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track that attains a lot of its surround presence from ambient environmental sounds in the many outdoor sequences, as well as the kind of elegiac score from Kubilay Uner. This does offer occasional "traditional" Western elements like the clip clop of horse hooves, but things like shootouts are not a major component of the sound design. Dialogue is presented cleanly and clearly throughout this problem free track. Optional subtitles in either English SDH, English or Spanish are available.

Gone Are the Days Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Behind the Scenes of Gone Are the Days (1080p; 22:01) is a decent EPK with lots of candid footage that has a kind of "fly on the wall" quality as shots are being staged and then filmed.


• Cast and Crew Interviews (1080p; 2:23) offers brief interviews, including with Lance Henriksen and Mark Landre Gould. Kind of hilariously (at least to yours truly), Mark Landre Gould talks about this being one of the best directing experiences of his career, and several online sites say this was the first directing experience of his career.


• Gone Are the Days Trailer (1080p; 1:21)

Additionally, both a DVD copy of the film and digital download are included in this release.

Gone Are the Days Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

This seems to be the sort of project designed almost willfully to garner a longtime habitue of Hollywood that long delayed Academy Award nomination. Ironically, my hunch is that had Henriksen been so feted (which he ended up not being), it could well have been in the Best Supporting Actor category even though he's front and center throughout this tale. Fans of the cast may find this a worthwhile viewing experience, but even they had best steel themselves for some relatively slow going. Technical merits are generally solid for those who are considering a purchase.