Rating summary

Movie		1.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		1.5

Hangman Blu-ray Movie Review

Ho_ _ ible.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 26, 2018

The rather severe fall off in “source material” from Se7en's religiously iconic septet of deadly sins to Hangman’s use of, well, the children’s game of hangman is perhaps the perfect symbol for how ridiculously lowbrow this formulaic and almost kind of sad enterprise is. Al Pacino, seemingly still in need of a paycheck this late in his career, or perhaps so fond of the spotlight that he can’t stand to be out of it no matter how squalid the actual material is, is on hand as a retired detective named Archer (no, not that one), who is addicted to solving crossword puzzles (in Latin, no less), something that makes him not so coincidentally perfectly positioned to solve a series of crimes instigated by a crazed killer who is carving letters into the corpses of his victims (some of whom are found hung, just in case the police are a little slow on the uptake). Archer is sucked back into more or less active duty by his former partner Ruiney (Karl Urban), a cop struggling to maintain emotional equilibrium despite the relatively recent brutal murder of his wife. (The fact that screenwriters Michael Caissie and Charles Huttinger spell this character’s surname the way they do when it’s pronounced “Rooney” is just one more indication of the lack of subtlety running rampant throughout this enterprise.) Ruiney is also attempting to navigate the roiling waters of having an unwanted tagalong on his beat, an investigative reporter named Christi Davies (Brittany Snow), who has her own troubled past and who becomes a kind of third wheel in the investigative process until she completely expectedly becomes the Damsel in Distress in the film’s patently absurd climax. The reason Ruiney calls upon his old buddy Archer is that the first crime scene he gets to has both his badge number and Archer’s badge number carved into a desk at the school where the body is found, something that seems to indicate the killer is trying to send a message, and that any nearby Western Union offices must have been closed (yes, that’s a joke). The fact that the corpses also appear to be spelling a word, one letter at a time, seems to make Archer an excellent candidate to ferret out clues.

Just in the first few minutes of this film, there are already so many boneheaded plot conceits that it almost boggles the imagination. The film begins with a vignette documenting a police chase, one which kicks into high gear when the bad guy trying to make a getaway careens into Archer’s vintage muscle car. There’s absolutely no reason given for the fact that Archer, still on the force at this point, is driving around in his own car during a police chase, when all the other cops are of course in patrol cars. There's also no reason given for Archer's choice of vehicle, other than that it's one of those supposed "character" beats that ostensibly makes Archer inherently cool. Later, once the film segues forward in time and Ruiney finds out Christi will be accompanying him for a while, he puts up absolutely no fuss when she follows him into the school after he is summoned to the site of the first corpse hanging outside of the building. Even the fact that Ruiney enters the school by himself (with gun drawn, of course) is absurd, but when Christi just kind of pops up “unexpectedly” once he’s in there, any semblance of verisimilitude is already so far by the wayside it can never be reclaimed. And we haven’t even gotten to Pacino’s “southern” accent yet.

Hangman unfolds pretty much as one might predict, with an emphasis on the police procedural side of things, something that perhaps adds to a kind of rote and frankly pretty unsuspenseful ambience. In a brief interview included on this disc as a supplement, a kind of halting Pacino seems to be searching desperately for some kind of positive way to describe this film (or maybe he’s still in character, albeit without the “southern” accent), and one of the examples he gives is its regular “surprises”, but I have to see for this particular viewer, there was an absolute lack of surprise, down to and including the denouement involving the crazed killer.

There’s so much here that is so resolutely by the numbers that, as mentioned above, the whole production just comes off as feeling a bit sad, considering the undeniable talents of the cast. But my hunch is any armchair sleuth worth their salt is going to guess the broad outlines of this story long before the actual revelations are presented, and unfortunately there’s not much other interest here aside from some decently staged crime scenes.

Hangman Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Hangman is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. Hey, here's an idea: how about a thriller or police procedural or serial killer drama (take your pick) which isn't graded in deep blue tones for much of its running time? I vote for chartreuse as the next "it" grading color. All joking aside, this is in fact another film that has large swaths pretty much swimming in blue tones, resulting in a noticeable loss of detail when compared to more abundantly lit or less agressively graded scenes. With that one perhaps major caveat aside, this is a fine, competent if not all that inspiring looking presentation that preserves good detail and fine detail levels (at least when lighting conditions permit). Director Johnny Martin and cinematographer Larry Blanford do exploit a lot of extreme close-ups of the focal triol, offering elements like the various signs of age on Pacino's face, or supposed scars on Snow's, with commendable precision.

Hangman Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Hangman's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track provides a listening experience that is, much like the video component of this release, perfectly competent without ever regularly visiting "wow" territory. There are a number of pretty traditional startle effects scattered throughout the film, but some of the more menacing sonics come from subtler uses of washes of LFE that kind of pervade the side and rear channels at various crime scenes. Dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly on this problem free track.

Hangman Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Al Pacino: Insight from a Hollywood Legend (1080p; 6:35) finds the icon discussing what interested him in this project.


• Hangman: In Their Own Words (1080p; 14:05) is a longer EPK featuring more snippets of the Pacino interview along with interviews with other cast and crew.

Hangman Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I'm really, really excited to see a film about a serial killer obsessed with tiddly winks, because after having sat through Hangman, I firmly believe that if this film got produced, something like that film can't be that far behind. Pacino is overly mannered, Snow is kind of annoying, and Urban frequently looks like he's passing an extremely unpleasant kidney stone in this unfortunate offering, but if there are in fact those considering a purchase, technical merits are fine if never overly impressive.