6.8 | / 10 |
Users | 4.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
After five years in prison, ex-cop Steve Rollins is paroled and begins his search for the San Francisco mobsters who framed him for manslaughter.
Starring: Alan Ladd, Edward G. Robinson, Joanne Dru, William Demarest, Perry LopezFilm-Noir | 100% |
Thriller | Insignificant |
Crime | Insignificant |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.55:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.55:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Hell on Frisco Bay was released in 1955, and while it was filmed in CinemaScope and
"Warnercolor", its spirit hearkens back to Warner Brothers' black-and-white gangster pictures of
the Thirties. The film was adapted from a novel by crime writer William P. McGivern, whose
work had already supplied the story for Fritz Lang's The
Big Heat and who would later co-author
the John Wayne cop adventure, Brannigan. McGivern's
novel was acquired by actor Alan Ladd's
production company as a vehicle for the Shane
star, and Ladd turned in one of his signature
laconic performances as a disgraced cop seeking revenge. But in an ironic turn, the film's leading
man and co-producer ended up being upstaged by his co-star, Edward G. Robinson, who added
yet another entry to his collection of memorable screen gangsters. Ladd hired director Frank
Tuttle, who had given the actor his breakthrough role as a hit man in This
Gun for Hire, and the
director chose to shoot major portions of the film on location in San Francisco, capturing a
grittier side of the Bay City than the dreamy landscape that Alfred Hitchcock would showcase a
few years later in Vertigo.
Frisco Bay hasn't been widely available in recent years, the victim of a complicated rights history
and a lack of acceptable elements for transfer to video. All of that should change with the Warner
Archive Collection's new Blu-ray, which is based on a 4K scan of the recently located camera
negative.
Hell on Frisco Bay was shot by John F. Seitz, the cinematographer of such visually inventive
films as Sunset Boulevard and Double Indemnity. According to the Warner
Archive Collection,
the film has not been seen in many years in its original CinemaScope aspect ratio, with only a
pan-and-scan master available for broadcast. The film has not been previously released on DVD,
let alone Blu-ray, due to a combination of tangled legal rights and the absence of acceptable
elements, all of which were several generations away from the original camera negative. With the
whereabouts of the OCN unknown, it was presumed to be lost or destroyed. Recently, however,
it was discovered in Warner's archives mismarked as "internegative", and an examination of the
element revealed that it was in excellent condition, a development made all the more surprising
by the fact that the film was a product of the short-lived process known as "Warnercolor", which
I have discussed elsewhere. With the OCN now in hand,
efforts to obtain the necessary
clearances for a home video release were renewed with a fresh urgency.
WAC's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray is the product of a 4K scan of the OCN, which was
performed by Warner's Motion Picture Imaging facility. Many hours of color correction
followed, performed by one of MPI's most senior and distinguished colorists. (As I noted in evaluating Night Moves, another 4K scan from negative, starting from the OCN entails
hours of additional labor; WAC estimates the expense at roughly four times that of a 2K scan from an interpositive.) After WAC's customarily
thorough cleanup to remove dirt and other imperfections, the image is one of
startling depth and clarity. The San Francisco location photography captures the city as it looked
in an earlier era, including Fisherman's Wharf when it still supported a thriving industry and
before it was rebuilt into a tourist attraction. The location footage has been neatly melded with
soundstage photography that is equally sharp and detailed, so much so that the scenes utilizing
rear projection stand out more obviously than they probably did for audiences in 1955.
The film's palette is modest and subdued in its location scenes, but intense blues and reds appear in specific
locations like the club where Marcia sings, and rich old-world earth tones dominate Victor
Amato's home and offices. MPI's color correction has massaged the frequent dissolves between
scenes to minimize the palette shifts that typically accompany that optically achieved effect; the
colors still shift, but lightly and briefly. The film's grain pattern has been naturally and finely
resolved, so much so that at times it almost disappears. The kinds of artifacts to which
CinemaScope lenses were prone (see discussion here)
are wholly absent, but that has less to do with the transfer to video than with director Frank Tuttle's limited use of camera pans.
Note, however, that the image retains the softness characteristic of CinemaScope lenses, and that
softness is magnified when the image is frozen for screen captures. The same phenomenon can
be seen in other CinemaScope/Warnercolor features from the same period, such as The Sea
Chase and Blood Alley. The
key difference between those Blu-rays and Frisco Bay is that the
latter has been derived from a 4K scan from negative instead of a 2K scan from an interpositive,
resulting in a finer and tighter grain structure. Some posters on internet forums, including this
site's, have incorrectly attributed these aspects of the disc's image to so-called "DNR", but
WAC does not use any form of digital noise reduction or other automated cleaning process. Its
masters are cleaned of dirt and defects by hand, one frame at a time. Nor does WAC apply any
high-frequency filtering of the sort that has been used by some studios in the past (including
Warner's main video division) to facilitate compression at low average bitrates. Frisco Bay has
been mastered at WAC's usual high average, here 34.98 Mbps.
Hell on Frisco Bay was released in both mono and four-track stereo, and WAC was disappointed to discover that the only extant source for the stereo mix was so badly damaged that even the most sophisticated digital tools could not restore it. As a result, the Blu-ray has a mono track, taken from the magnetic master, cleaned of any age-related artifacts, and encoded as lossless DTS-HD MA. Even though the sound is mono, it's excellent mono, with broad dynamic range (for the period) and a lush reproduction of the orchestral score by the legendary Max Steiner (Casablanca and Gone with the Wind). The dialogue is clearly rendered, as are the essential sound effects.
The sole extra is a trailer (1080p; 2.55:1; 2:12).
Hell on Frisco Bay was dismissed upon its initial release as just another gangster picture. Today,
when gangster films are even more their own genre than in the Fifties, this one stands out for the
focused intensity of its lead performances, which are ably backed by a deep bench of supporting
players. If we can't get more of Warner's classic gangster output from the Thirties, at least we
have this vivid rendition of Frisco Bay, which arrives with the novelty factor of providing the
film with its first widescreen presentation on home video. Highly recommended.
Encore Edition | Limited Edition to 3000 - SOLD OUT
1953
Limited Edition to 3000
1961
Warner Archive Collection
1938
1937
1956
1952
1950
1949
Warner Archive Collection
1951
1958
Warner Archive Collection
1948
1957
1955
Reissue | Special Edition
1948
1932
Warner Archive Collection
1978
1946
1952
I Became a Criminal / Kino Classics Presents
1947
Warner Archive Collection
1947