Rating summary

Movie		0.5
Video		2.5
Audio		3.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		1.5

Leonard Part 6 Blu-ray Movie Review

Wash it off with LAVA.

Reviewed by Martin Liebman September 23, 2017

To start, a fun little personal story about Leonard Part 6. In my youth, my dad and I were voracious home video consumers (in addition to seeing many movies in theaters), recording movies off of TV and HBO, neatly typing up labels for them on the typewriter. We also rented quite a few, frequenting the convenient "Iggle Video" section of the local Giant Eagle grocery store, as well as a few smaller mom-and-pop shops around town, but mostly Iggle Video. One day at Iggle Video I spotted Leonard Part 6, thought it looked good (hey, I was really young back then), and we rented it. But before doing so, I curiously asked my dad about the others in the series since I had apparently missed them and didn't see them on the shelf. He assured me the title was part of the joke and that there were no other movies in the series. We later returned the tape, and literally the next time we were at the store, I saw a lady pick up the box, look it over, and ask whoever she was with in a big, booming voice, "what about parts one-through-five?" My dad and I looked at each other and just smiled. He passed away more than seven years ago, but that's one of many good movie memories I made with him. So, anyway, that's the long way of saying no, there aren't five more 'Leonard' movies out there, so don't worry about it! Oh, and don't worry about this one, either.

Yum?

The world is in peril! Eight CIA agents are dead, each of them viciously killed by a variety of otherwise innocent animals -- kittens, rainbow trout -- that are being modified into malicious monsters by a crime syndicate, headed up by Medusa Johnson (Gloria Foster), who is operating out of a tuna factory. The only man who can put an end to her evil ways is Leonard Parker (Bill Cosby), once heralded as the greatest spy ever to live but who has since retired in the comfort of his fortune and started a lucrative restaurant business. And he's happy where he is and has no intention of getting back in the game. After all, he's got enough on his plate already, including a wife (Pat Colbert) who has left him and a daughter (Victoria Rowell) with plans to marry a man more than three times her age. But CIA top man Nick Snyderburn (Joe Don Baker) finally convinces Leonard to get to work. With the help of his butler Frayn (Tom Courtenay), he gears up and goes to work saving the world, plastering bad guys with raw hamburger meat and exploding hot dogs when it becomes clear that wafer-thin hand grenades and under-the-arm micro missiles aren't going to do the trick.

Bill Cosby has proven to be no angel over the last few years, but the 80s superstar did do a good deed when, ahead of this film's release, he publicly disavowed the movie, trashed it, encouraged people not to watch it...and considering his stardom and not only his lead role in the film but also a "story by" credit, that's saying something. One can only imagine life on the set or the editing room and Cosby's growing displeasure with the entire thing, what buttons must have been pushed, what words must have been said, which heads figuratively rolled. And the movie really is that bad. Humorless, disastrous editing, awful special effects, extreme randomness, and a nonsensical explanation for the "missing" first five films are amongst the endless issues in play. The movie actually claims that Leonard's first five adventures were, paraphrasing (because I refuse to go back to get the exact wording) so critical to national security that they have been deemed classified and cannot be released to the public. So right off the bat the movie is putting itself behind the eight ball, admitting that this really isn't a story of all that much import, more a run-of-the-mill tale that's without any serious repercussions. Good job, writers. Way to pump up the audience from the outset. And the film follows by building up the lore around him, about his skill sets and bravery and so forth and, after gearing up for the mission, he expends all of his munitions on the building's front door, blowing up everything but that front door, and that is after Joe Don Baker said something about needing Leonard because he would not lay waste to the place and destroy the enemy's secret sauce or whatever that the CIA wants to get its hands on. One would also think a man of Leonard's abilities would be able to approach an enemy stronghold a little more slyly than that and have some kind of grasp on who and what he is up against.

But, oh, the treasures to come. Leonard Part 6 features a daughter marrying a man older than her father, a wife who seems to get off on covering her man in food (both in anger and in love, she admits), a shoot-out in a crowded restaurant kitchen where none of the employees even bat an eyelash at the gunfire erupting around them, hand-to-hand combat with people dressed up like chickens (or something), a random ballet sequence (more on that in a minute), and really not much more, because the movie insists on dragging these segments out to cover about half the runtime, it feels like. The film has no concept of time management, or cinematic rhythm, of focusing on those things which will entertain the audience, not drive it away. But the ballet thing is too funny not to mention. Leonard is dressed in his assault outfit or whatever it is, and it includes what looks like a bicycle helmet with a clear visor on it. But when he straps on his ballet shoes and dances through the enemy tuna factory, his visor suddenly loses its transparency, looking more like a blast shield that hides the face of the clearly much smaller (and more nimble) dancer that has taken up residence in the suit. There's more, including a literal mountain of product placement and a magic wiener, but it's not worth the effort. Horrible movie. Enough said.

Leonard Part 6 Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Leonard Part 6 doesn't look great, but it doesn't look bad. It certainly fares better than another Mill Creek disc that streeted on the same day, Suspect, but that's not a particularly high bar to hurdle. While the movie still shows some macroblokcing and mild filtering, it offers a serviceable image on the whole, occasionally filmic and retaining some semblance of a grain structure. Details range from adequate to crisp, with facial textures generally the most revealing in close-up. Some of the more dense locations struggle to offer more advanced clarity and definition, though such environments, like the tuna factory interior, are a bit dark to begin with. Colors are fine, offering little in the way of extreme brilliance or nuance but enough general saturation and core reproduction to please. Black levels and skin tones aren't particularly problematic. A number of pops and speckles are included, though not often severe.

Leonard Part 6 Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Leonard Part 6 features an LPCM 2.0 uncompressed soundtrack. The track offers enough oomph and spacing to please. The track is never shy about pushing to the edge of the stage. Action effects and environmental din alike stretch the track out to the sides, and while clarity isn't particularly noteworthy, basic sound design is presented with little effort. Environments like a bustling kitchen and sounds like a swarm of bees or a cacophony of frogs offer enough raw sonic material to adequately support the moment. Dialogue is commendably clear and detailed with good front-center imaging.

Leonard Part 6 Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This Blu-ray release of Leonard Part 6 contains no supplemental content.

Leonard Part 6 Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

So watching the movie back then was like:


And watching it today was like:


But that's the beauty of the movies. No matter how bad one may be, a good memory can ease the burden of slugging through a steaming pile, even one as bad as Leonard Part 6. Mill Creek's Blu-ray is no great shakes, but video and audio are at least serviceable. No extras are included. Skip it.