Marathon Man 4K Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		3.0
Overall		3.0

Marathon Man 4K Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov March 2, 2023

John Schlesinger's "Marathon Man" (1976) arrives on 4K Blu-ray/Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber. The supplemental features on the release include three archival programs that examine the conception and production of the film; new audio commentary by critics Steve Mitchell and Nathaniel Thompson; and vintage promotional materials for the film. In English, with optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature. Region-Free.

You have quite a cavity here

Babe (Dustin Hoffman, The Graduate), the main protagonist in director John Schlesinger’s Marathon Man, is a doctoral student at Columbia University who loves jogging. He also loves politics but tries hard not to show his classmates and professors what he thinks about his country and its leaders. While jogging in Central Park, he witnesses a terrible car accident.

Babe’s brother, Doc (Roy Scheider, The French Connection), is a businessman who spends most of his time traveling. Early into the film, he meets a client in Paris who promises to provide him with valuable information about something rather important. But before he does someone detonates a bomb in front of his antique shop. After the explosion, Doc meets Peter Janeway (William Devane, Rolling Thunder), a CIA operative with plenty of contacts in Paris, who assures him that no one is after him.

Soon after, Doc comes home to New York and meets Babe and his new girlfriend, Elsa (Marthe Keller, Black Sunday), a beautiful foreign student. They try to have dinner together, but Doc quickly frustrates Elsa with his questions and she leaves. After the dinner, he meets a man with a German accent who stabs him multiple times with a sharp object. He manages to get back to Babe’s apartment and dies in his hands.

The shocked and stunned Babe is visited by Janeway, who reveals to him that Doc was not in the oil business as he had assumed but in the business of "providing" – meaning that he would do dirty jobs neither the CIA nor the FBI would touch. Janeway then asks for permission to use Babe as bait to attract and get the people that killed his brother. When Babe reluctantly agrees, all hell breaks loose.

Based on William Goldman’s novel, Marathon Man blends the paranoia from Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation with the moodiness of Sydney Pollack’s 3 Days of the Condor. The result is an atmospheric but notably inconsistent film with a very strange narrative structure. Large portions of it, for instance, focus on relationships that are so utterly unbelievable that even viewers who love crazy conspiracies will likely have a difficult time tolerating them. There are also all sorts of different political overtones attached to these relationships that further destabilize the film and make it look like a giant mess of ideas that never really make much sense. And in the final third, where one would expect to see at least some sort of justification for their existence, the film quickly settles for a cliched finale which almost makes one feel cheated.

Hoffman is the only actor that leaves a lasting impression. There are a couple of sequences where he looks genuinely perplexed and bewildered. Olivier, Devane, and Scheider never quite manage to be the stars they were in other films from the same era. Olivier’s sadist, in particular, undergoes a character transformation at the end of the film that is beyond disappointing.

Michael Small's claustrophobic soundtrack, however, is fantastic. The music is very dark and very intense, and it is used in a manner that creates and sustains much of the paranoia which makes this film somewhat enjoyable.

Marathon Man was lensed by cinematographer Conrad L. Hall (George Roy Hill’s Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Stuart Rosenberg’s Cool Hand Luke).

*In 1977, Marathon Man earned an Oscar nomination for Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Laurence Olivier).

Marathon Man 4K Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Kino Lorber's release of Marathon Man is a 4K Blu-ray/Blu-ray combo pack. The 4K Blu-ray release is Region-Free. The Blu-ray release is Region-A "locked".

Please note that all of the screencaptures that are included in this article are from the Blu-ray. We have not provided screencaptures from the 4K Blu-ray.

The film has been fully remastered in 4K by Paramount Pictures. The 4K makeover can be seen with HDR or Dolby Vision. I viewed the entire film with HDR and only sampled a few areas with Dolby Vision.

I found the new 4K makeover of Marathon Man as frustrating as the recent 4K makeover of Nobody's Fool. It is very easy to tell that the 4K scan that was used to produce it is excellent and could have delivered a definitive home video release, but the film does not look as it should. In fact, there are several areas of it that look very, very strange now.

Generally speaking, the film looks healthier in native 4K and 1080p than it does on the this release Paramount produced for the European markets. (I am sorry. I do not have the U.S. release in my library. However, you should know that the U.S. release is sourced from the same master that was used to produce the European release. The U.S. release simply came out a few months after the European release, so I did not have to upgrade). For example, the surface of the visuals is healthier and grain exposure is more convincing. The previous release looked good too because the older master was not compromised by digital corrections, but its age shows. On the 4K makeover, density levels are better as well. Unfortunately, the color grade is unconvincing. For example, rather strong turquoise replaces several ranges of native blues, causing some visuals to have a very contemporary appearance. Elsewhere turquoise and cyan destabilize other primaries -- some appear more prominent during daylight or indoor footage, while some appear more prominent during nighttime footage. You can see examples of the alterations in screencaptures #4 and 20. Cyan completely alters the color temperature of another shot which can be seen in screencapture #28. Furthermore, there are a couple of different segments that produce very odd magenta-timed visuals. See screencaptures #5, 12, and 25. The sequence where Roy Scheider is having a drink right before he is attacked just randomly switches to magenta even though the footage that precedes it is timed differently. To be honest, I do not understand why such drastic switches occur, but it is very easy for me to tell that the turquoise and cyan affect whites, grays, and blues in many different ways, so once the balance is off there are entire ranges of nuances that begin to produce different anomalies affecting the overall temperature of the visuals. (For what it's worth, the same issue is responsible for the anomalies that make different areas of the new 4K makeover of Nobody's Fool look odd as well). (I have included additional screencaptures from the previous release to highlight the color shifts at the bottom of this review). Image stability is outstanding.

How do these areas where color fluctuations are very obvious look with HDR? Most enhance the turquoise more, so there is less blue to see, plus in darker areas, some grays are lost. However, color saturation can be much more convincing when the turquoise and/or cyan are greatly minimized or absent. For example, the segment at the fountain with the reds in the background looks vastly superior now. See screencapture #2. In some darker areas, however, I think that even in native 4K there is light crushing that could have been avoided. In other words, in native 4K, with HDR or Dolby Vision, the dynamic range of the visuals is very clearly superior, but color balance is unconvincing.

Marathon Man 4K Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There are two standard audio tracks on this release: English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 and English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1. Optional English SDH subtitles are provided for the main feature.

The older release of Marathon Man that I have in my library has English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and English Dolby Digital 2.0 tracks. The 5.1 track is very good on both releases, so if there are any improvements on the 5.1 track that is included on this release, I could not tell. I viewed large portions of the film with the 2.0 track and liked it a lot. In a few areas, I thought that the audio could have been slightly more expanded as the action intensified, but I would recommend that I test this track first before you move to the 5.1 track.

Marathon Man 4K Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

4K BLU-RAY DISC

• Commentary - this exclusive new audio commentary was recorded by critics Steve Mitchell and Nathaniel Thompson.

BLU-RAY DISC

• The Magic of Hollywood - this archival program takes a closer look at the production of Marathon Man. Included in it are clips from interviews with producer Robert Evans, John Schlesinger, and Dustin Hoffman, among others. Raw footage from the shooting of the film is included as well. In English, not subtitled. (22 min).

• Going the Distance: Remembering Marathon Man - this archival program focuses on the conception and reception of Marathon Man. Also, there are some quite interesting comments about the characterizations and the structure of the story that is told in the film. Included in it are clips from interviews with producer Robert Evans, screenwriter William Goldman, Roy Scheider, Dustin Hoffman, and Marthe Keller. among others. In English, not subtitled. (30 min).

• Rehearsal Footage - this archival program focuses on the preparation process and rehearsals sessions before the filming of Marathon Man was initiated. Short clips from archival interviews are included here as well. In English, not subtitled. (22 min).

• Trailer - presented here is a vintage U.S. trailer for Marathon Man. In English, not subtitled. (3 min).

• TV Spots - presented here are several vintage U.S. TV spots for Marathon Man. In English, not subtitled. (6 min).

• Radio Spots - presented here are a couple of vintage U.S. radio spots for Marathon Man. In English, not subtitled. (2 min).

• Commentary - this exclusive new audio commentary was recorded by critics Steve Mitchell and Nathaniel Thompson.

Marathon Man 4K Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

I am not a big fan of this film. Excluding Michael Small's claustrophobic soundtrack, everything in it could have been a lot better. None of the supposedly important relationships are believable, which is why the tension and paranoia the film tries to sustain are also quite underwhelming. If you wish to upgrade an older Blu-ray release, I suggest that you find a way to test Kino Lorber's 4K Blu-ray/Blu-ray combo pack. Marathon Man has been fully restored in 4K at Paramount Pictures, but I think that right now there are various sections of it that look unconvincing because they are not graded properly. If you test the 4K Blu-ray/Blu-ray combo pack, you could disagree and find the discrepancies that are highlighted in our review irrelevant.