Pathfinders: In the Company of Strangers Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		3.5
Audio		2.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		2.5

Pathfinders: In the Company of Strangers Blu-ray Movie Review

Good Intentions

Reviewed by Michael Reuben January 28, 2013

The most noteworthy feature of Pathfinders: In the Company of Strangers isn't in the movie or even in the credits. It didn't show up until I researched Pathfinders for this review. The film has the odd distinction of uniting two actors who previously appeared as child actors portraying the younger versions of major characters in classic films of the 1990s: Christopher Serrone, who played the young Henry Hill in Goodfellas, and Michael Conner Humphreys, who played young Forrest in Forrest Gump.

Otherwise, Pathfinders is unremarkable. The sole production to date of Portland Independent Films, Pathfinders purports to recover the "untold" history of the elite cadre who undertook the dangerous work of preceding the D-Day invasion by parachuting into a thicket of Nazi troops to post lights and radio beacons (known as "Eureka" transmitters") as guides for the planes dropping the paratrooper assault that followed. While it may be true that no previous film has focused on this operation as its main subject, the history has hardly been "lost". The operation is referenced in other films (e.g., The Longest Day) and is sufficiently covered in the archives and history books that the writers, Charlie Armstrong and co-director Curt A. Sindelar, were able to document technical minutia down to the order in which the "pathfinder" forces jumped from their plane—a topic addressed in a technical note after the credits.

Despite their extensive research, commentators at IMDb have faulted the filmmakers on technical details ranging from weapons and equipment to period and geographic detail. I am not competent to judge Pathfinders in any of these areas, but I do believe that a film which made these events vital, dramatic and compelling would have a legitimate claim on our attention regardless of any historical quibbles. Unfortunately, co-directors Sindelar and Humphreys are defeated by a ponderous script, wooden acting, choppy pacing and an overabundance of interchangeable characters.

Pathfinders falls into two parts, preparation for the mission and the actual drop into occupied France. The mission itself isn't complicated, but the stakes are high and the likelihood of survival low. Of particular concern is the fact that the D-Day invasion has previously been scheduled and then called off at the last moment. The soldiers designated as "pathfinders" face the risk that they may be dropped behind enemy lines, only to discover that their mission has been canceled and they've been abandoned in hostile territory.

The situation presents rich potential for drama, as each soldier deals with the pressure in his own way, but Pathfinders almost immediately falters by failing to focus on a small enough group that the audience can recognize, get to know and follow through the rest of the film. Instead, the film jumps around among a bewildering array of faces and names, as two divisions—the 504 and 508—are brought together for the mission and have to learn to function as a unit overnight (they're the "strangers" of the title). We get predictable doses of banter, joking and rivalry, but none of it is sufficient to individuate the soldiers or reveal any depth of character. The whole pre-operation section has a perfunctory atmosphere, as if the film were marking time awaiting a "go" signal, just like the men themselves.

The sole exception is Capt. McRoberts (Serrone), who is sufficiently brazen and impetuous to telephone his English sweetheart, Beth (Rebecca Ovall), from the base just as she's sitting down to dinner with her family. He asks whether she's set a place for him, and she thinks he's joking until he parachutes directly into her front yard. McRoberts' romantic attachment, and the brief narration he supplies at the end of the film, mark him as a likely character around whom to organize the story, but Pathfinders squanders the narrative potential. Once the pathfinder troops drop into enemy territory, you quickly lose track of who's who, with the sole exception of a soldier named Livingston (co-director Humphreys), who is easy to keep track of because he's the only one operating solo. The rest are in small groups, repeatedly identified on screen by their function as either a "light" team or a "Eureka" beacon team, as the film cuts from one group to another with no apparent rhyme or reason.

A few of the individual skirmishes and confrontations are staged effectively enough, but the two directors never convey a sufficiently effective overview of the various teams converging on the same spot to which they need to steer the main paratrooper force. Groups encounter each other from odd directions, but there's no sense of how each one got there. More importantly, despite the on-screen text, the directors fail to provide the essential focus on the key equipment, the lights and the beacons, so that viewers know who is carrying what and has retained the components essential to fulfilling the mission. With so much stress laid on the importance of delivering these critical items to their destination, this is a major failing. A director skilled in the language of visual storytelling would have ensured that these central objects were readily identifiable and then kept the viewer aware of their locations at all times. Directing the eye in such a fashion is essential to the craft of filmmaking.

Pathfinders should have cut down the number of characters, let McRoberts introduce the other soldiers and their mission through narration, then stayed with whatever unit McRoberts commanded on the ground, viewing the operation primarily through his eyes. This would have given the film a clear narrative focus and a straight throughline. Without those, Pathfinders never has chance to build the requisite sense of tension and urgency. Even when a story involves people fumbling in the dark trying to find their way, the audience should never be left in that position.

Pathfinders: In the Company of Strangers Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Pathfinders has no credit for a cinematographer. Its other credits, which are listed in a bizarre order bearing no relation to that stipulated by Hollywood union rules, indicate almost nothing about the shooting format or the post-production process. IMDb claims the movie was shot on film in the Super35 format, but if so it has been processed to resemble digital photography.

Whatever the form of origination, the image as presented on Inception Media's 1080p, MPEG2-encoded Blu-ray follows the now-familiar formula for "gritty" war films of desaturating the palette until nearly all color has vanished from the image (with the notable exception of McRoberts' dinner with Beth and her family). At the point where the mission begins and the pathfinders are dropped into France at night, the image is virtually black-and-white. It's a reasonably detailed image, though I suspect it might be more so with a more advanced codec than MPEG2, since there's a small but noticeable amount of video noise that creeps in with the older compression scheme. The main reason I suspect digital capture is because no noticeable film grain is observable. If any was there, it was removed by the same post-production process that leeched away the color. It's not an especially attractive image, but within the limits of MPEG2, it appears to represent the filmmakers' intent.

Pathfinders: In the Company of Strangers Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Blu-ray's audio track is Dolby Digital 5.1 at the anemic bitrate of 384 kbps, which is rarely used even on DVD anymore. There's certainly no excuse for using it on Blu-ray, where bandwidth is not an issue. Except when space is an issue (and that isn't the case here), DD 5.1 on Blu-ray should always use the maximum permissible bitrate of 640 kbps.

The track is inconsistently recorded and mixed, with some dialogue scenes sounding hollow and "chesty", while others sound normal. Bass extension is limited, although whether this is a function of the mix or the lossy format and its low bitrate is impossible to say. Surround activity is fairly tame for a film in which half of the running time is spent in battle zones with the sound of flying bullets and distant machine gun fire all around. The score credited to Chris Hurn, Philip Delorenzo, Lilli Turner & Steve Averill strikes a generically military tone for the big scenes, and at other times retreats to a distant throbbing sound that is the most active element for a 5.1 system's subwoofer.

Pathfinders: In the Company of Strangers Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Other than a trailer (1080p; 2.35:1; 1:43), the disc has no extras. The main menu does not even offer chapter selections, although the disc does include chapter markers.

Pathfinders: In the Company of Strangers Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

As an attempt to focus on an aspect of D-Day that has never been given the full cinematic treatment, Pathfinders is an admirable effort. As a film, it's a failure, distinguished by a few interesting battle scenes. As a Blu-ray, Pathfinders is a disappointment, hobbled by an outdated codec and a lossy soundtrack that even most DVD producers would consider not good enough for their product. Rent, if you're interested in the subject matter.