Raw Deal Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		3.0
Overall		4.0

Raw Deal Blu-ray Movie Review

Raw, but still extremely tasty.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman January 10, 2018

Director Anthony Mann and cinematographer John Alton worked together six times, on T-Men, He Walked by Night , Reign of Terror, Border Incident, Devil's Doorway and the film currently under review. While six films is nothing to sneeze at in terms of collaborative output, it also isn’t a huge number, and that fact coupled with the fact that none of the Mann — Alton films were stupendously budgeted or even gigantic box office hits perhaps only proves what a contribution these two men made together, since several of these “little” efforts are now rightly recognized as at least minor masterpieces, especially the noir entries. Speaking of “little”, it’s also instructive to note that this is another Mann — Alton film featuring the imprimatur of producer Edward Small, a really interesting Hollywood honcho whom I’ve joked must have had large somethings, since he was one of a very few people who hired temperamental actress Frances Farmer on more than one occasion. Of the three Mann — Alton pairings that ClassicFlix has released thus far, Raw Deal is in many ways the most interesting. T-Men was kind of formulaic in a number of aspects, despite the deliberately askew presentational style that the director and cinematographer brought to the project. He Walked By Night (on which Mann gave an uncredited “assist”) was at least a bit twistier, with a great central performance by Richard Basehart as a nasty sociopath. But Raw Deal upends several noir tropes, and, as commentator Jeremy Arnold mentions in his discussion of the film, there are some really interesting angles to what is in essence a “criminal on the lam” scenario, including the fact that this particular criminal, one Joe Sullivan (Dennis O’Keefe), may not in fact be a notorious bad guy, and that once he breaks out of stir he’s accompanied by not one, but two, females, his ostensible girlfriend Pat Regan (Claire Trevor) and Ann Martin (Marsha Hunt), a woman who has some kind of connection to Joe’s attorney.

As both the commentary by Jeremy Arnold and one of the supplemental featurettes discuss, one of the more unusual elements of this noir is its present tense narration by Pat, something that immediately immerses the viewer in the plot machinations, but which perhaps more importantly pauses to give some psychological insight into the character at several key junctures. But what really gives Raw Deal its frisson of energy is the dynamic between Pat and Ann. As Arnold suggests in his commentary, Pat is the “devil” and Ann the “angel” on Joe’s shoulder, and the interplay between these two “forces” gives Raw Deal a very unique and visceral quality.

There are a couple of weirdly underdeveloped aspects to the plot, including the whole way Joe ropes Ann into accompanying them, but also with regard to the ostensible bad guy of the piece, nasty villain Rick Coyle (Raymond Burr), the guy Joe took the fall for and who now more or less just waits around in his apartment for Joe to show up and take revenge. That apartment is in so-called Corkscrew Alley (evidently the original name of the film in a previous draft version), another passing plot point which would seem to be ripe for some kind of development, but which is relegated to a couple of fleeting visions of a street sign.

While the film has the kind of hard bitten ambience that is a hallmark of noir, it’s often how that steely aspect plays out with regard to the women, rather than with Joe, that really makes Raw Deal so distinctive. There’s a great scene late in the film, for example, where tensions have reached their breaking point between Ann and Pat, and Pat just hauls off and slaps Ann viciously across the face (in what looks like it was not “stage managed”). Ann pauses for a moment and then thanks Pat for her “attention”. That is a rather potent piece of subterfuge, one that perhaps hints at the kind of slightly off kilter sexuality that runs just beneath the surface of the film and which evidently gave Joseph Breen fits.

There’s a kind of fun if obviously unintended and tangential connection to Alfred Hitchcock’s legendary 1954 film Rear Window, in that both films feature Raymond Burr in a climax which offers a calamitous tumble from an apartment window. Let’s just say that it’s not Jimmy Stewart breaking another leg in this go ‘round, but also that there’s a certain classical tragedy aspect to the film’s conclusion where it’s not just the villains who meet their fate.

Raw Deal Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Raw Deal is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of ClassicFlix with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.33:1. Both the restoration demonstration and the actual start of the film contain a couple of "pages" of text documenting this 2K restoration, which was culled from a "fine grain element" held by the British Film Institute. All of ClassicFlix's restorations thus far have been largely winning affairs, and that certainly continues with Raw Deal, though as the restoration demonstration perhaps shows, the source element here had a lot of at times fairly significant issues, not all of which even this heroic restoration has been able to completely eliminate. While there is certainly none of the major damage that's seen in the "before" examples in the restoration demonstration, there are still a few stray minor blemishes that have made it through to the final presentation, as well as some perhaps more noticeable examples of density fluctuation and flicker (watch the tracking shot past Pat in her car as she waits for Joe to break out of jail for one example). Contrast and shadow detail have been almost miraculously improved from what is on display in the "before" examples of the restoration demonstration, but there are still a few passing issues with crush where blacks aren't completely delineated. That said, Alton's gorgeous chiaroscuro lighting techniques are rendered beautifully throughout the transfer, with solid blacks and nicely modulated gray scale. The entire transfer is just a bit on the soft side, as befits its source, though fine detail can still be excellent in close-ups, where even the fine downy hair on Trevor's face is frequently visible. Grain isn't especially heavy in this presentation, but looks natural and resolves without any compression anomalies. Considering the state of the original element and the results shown here, some may feel a score higher than 4.0 is warranted.

Raw Deal Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Raw Deal features a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono track which can sound just slightly boxy at times, especially with regard to Paul Sawtell's dramatic score, but which delivers dialogue and effects without any issues. A few isolated sound effects reverberate rather boisterously despite the inherent narrowness of the track, and there are no real problems with distortion or other damage.

Raw Deal Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Feature length audio commentary by author and film historian Jeremy Arnold


• Deadly is the Male: The Making of Raw Deal (1080p; 9:06 ) serves as a companion piece of sorts to the similar "making of" featurette on He Walked by Night, including the participation of Alan K. Rode and Julie Kirgo in what looks like snippets culled from the same interview sessions for the previous piece.


• Dennis O'Keefe: An Extraordinary Ordinary Guy (1080p; 5:39) is a fond reminiscence of the actor with Rode again, this time along with O'Keefe's son.


• Image Gallery (1080p; 4:50) is authored to "behave" like the one described on Tomorrow Is Forever, in that while you can skip to the next image courtesy of the Chapter Ahead button, there's still a timer in action, so have your pause button handy or the gallery will automatically move on to the next image after a couple of seconds.


• Restoration Demonstration (1080p; 5:30) shows just how problematic the fine grain element utilized for this transfer was, and why I state in the video section that some may feel a score higher than 4.0 is warranted.

Additionally, trailer for other ClassicFlix releases are included on the disc, and the package comes with a nicely appointed insert booklet with an essay and archival stills.

Raw Deal Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

ClassicFlix is rapidly becoming one of my favorite new(ish) labels, offering top notch technical presentations of some lesser known but still extremely enjoyable (and some might even argue important) films. Raw Deal is my personal favorite of the Mann — Alton collaborations that ClassicFlix has offered film lovers, and it has a really peculiarly twisted sensibility that pushes some noir tropes into "dangerous" new territory. Highly recommended.