6.4 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
In prohibition-era Chicago, Guy Gisborne seizes control of the rackets after bumping off Boss Big Jim. Only Robbo wants to keep his own territory. Joining forces with a pool shark from Indiana and the director of a boys' orphanage, Robbo is cheered as a modern-day Robin Hood when he donates money to the orphanage. Meanwhile, Big Jim's heretofore unknown daughter, Marian, goes from man to man trying to find an ally in her quest to run the whole show.
Starring: Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., Bing Crosby, Peter FalkMusical | 100% |
Comedy | 95% |
Crime | 7% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.35:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: Dolby Digital Mono
Spanish: Dolby Digital Mono
English SDH, French, Japanese, Spanish
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 3.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
As Frank Sinatra Jr. observes in his commentary, Robin and the 7 Hoods (or, for short, just "Robin") should have been a lot of fun, both for the cast and the audience. In 1963, Frank Sr., now a certified movie star as well as a singing legend, persuaded studio head Jack Warner to try his hand at re-creating the MGM movie musical formula. With Sinatra producing, the studio assigned versatile director Gordon Douglas, who could do everything from steering Elvis Presley in Follow That Dream to supervising giant ants in the sci-fi classic Them! The screenplay was by comedy writer David R. Schwartz, who had penned numerous episodes for The Amos 'n Andy Show, and the songs came from Jimmy van Heusen and Sammy Cahn, with band leader Nelson Riddle overseeing the music. With Sinatra joined by fellow Rat Packers Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr., plus the return to the screen of one of Sinatra's early idols, the legendary Bing Crosby (in what would be his last film), a splendid time seemed guaranteed for all. But it was not to be. Early during production, on November 22, 1963, a shattered Sinatra had to inform the cast and crew that his friend, President Kennedy, had just been assassinated in Dallas. Filming shut down for the day. When it resumed the following Monday, the mood had changed. What had been an upbeat set with people happy to come to work became a gloomy grind, as the nation mourned the fallen President. Robin's producer and star took the loss especially hard, due to a deep personal attachment to the 35th President, even though Kennedy had been deliberately distancing himself from Sinatra in recent months, because his brother, the Attorney General, was concerned about the singer's rumored connections with organized crime. As if the national tragedy weren't enough, in December of the same year, Sinatra's 19-year-old son was kidnapped and held for ransom, which the star paid to secure Frank Jr.'s release. (The kidnappers were captured, tried and sentenced to prison.) With so much distraction, Sinatra reportedly considered shutting down Robin altogether, but elected to continue. Released in June 1964, the finished product was reasonably successful, but it has an unfinished quality, as if the creative energy was spent and everyone was doing the best they could to get finished.
With elegantly composed anamorphic widescreen cinematography by William H. Daniels, who also shot Ocean's 11, Robin and the 7 Hoods is the most recent of the three films new to Blu-ray in Warner's Frank Sinatra Collection, and it hasn't been treated any better. To the extent Warner's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray compares favorably to those of Anchors Aweigh or On the Town, the difference is down to superior source material from a later era, because the same indifference toward Blu-ray mastering is evident in the disc. Like the other two titles, this 123-minute film has been crunched onto a BD-25, at an average bitrate of 19.99 Mbps. The result isn't filled with obvious artifacts like Anchors Aweigh (although there are some to be seen, if you look closely), but the image isn't particularly film-like and fine detail is frequently lacking, which is a shame given the intricacy of the sets and costumes. Black levels are erratic, and the problem is easy to spot, if one watches the frequently worn tuxedos, which too often shade to gray. Such inconsistencies raise legitimate questions about the accuracy of the remaining palette, which is certainly lively, although it may be wrong. Except for the beginning and end titles, Robin did not make extensive use of opticals, so that the softness of the image cannot be attributed to that common cause from the pre-digital era. High-frequency rolloff appears to be the culprit.
Robin's original mono track has been encoded as lossless DTS-HD MA 1.0. The track is in very good shape, and the dynamic range is wide enough to encompass both Nelson Riddle's orchestra and the tommy gun fire that is an essential component of the song "Bang! Bang!", as well as being part of many non-musical scenes. Dialogue and vocal performances are well-reproduced, and the transitions between singing and speaking are less jarring than in musicals from a decade earlier. Even though the sound mix occupies only a single channel, the layering of nightlife sounds in the various speakeasy scenes, with roulette wheels spinning, chips being tossed and glasses clinking, is effective. Mono gets a bad rep, but a track like this one serves as a reminder that mono delivered big-screen pizzaz for a long time and did it well.
Warner previously released Robin and the 7 Hoods on DVD in 2002, and again in 2008, with the commentary, featurette and trailer. For Blu-ray, it has added three cartoons.
Even if Robin doesn't work as a whole, the film has its moments, and Peter Falk's performance keeps re-energizing the narrative. But why bother to release the Blu-ray at all, if you're going to do a slapdash job? Once again, the product of a media giant's home video division is put to shame by comparison to the work of tiny independent labels like MPI or Magnolia—or WHV's own corporate sibling, the Warner Archive Collection. Fans of Robin can reasonably justify owning this disc, at a bargain price, on the ground that this is the best it has ever looked. For those not already familiar with the film, I suggest waiting for some of Sinatra's better efforts, which one can only hope will be better treated.
1945
1955
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1967
Limited Edition - SOLD OUT
1962
2002
1953
1982
1964
1995
Warner Archive Collection
1963
1952
1967
1966
Paramount Presents #23
1976
10th Anniversary Edition
2008
1982
Sing-Along Edition
2018
Fox Studio Classics
1969
Warner Archive Collection
1940