7 | / 10 |
Users | 4.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Two very different men hitchhike across country and form a unique friendship.
Starring: Gene Hackman, Al Pacino, Dorothy Tristan, Ann Wedgeworth, Richard Lynch (I)Drama | 100% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 1.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Scarecrow arrived in theaters with great anticipation, thanks to the much-advertised pairing of
Gene Hackman and Al Pacino, both of whom had become box office draws after Hackman's
Oscar-winning performance in The French
Connection and Pacino's Oscar-nominated
appearance on The Godfather (he would be
nominated again for Serpico, which appeared the
same year as Scarecrow). Despite the pre-release excitement, the film landed with a thud at the
U.S. box office, as audiences expecting the intensity of Popeye Doyle colliding with Michael
Corleone instead found a meandering road picture about two losers going nowhere. In Europe,
however, director Jerry Schatzberg's follow-up to The Panic in Needle Park (also starring Pacino)
enjoyed a much warmer reception, receiving that year's Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival
(which it shared with a British film, The Hireling).
Scarecrow is the kind of work that no major studio would bankroll today, regardless of the talent
involved. A quintessential product of Seventies' cinematic rebellion, the film is a natural
successor to moody, actor-driven projects like Five Easy
Pieces and The King of Marvin
Gardens—but with even less plot. It's a melancholy tone poem of isolation punctuated by brief
moments of connection, and it wouldn't work without the peculiar chemistry of Hackman and
Pacino, unlikely traveling companions who become as dependent on each other as Beckett's
two tramps eternally waiting in the wilderness.
Scarecrow has been released on Blu-ray by the Warner Archive Collection, which has performed
its usual exemplary work in bringing cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond's expressive
widescreen panoramas to home video.
The cinematographer on Scarecrow was the late Vilmos Zsigmond, a poet of Panavision who had
just photographed Deliverance for John Boorman and
would shortly shoot a more kinetic road
movie, The Sugarland Express, for
Steven Spielberg. Zsigmond's expressive frames situate Max
and Lion against landscapes that recall Easy Rider
in their variety and dusty authenticity. For this
1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray from the Warner Archive Collection, an interpositive of recent
vintage was scanned at 2K by Warner's Motion Picturing Imaging facility. MPI's color
correction used a dye-transfer release print as a reference, followed by WAC's customarily
thorough cleanup to remove dirt, scratches and damage.
The Blu-ray image reflects Scarecrow's origination on film, with a natural and finely resolved
grain field that is noticeable but never intrusive, except (marginally) in the opening titles, which
were optically superimposed. The degree of sharpness and detail varies somewhat as the lighting
shifts, with a fall-off in dim interiors like Turk's Supper Club, where Zsigmond often diffuses a
moody reddish glow. Nightime scenes are similarly dim, but never to the point where visibility is
compromised, and the blacks are solidly rendered. Daytime detail is excellent, which is crucial
for the film's many expansive frames picking up background minutia, whether of the natural
landscape, of train yards and crumbling city outskirts, or of the junk-strewn backyard of Coley's
home/business. Scarecrow's palette is quietly understated, with some of the brightest colors seen
in Max's motley wardrobe, which he wears in layers because he's always cold.
WAC has mastered Scarecrow at its usual high average bitrate, here 34.98 Mbps.
Scarecrow's original mono soundtrack has been taken from the magnetic masters, cleaned of age-related defects and encoded as lossless DTS-HD MA 2.0. The presentation is authentic and accurate, but it won't win any awards. The dialogue was recorded as production sound, with little or no post-dubbing, and the voices are thin, hollow and occasionally hard to understand (though it's not as if every word is essential in this saga). The effects are minimalist, and there is almost no underscoring, although source music can be heard from jukeboxes and radios. (The sparse cues were written by Fred Myrow, composer of Phantasm.) The Blu-ray track deserve a high mark for accuracy, faithfully reproducing a purely functional source.
The extras have been ported over from Warner's 2005 DVD of Scarecrow. The trailer has been
remastered in 1080p.
Scarecrow isn't for everyone, but it's a memorable experience powered by two of America's
greatest screen actors in peak form. The characters they're bringing to life may be nobodies, but
Hackman and Pacino make them unforgettable. WAC's Blu-ray presents this quietly provocative
artifact of the Seventies film revolution with the intensity and vividness that its scope deserves.
Highly recommended.
Shout Select
1973
2011
2018
2016
2016
2012
2014
1969
De rouille et d'os
2012
1971
1940
1997
Falsche Bewegung
1975
Collector's Edition
1982
2012
2008
Im Lauf der Zeit
1976
După dealuri
2012
밀양 / Milyang
2007
Europa '51 / The Greatest Love
1952