Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		3.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		2.5

The Bedroom Window Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov May 21, 2019

Curtis Hanson's "The Bedroom Window" (1987) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber. The supplemental features on the disc include an original trailer for the film and audio commentary by critic Peter Tonguette. In English, with optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature. Region-A "locked".

Secret lovers

It is so strange to see that when The Bedroom Window was released in the late ‘80s some people recognized Hitchcockian overtones in it. This film has so many phony characters that it actually makes the ‘80s look seriously awful -- and this isn’t an easy job.

Terry Lambert (Steven Guttenberg) comes home with his boss’s wife, Sylvia (Isabelle Huppert), and the two quickly agree that the time is right to jump in bed and have some steamy sex. (There is no serious foreplay. They just tell each other that they wanted to do it for a long time and now they are about to make it happen). After the fireworks end, and while Terry is in the bathroom, Sylvia witnesses an attempted murder though his window. The lovers then agree that they ought to speak with the authorities, but Terry has to lie that he was alone in his apartment so that they can keep their affair secret. Shortly after, Terry is visited by detectives Quirke (Carl Lumbly) and Jessup (Frederick Coffin) who document his recollections and ask him to come over to the police station to identify the attacker (Brad Greenquist). Terry struggles to do so, but they still decide to go to court with a slightly different strategy which would put their man behind bars. Fast-forward. The strategy backfires when a seasoned defense attorney (Wallace Shawn) makes it painfully obvious to the jury that Terry could not have possibly recognized his client from his bedroom and he is released. Terry then becomes the main suspect and the two detectives begin collecting data on him. While attempting to restore balance in his life, Terry befriends Denise (Elizabeth McGovern), a former target of the released psychopath, and the two decide to get him behind bars. Shortly after, they set up a trap for him.

The words and actions of the main protagonists are so ridiculous that from time to time it actually looks like the film was meant to be some sort of a parody. Take the two detectives, for instance, who never once consider monitoring the psychopath but immediately go ‘researching’ Terry’s private life. Their thought process is so flawed that they really do look like the two biggest chumps in Baltimore, but the film insist that they are seen as serious pros. Then there is the bored and supposedly intelligent Sylvia who values privacy but keeps encouraging Terry to play a game that cannot possibly end well. Why? If it is something that excites her, the film completely ignores it. And if it just because she is a good person that wants to do the right thing, the film again misses the mark and frames her as a heartless elitist snob. The romance between Terry and Denise is also hugely problematic, and their trap is flat-out ridiculous. It can work only if the psychopath is such an amateur that he would have never ever been able to secretly follow his targets and figure out the right time to attack them. He is supposed to have a great memory, and yet somehow at the end it is his memory that prevents him from recognizing that he is being played.

In the hands of a director that understands kitsch, like Paul Verhoeven, maybe this film could have been special. But Hanson, who also wrote the script for it, did not have the right formula for that kind of a genre film. There is some decent '80s atmosphere here, but everything else just looks out of sync and sadly for a variety of different reasons. Huppert is too classy to play the snob and the more she tries to sell her character, the more ridiculous she looks. It is one of the worst parts that she has done in her illustrious career. Guttenberg employs contrasting identities that routinely deflate the tension and this is one of the key reasons why the film looks so goofy. Then all of the action in the final third is so pulpy that it feels like it emerged from a completely different script that a team of MTV writers delivered.

Apparently, cinematographer Gilbert Taylor was brought on board when an Italian cinematographer and camera crew were fired by producer Dino De Laurentis. According to Guttenberg, the Italians could not communicate in English.

The Bedroom Window Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in an aspect ratio of 2.35:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Curtis Hanson's The Bedroom Window arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber.

The old master that was used to prepare this release, which apparently comes from StudioCanal, isn't any better than the one that Fox has in its vaults for The Entity. What this means is that there are a few areas where delineation is fine, even good, but there is plenty of surface harshness that basically gives the film a digital edge. Also, a lot of the darker footage struggles with different levels of black crush, and plenty of the grain there actually collapses into noise. So, even though there is harshness on top, underneath it there is plenty of unnatural flatness as well. Colors are stable, but in certain areas it is very easy to see that some nuances are either unconvincing or missing (see screencapture #12). Image stability is very good. Lastly, there are no distracting large debris, cuts, damage marks, or torn frames to report. My score is 3.25/5.00. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-A or Region-Free player in order to access its content).

The Bedroom Window Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. Optional English SDH subtitles are provided for the main feature.

Clarity and stability are very good. My one and only minor criticism pertains to the fullness of the sound during a few action sequence, where it feels like there is room to expand it a little. I can't tell with absolute certainty that a new remix will offer a dramatic improvement, but this is one area where it feels like there is room for improvement.

The Bedroom Window Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Commentary - film historian and critic Peter Tonguette deconstructs The Bedroom Window and has some interesting ideas why it could be an entertaining film.

• Trailer - a vintage trailer for The Bedroom Window.

• Trailers - additional trailers for other Kino Lorber releases.

The Bedroom Window Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Bedroom Window does not work for me. I think that a lot of the actors that made the film were simply not right for it, plus the script has all sorts of different issues. I could have liked it if it was done as a kitschy thriller, like some of the films that you will find in Paul Verhoeven and Brian De Palma's filmographies, but there is a huge part of it that wants to be taken seriously and as a result the end product looks bad and not in a cool '80s way. This new release is sourced from an older master that has some pretty obvious weaknesses, so if you like the film and wish to add it to your library consider a rental first. RENT IT.