Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		2.5

The Big Shave Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman September 16, 2020

Note: This film is available as part of Scorsese Shorts.

There was a rather funny throwaway line in the recently reviewed mockumentary Brutal Massacre: A Comedy, where a hapless horror film director was discussing film shoots fraught with peril and disappointment. This director, the sort of guy who really wants to impress his interviewer even if he's manifestly short on any actually impressive achievements, mentions Apocalypse Now as a prime example of this phenomenon and then adds "just go ask Scorsese" to make his point. Those who aren't confused about Scorsese's filmography may think of his feature film career starting with at least Mean Streets, though diehard Scorsese fans will of course know about Boxcar Bertha and perhaps even Who's That Knocking at My Door? . But even before Who's That Knocking at My Door? came out in 1967, Scorsese had started making a name for himself with both documentaries and some more whimsically minded shorts, and this Criterion release aggregates several of them, giving fans an opportunity to see one of the titans of contemporary cinema beginning to define his style.

The Big Shave is definitely the outlier in the pieces collected in Scorsese Shorts. First of all, it's by far the shortest of these so- called shorts, clocking it at only around five minutes. But even more so, it's just a really weird little vignette which offers nothing other than a man shaving until he starts bleeding profusely. It's all set to a vintage recording of Bunny Berigan's version of Cole Porter's "I Can't Get Started", though some curmudgeons (ahem) might think another Porter tune, namely "I've Got You Under My Skin", might have been more a propos, considering the carnage that's ultimately on display. Scorsese is on record speaking to his perceived subtext here, which I won't "spoil", other than to see it's easily Google-able, but I'd wager that anyone not familiar with what Scorsese claims is the implied meaning to the imagery would be able to guess it beforehand.

The Big Shave Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

All of the films included in Scorsese Shorts are presented on Blu-ray courtesy of The Criterion Collection with AVC encoded 1080p transfers in 1.33:1. Criterion's insert booklet lumps information about the transfers together as follows:

All five films are presented in their original aspect ratio of 1.33:1. On widescreen televisions, black bars will appear on the left and right of the imae to maintain the proper screen format. The new digital transfers of Italianamerican and American Boy were created in 4K resolution on a Lasergraphics Director film scanner from the 16 mm negative A/B rolls. The Big Shave, It's Not Just You, Murray!, and What's a Nice Girl Like Your Doing in a Place Like This? were created in 4K resolution from the original 16 mm reversal A/B rolls.

The original monaural soundtracks for Italianamerican and American Boy were remastered from 35 mm magnetic tracks. The original monaural soundtrack for The Big Shave was remastered from 16 mm magnetic tracks. The original monaural soundtracks for It's Not Just You, Murray! and What's a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This? were remastered from 16 mm optical soundtrack positives. Clicks, thumps, hiss, hum, and crackle were manually removed using Pro Tools HD and iZotope RX.

American Boy; The Big Shave; It's Not Just You, Murray!; and What's a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This? film elements courtesy of the George Eastman Museum, Rochester, New York. Italianamerican film element courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art, New York.

The Big Shave offers what is arguably the most consistently high levels of sharpness and detail of any of the documentaries or shorts in this set, and it also offers a nicely suffused palette, albeit one that tends to feature a lot of white porcelain and gleaming silver steel before all the blood starts showing up. Detail levels on the close-ups of the shaver's face are typically quite excellent. Grain resolves naturally throughout the presentation.

The Big Shave Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There's not much to The Big Shave's soundtrack other than the Berigan tune mentioned above, and while the LPCM Mono track on this short is understandably limited by the archival nature of the recording, there's no outright damage per se. Things sound typically boxy in an expected way, but the track has fine fidelity with an understanding of the limitations of the source material.

The Big Shave Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There are no supplements tied to this specific film on the disc. For the more generalist supplements that the disc does offer, please refer to the Scorsese Shorts Blu-ray review.

The Big Shave Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Big Shave evidently had an alternate title of Viet '67, which may be a more clear giveaway to what Scorsese thought he was getting at. I'm not sure he actually succeeded, but this is a fascinating piece that at least may provoke thought and discussion. Technical merits are solid.