Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		4.0

The Docks of New York Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 26, 2020

Note: This film is available as part of 3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg.

Whether fairly or unfairly, Josef von Sternberg is probably best remembered for his collaborations with Marlene Dietrich, and in fact Criterion itself has celebrated that partnership with their excellent release Dietrich & von Sternberg in Hollywood. That very partnership may have led some film fans to assume that von Sternberg, like Dietrich, was a German emigré, but as one of the supplements on the set currently under discussion gets into, von Sternberg was actually born Jonas Sternberg in Vienna, moving to the United States with his family when he was still a tot. The “Josef”, and, later, the “von”, were added at later dates, perhaps in an attempt by either (von) Sternberg himself or those wanting to help his career to make him seem more “exotic” somehow (there’s some indication that the “von” addition may have been inspired by Erich von Stroheim). This same supplement details von Sternberg’s early career in the film industry, which included everything from being a “go fer” to editing before von Sternberg finally kind of almost stumbled into a directing career with his self funded The Salvation Hunters, which this supplement goes on to describe as one of the first supposedly mainstream “Art Films”. Von Sternberg had a kind of rocky first few years as a supposed wunderkind, with a proposed film starring Mary Pickford and then another evidently completed film done for Charlie Chaplin never really seeing the light of day (the supplement makes a passing case that the Chaplin film may be lying around in someone’s vault somewhere and that a hunt for it should be undertaken). Those stumbling blocks may have played into the decision by Paramount's legendary B.P. Schulberg to offer von Sternberg a job not as a director (at least initially), but as more of a jack of all trades assigned to clean up various productions which the studio deemed were in trouble for one reason or another. Von Stroheim's success with regard to Children of Divorce in particular finally gave him the opportunity to start directing for Paramount, and the films in this set are among his early silents for the studio.

The Docks of New York may have been adapted from a novel by frequent von Sternberg collaborator Jules Furthman, but there’s a kind of Eugene O’Neill ambience suffusing this effort which takes place in and around its titular locale. George Brent, who was so viscerally intriguing in von Sternberg’s Underworld (also included in 3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg) is back on hand here as rough and tumble “stoker” Bill Roberts. Shore leave beckons with various enticements for Bill, not the least of which turns out to be a very O’Neill-esque floozy type named Mae (Betty Compson).

In fact, the whole up and down relationship between Bill and Mae which provides The Docks of New York with the bulk of its narrative momentum struck me as something that would have been right at home in the background in either Anna Christie or The Iceman Cometh, but aside from any purely narrative connections, The Docks of New York is very much its own piece, especially with regard to the fog shrouded cinematography of Harold Rosson, and some presentational aspects that once again, kind of like a few selected moments in Underworld , seem to be flirting with Abstract Expressionism.

The Docks of New York Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

All of the presentations included in 3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg are presented on Blu-ray courtesy of The Criterion Collection with AVC encoded 1080p transfers in 1.33:1. The expansive insert booklet included in this set lumps all three together in their informational page devoted to the transfers, with the following verbiage:

All three 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 image to maintain the proper screen format. These high definition digital transfers were created on a Spirit HD DataCine, with density correction done on a da Vinci 2K. Underworld's transfer was created from a 35 mm fine grain positive, The Last Command's from a 35 mm duplicate negative, and The Docks of New York's from a 35 mm fine grain master positive. Thousands of instances of dirt, debris, scratches, splices and warps were manually removed using MTI Film's DRS, while Digital Vision's Phoenix was used for flicker and small dirt.

Like all three films in this set, The Docks of New York can show pretty significant damage at times, with scratches and nicks perhaps being more exacerbated in this presentation due to the prevalence of effects like fog and mist. Perusing some of the screenshots accompanying this review can give at least some idea of the damage on display. Interestingly, though, some of the interior scenes in this presentation are among the best looking in the entire three film set, despite continued damage. Clarity is rather good in many of these scenes, with abundant detail levels and some really appealing contrast that highlights both gray scale and blacks. That said, there are variances in densities and (somewhat less noticeable) contrast that can affect both overall detail levels and the gradations between blacks, grays and whites. Grain resolves naturally throughout the presentation.

The Docks of New York Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

All three films included in this set feature two different musical soundtracks delivered via LPCM 2.0 tracks. All three films feature scores by the reliable Robert Israel, with two of the three, Underworld and The Last Command , also featuring a score by the Alloy Orchestra, and the third, The Docks of New York, also featuring a score by Donald Sosin. As mentioned in the Supplements section of the overarching 3 Silent Classics by Josef von Sternberg Blu-ray review, there are some interesting comments by the composers included in the insert booklet which may be of some interest to fans. The Israel scores are inventive orchestral pieces, often quite boisterous. The Alloy Orchestra scores are a bit more experimental in nature, but are often surprisingly similar to Israel's in terms of orchestration and even general musical ideas presented. The Sosin score is more of a piano based work and also features a vocal by Joanna Seaton. Fidelity is fine and problem free throughout all scores, with a nicely burnished tone in the orchestral offerings and a slightly bright but never really brittle ambience to the piano based score. I noticed no issues whatsoever with regard to distortion, dropouts or other damage.

The Docks of New York Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Josef von Sternberg Interview (1080p; 39:46) is culled from a 1968 Swedish television broadcast, and includes some of the legend's memories of his work during the silent era. Von Sternberg speaks in rather cultured sounding English, but interstitial narration and other elements are in Swedish with English subtitles.

The Docks of New York Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Docks of New York is a fascinating exercise in what I called almost a socioeconomic critique disguised as a love story. Bancroft and Compson are intriguing as the focal couple, and this film is awash (in more ways than one) in style. Video has fairly recurrent hurdles, but audio is great, and the supplement very interesting. Recommended.