Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		3.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.0

The Don Is Dead Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov March 13, 2021

Richard Fleischer's "The Don is Dead" (1973) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Eureka Entertainment. The supplemental features on the disc include vintage trailer for the film and exclusive new audio commentary by critic Sergio Mims. In English, with optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature. Region-A "locked".

I cannot agree that The Don is Dead was produced to compete with The Godfather. Compete for what exactly? The honor of being crowned the greatest mafia film ever made? A quick look at the cast that was assembled for The Don is Dead immediately invalidates such a theory. There are some very solid actors there -- Anthony Queen, Frederic Forrest, Al Lettieri, Robert Forster, Abe Vigoda, and Louis Zorich -- but you are not looking at a team of top stars that could have made The Don is Dead a grand classic. This is simply an indisputable fact. The kind of epic film some folks have speculated The Don is Dead was conceived to be requires very serious polish work and right from the get-go you can tell that Richard Fleischer was going for the exact opposite quality. Indeed, it is not a coincidence that The Don is Dead has a very casual, street-smart personality. Pay attention to the seemingly endless executions that are part of its narrative and you will realize that the lack of glamour is entirely intentional. Why? Because the goal is to portray the killing almost as a nuisance in a very messy business, which means that the emotions that build up the great drama in The Godfather are utterly incompatible with it. This is what Fleischer emphasizes ad nauseum in The Don is Dead -- being a mobster is a lousy occupation and the risk of getting a bullet in your head is always the same, regardless of whether you are at the very top and calling all the shots, or at the very bottom doing the dirty work for the people above you.

The original material for The Don is Dead comes from Marvin H. Albert’s novel, who also worked on the screenplay, but the film delivers Fleischer’s interpretation of it. The aging Don Angelo (Quinn) is tricked by the younger and very ambitious mobster Luigi Orlando (Charles Cioffi) to begin a romantic relationship with the young and very beautiful aspiring singer Ruby Dune (Angel Tompkins). What Don Angelo does not know is that Ruby is already in a romantic relationship with Frank Regalbuto (Forster), who happens to be the son of his late best friend. Frank also has huge ambitions and is already working with a prominent mafia boss in Naples whose people supply massive amounts of drugs that are distributed in America. When Frank discovers that Don Angelo has been seeing his girl, he goes berserk and a deadly gang war becomes inevitable, which of course is precisely what Orlando has been hoping for. So, there isn’t a shortage of intrigues in The Don is Dead, but once the mayhem begins everything actually becomes very pragmatic -- the betrayals, the dirty tricks, the executions, they are all done with a clear understanding that the business comes first.

If there is still any doubt that Fleischer wasn’t interested in glamorizing the mafiosi, as it appears some folks expected he would after the success of The Godfather, examine closely the transformation of Forrest’s character. Initially, he is a low-level executioner who seems eager to find the right excuse to walk away from the business. His brother (Lettieri) urges him to stay with him because they would become independent and eventually have enough to retire in style, and he reluctantly agrees. Then in the midst of the gang war he abruptly concludes that there are opportunities for him to claim a piece of the business and begins dealing with the same people that forced him on the warpath. All is suddenly forgotten and proper arrangements made in the most unglamorous way imaginable. This guy turns out to be an even more cynical pragmatist than the people he previously planned to walk away from, which of course makes him even more repulsive.

There are winners and losers in The Don is Dead but they are all seriously unlikable characters. This is entirely by design. From time to time a few of them get opportunities to appear strong and impress the clueless around them, but everything about these characters and their existence is off-putting. Needless to say, when the final credits roll The Don is Dead accomplishes exactly the opposite of what The Godfather does -- it portrays mobsters as a big tribe of backstabbing losers.

The Don Is Dead Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, The Don is Dead arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber.

If you have seen our review of Eureka Entertainment's recent release of The Don is Dead you should know exactly what to expect from Kino Lorber's release since they are sourced from the same older master, which was supplied by Universal Pictures. Unfortunately, this master has a lot of familiar shortcomings. Indeed, there are obvious traces of filtering adjustments and in some areas even classic edge-enhancement patterns (see screencaptures #8 and 18). The wider panoramic shots, and in particular the ones that have plenty of natural light, tend to smeary as well. Predictably, depth and clarity suffer a lot, so if you view your films on a larger screen there is an excellent chance that many of these anomalies will annoy you. The color scheme is convincing. However, this is another area where meaningful improvements can be made. In darker areas, where the filtering has destabilized different ranges of nuances, a proper new master can reveal substantial improvements and dramatically strengthen delineation as well. Image stability is very good. There are no large distracting debris, cuts, damage marks, warped or torn frames to report in our review. So, while certain areas can appear somewhat decent, the current master fails to produce a solid organic presentation of the film. 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 Don Is Dead Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

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

I checked the same footage in the beginning of the film, during the melee, and the same light distortions are present here as well, which confirms that they are on the master. The rest of the film sounds fine. Dynamic intensity is appropriate for a film from the '70s.

The Don Is Dead Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer - a vintage trailer for The Don is Dead. In English, not subtitled. (2 min, 480/60i).

• Commentary - in this new audio commentary, critic Sergio Mims discusses the period appearance of The Don is Dead, the fact that the film is structured and executed as an ensemble piece, cinematographer Richard Kline's body of work, Anthony Quinn's legacy, etc.

The Don Is Dead Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The damage great films like The Godfather and Scarface have done on mainstream perceptions about mobsters in America is truly incalculable. They legitimized lifestyles and values that were essentially incompatible with the real world of organized crime, where loyalty and honor for instance meant very little and life was as cheap as a pack of cigarettes. (In case you have any doubts that it is so, spend a night with Whitey: United States of America V. James J. Bulger). Richard Fleischer's The Don is Dead comes much closer to the truth, which is precisely the reason why it lacks the glamour of The Godfather and Scarface. What its unlikable characters do is essentially a lot of pragmatic backstabbing and killing that weed out the weaker and naive amongst them. The survivors then keep rearranging their interests until the next wave of disputes and bloody troubles disrupt the business, exactly as it used to happen in the real world. Kino Lorber's release is sourced from the same older and unconvincing master that Eureka Entertainment worked with to produce its Region-B release of The Don is Dead. If you want it in your collection, find a way to rent and test it first, and then consider a purchase.