Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		5.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		4.0
Overall		3.0

The Hunted 4K Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov December 6, 2024

William Friedkin's "The Hunted" (2003) arrives on 4K Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber. The supplemental features on the release include archival audio commentary recorded by William Friedkin; archival cast and crew interviews; making of featurette; deleted scsnes; and more. In English, with optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature. Region-Free.

The tracker

Instead of wasting his time and plenty of resources that could have been used for a much more interesting project, William Friedkin should have just rewatched Ted Kotcheff’s First Blood. Kotcheff made the film Friedkin wanted to shoot two decades earlier. It is true. In The Hunted, Friedkin borrows the story of First Blood and then retells it badly with several actors who are not right for it. So, what was the point of shooting The Hunted? Friedkin likely had a good answer, but anyone who does not blindly defend everything he has done over the years can see that The Hunted reimagines First Blood and convincingly fails for multiple reasons.

One of these reasons is the decision to cast Tommy Lee Jones as L.T. Bonham, a retired military man who once trained America’s best professional killers and helped the FBI track down the worst freelancing killers its experts could not get. L.T. appears to be in his late sixties and lives in a shack in the deep forests of British Columbia. When someone ceremonially kills a couple of hunters in the deep forests of Oregon, an FBI agent connects the dots and reaches out to L.T. with a request for help because the case appears to be very, very serious. L.T. reluctantly agrees to get involved with the case, arrives at the murder scene, and less than an hour later, while snooping around, meets the killer. It is Aaron Hallam (Benicio Del Toro), one of his students, who has gone loco and become a forest man, too. L.T. tells Hallam, who is several decades younger, that he must stop killing, but moments later they begin fighting. L.T. is quickly overpowered, but right before Hallam sends him to his creator, an FBI takes him down with a tranquilizer gun. After Hallam is transferred to the FBI building in Portland, some very shady military guys appear and claim him, but soon after he kills them and disappears, and L.T. again begins hunting for him. Up to this point, there isn’t a single scene where Jones behaves like the man L.T. needs to be so that he has a chance of surviving an encounter with Hallam.

But it gets worse. After Hallam outsmarts an entire building full of FBI agents and disappears, L.T. begins searching for him in Portland, meets and loses him again, and then sprints like a champion to reach a rugged cliff where the two have a rematch. One more crucial detail. L.T. does not use guns and repeatedly rejects help from FBI agent Abby Durrell (Connie Nielsen). So, logic and authenticity have everything to do with all the other reasons The Hunted fails.

Del Toro, while looking fitter, is miscast, too. For example, he tries hard to appear ominous, but the delivery of his lines is very problematic. Their tone is wrong. His body posture is wrong, too. Real psychopaths can easily switch personalities, but they always have that look, revealing that their minds are plugged in somewhere else.

So, how can a great director like Friedkin shoot a film as bad as The Hunted? Great directors, especially late in their careers, are rarely confronted with the truth and, sadly, it appears that this is why The Hunted materialized. No one dared to tell Friedkin that what he was shooting was not good. Or maybe someone did, but Friedkin ignored him and continued working. This is a plausible scenario with great directors, too.

A quick comment about the prologue. It is worse than that notorious prologue Jonathan Mostow shot for Breakdown, after he was told to do one to make it more believable, and then junked. (In it, Kurt Russell's character, Jeff Taylor, is sent to Bosnia where, like Hallam, he is also permanently scarred). Friedkin portrays the Serbs as bloodthirsty monsters who speak like robots and exterminate an entire village of peaceful Albanians.

The Hunted 4K Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Kino Lorber's release of The Hunted is a 4K Blu-ray/Blu-ray combo pack. The 4K Blu-ray is Region-Free. However, the Blu-ray is Region-A "locked".

The release introduces an exclusive new 4K makeover of The Hunted which is presented in native 4K and 1080p. The native 4K presentation can be viewed with Dolby Vision and HDR grades. I chose to view it with Dolby Vision. Later, I spent time with the 1080p presentation on the Blu-ray.

Please note that some of the screencaptures included with this article are taken from the 4K Blu-ray and downscaled to 1080p. Therefore, they do not accurately reflect the quality of the 4K content on the 4K Blu-ray disc, including the actual color values of this content.

Screencaptures #1-27 are from the Blu-ray.
Screencaptures #30-39 are from the 4K Blu-ray.

The Hunted made its high-definition debut with this Blu-ray release in 2022. Unfortunately, I do not have it in my library. However, even if I did, I would not have spent any time performing numerous comparisons with it. Why? Because the quality of the 4K presentation is too good to be matched by an older 1080p master.

The entire film looks pretty incredible now, boasting visuals whose delineation, clarity, and depth are often perfect. Some of the larger panoramic shots in particular look so striking that they can easily be described as 'reference material'. Darker footage, such as the one from the forest, reveals tremendous ranges of subtle darker nuances too, which the Dolby Vision grade handles incredibly well. Colors are rich, wonderfully balanced, and healthy. I did not notice any anomalies to report in our review. Only in a few areas with quick camera zooms and cuts I thought that the fluidity of the visuals could have been slightly more convincing, but it could very well be that what I saw is how this material was shot. Regardless, I think that all of it is still very impressive. Image stability is excellent. There are no traces of any problematic digital corrections.

How does the 1080p presentation on the Blu-ray look? Terrific. Delineation, clarity, and depth are terrific, and color reproduction is mighty impressive. I think that a few of the larger panoramic shots might be slightly sharper and better defined in native 4K, but this is a difference that becomes meaningful only if you are looking at the native 4K and 1080p presentations at the same time. I think that folks who can play only Blu-ray releases will be incredibly happy with the 1080p presentation.

The Hunted 4K Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There are two standard audio tracks on this release: English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. Optional English SDH subtitles re provide for the main feature.

The 5.1 track is outstanding. Obviously, The Hunted has a tremendous amount of high-octane footage that is wonderfully mixed, but I think that the lossless track replicates its wonderful qualities very well, too. I wish I had the previous Blu-ray release to see whether the 5.1 track is newly remastered. I suspect that it is not because the 5.1 track was finalized under William Friedkin's supervision, or someone he trusted to have it done right.

The Hunted 4K Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

4K BLU-RAY DISC

• Commentary - this archival audio commentary was recorded by William Friedkin. I listened to in its entirety because see The Hunted as a vanity project gone wrong. Friedkin recalls a meeting with a real tracker named Tom Brown, who impressed him a lot and apparently became the model for Tommy Lee Jones' character. Also, there are some quite interesting comments about his split personality, as well as the real FBI procedures that are initiated when a dangerous character like the one Benicio Del Toro plays must be tracked down. Friedkin is always a good commentator, but his enthusiasm for The Hunted is questionable, to say the least.

BLU-RAY DISC

• Commentary - this archival audio commentary was recorded by William Friedkin. I listened to in its entirety because see The Hunted as a vanity project gone wrong. Friedkin recalls a meeting with a real tracker named Tom Brown, who impressed him a lot and apparently became the model for Tommy Lee Jones' character. Also, there are some quite interesting comments about his split personality, as well as the real FBI procedures that are initiated when a dangerous character like the one Benicio Del Toro plays must be tracked down. Friedkin is always a good commentator, but his enthusiasm for The Hunted is questionable, to say the least.

• Pursuing The Hunted - in this archival program, William Friedkin discusses the real tracker Tom Brown and the type of skills he had and used to get men like the one Benicio Del Toro becomes in The Hunted. Brown, who served as a technical advisor on the film, comments as well. In English, not subtitled. (9 min).

• Filming The Hunted - in this archival program, William Friedking explains why The Hunted had to be a fast-moving film. Tommy Lee Jones, stunt coordinator Buddy Joe Hooker, and co-producer James Jacks comment as well. In English, not subtitled. (10 min).

• Tracking The Hunted - in this archival program, Tom Brown explains what had to be done to get the tracking skills in The Hunted to appear authentic. Raw footage from the shooting of key scenes with Tommy Lee Jones is included as well. In English, not subtitled. (5 min).

• The Cutting Edge - The Hunted - in this archival program, William Friedkin, co-producer/co-screenwriter Art Monterastelli, Benicio Del Toro, and stunt coordinator Buddy Joe Hooker, among others, discuss the shooting of the more difficult and risky footage in The Hunted. In English, not subtitled. (9 min).

• Deleted Scenes - in English, not subtitled. (10 min).
  
  1. FBI Sting Section.
  2. Chenoweth Arrives at Zander's
  3. Bonham Climbs Tree
  4. Van Zandt Says Hallam's Gone
  5. Bible Reading and Loretta's Bedtime
  6. Rock Trap in the Woods.

• Trailer - presented here is a vintage trailer for The Hunted. In English, not subtitled. (3 min).

The Hunted 4K Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

William Friedkin was a great conversationalist who always shared fascinating information when talking about films. In the archival audio commentary for The Hunted, Friedkin again shares plenty of fascinating information, but he also describes a terrific film that does not exist. The Hunted is a very problematic film, at times almost resembling a parody, and this is not how Friedkin imagined and wanted it to turn out. Its flaws are very big and very obvious, so it is too bad that no one dared to point out to Friedkin that the problematic film he was shooting was inevitable. Kino Lorber's combo pack introduces a fabulous exclusive new 4K makeover of The Hunted prepared by Paramount. It looks terrific on 4K Blu-ray and Blu-ray.