5.2 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 2.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
A journalist (Joanne Lumley) is interviewing people who came into contact with the late Inspector Clouseau for an article in tribute to the great detective. Made two years after Peter Sellers' death, and featuring a string of outtakes from the earlier Pink Panther films.
Starring: Peter Sellers, David Niven, Herbert Lom, Richard Mulligan, Joanna LumleyComedy | 100% |
Crime | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.35:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: DTS-HD Master Audio Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
5.1: 2819 kbps; 2.0 Stereo: 1584 kbps; 2.0 Dual Mono: 1624 kbps
English SDH
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (locked)
Movie | 2.5 | |
Video | 2.0 | |
Audio | 3.0 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
Trail of the Pink Panther is being released as part of The Pink Panther Film Collection.
With the very unfortunate and untimely passing of Peter Sellers at age 54 in July 1980, United Artists was forced to scramble with how it would assemble the next film in The Pink Panther series. According to William Patrick Maynard on this disc's commentary, the studio was insistent that a transitional film be made featuring unused footage of Sellers before proceeding with Curse of the Pink Panther. Director Blake Edwards and his editor Alan Jones combed through the MGM/UA library and extracted two-thirds of outtakes from The Pink Panther Strikes Again, which fills most of Trail of the Pink Panther's first forty minutes. Previously unreleased scenes of Chief Inspector Clouseau at his favorite masquerade shop owned by Professor Auguste Balls (Harvey Korman), inside his office at the French Sűreté, and in an airplane bandaged from head to toe were inserted and juxtaposed with interlinking new footage. Cinematographer Dick Bush filmed new material in two different police headquarters (separate scenes), Chief Inspector Dreyfus talking to his psychiatrist on the couch, a stunt double mimicking Sellers's Clouseau, among other new inserts. The filmed but excised opening scene of Revenge of the Pink Panther in which Sergeant Francois Duval (André Maranne) drives Clouseau to the psychiatric clinic to visit Dreyfus is re-purposed here for a drive to the airport where Clouseau will fly to London to try to catch Sir Charles Litton, who is actually residing in the South of France. When he learns that he is the target of yet another assassination plot, Clouseau takes a different flight for Lugash. Character names have been altered by dubbing the actors' original utterances in order to accommodate changes in this film's story. In his mostly favorable review of Trail of the Pink Panther, Vincent Canby wrote in the New York Times that the various strands of footage are expertly put together.
When and where does Clouseau's fate await him?
Trail of the Pink Panther makes its Blu-ray debut worldwide courtesy of Shout Select on this MPEG-4 AVC-encoded BD-50. The first posthumously released post-Sellers film appears in its original theatrical aspect ratio of 2.35:1. Video streams on the main feature average a healthy 31995 kbps while the whole disc amasses a total bitrate of 42.38 Mbps. Even though this is the most recent Panther title in Shout's set, it is the weakest looking and contains the least amount of restoration work done. For instance, notice the swarm of dirt/noise hovering around the blue sky above the cityscape in Screenshot #10. There is a high number of artifacts appearing throughout the presentation. This would not be as bothersome during the recycled footage from the previous films (which frequently have speckles) but it's inexcusable for the previously unseen material. The conversation between Jouvet and the Littons shows pretty consistent scratches and blips. See the marks on and above the back cushion on the left side of the frame in #2. Colors look decent but contrast is mediocre.
Shout has demarcated the main movie into a dozen scene selections.
Shout has provided a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 Surround (2819 kbps, 24-bit), a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Stereo (1584 kbps, 24-bit), and a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Dual Mono (1624 kbps, 24-bit). The tracks made from the original masters sound okay but vary in quality. As previously noted, there are some dubbed lines and these tend to sound inauthentic. For such instances, spoken dialogue sounds a little like a wound-up chipmunk. Because he was suffering from ALS at the time of filming, David Niven had his lines looped by Canadian actor Rich Little so they're not spoken by a true Brit. Henry Mancini's music sounds flatter and less robust than it does in the other films.
Shout has supplied the option for English SDH and they present an accurate transcription of the dialogue.
With one of his favorite lead actors gone, Blake Edwards faced a great challenge in trying to carve a narrative out of Trail of the Pink Panther. The director did all he could with the material available to him but the end result is an omnibus rather than a film that can stand on its own. Shout Select essentially recycles a fair-looking theatrical release print as the basis for its transfer. The extra features don't include any new interviews or featurettes but the commentary track contains some quality tidbits and trivia. The movie is a compendium of cinematic endnotes and should especially appeal to Sellers's most dedicated fans.
(Still not reliable for this title)
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