The Thin Red Line (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray]
The Thin Red Line (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray]
After directing two of the most extraordinary movies of the 1970s, Badlands and Days of Heaven, American artist Terrence Malick disappeared from the film world for twenty years, only to resurface in 1998 with this visionary adaptation of James Jones’s 1962 novel about the World War II battle for Guadalcanal. A big-budget, spectacularly mounted epic, The Thin Red Line is also one of the most deeply philosophical films ever released by a major Hollywood studio, a thought-provoking meditation on man, nature, and violence. Featuring a cast of contemporary cinema’s finest actors—Sean Penn (Dead Man Walking, Milk), Nick Nolte (The Prince of Tides, Affliction), Elias Koteas (Zodiac, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button), and Woody Harrelson (Natural Born Killers, The People vs. Larry Flynt) among them—The Thin Red Line is a kaleidoscopic evocation of the experience of combat that ranks as one of cinema’s greatest war films.
User Ratings and Reviews
1 Stars Can we please wait for the Blu-Ray?
OK, I understand that this is a film that many people like (it has been out on DVD for a while, and there are plenty of reviews of its quality around–on DVD). When I come to this specific site, I know the film, what I don’t know is what is the film like TECHNICALLY as a blu-ray. These reviews do not help with that goal. They just take up space at the “front of the bus,” so to speak. Can we hold off waxing about how good the blu-ray will be UNTIL we actually see what it is like? One star for the fan momentum, four stars for the film, and who knows how many stars for the blu-ray.
5 Stars Now my life will be complete!
With news of the upcoming release of Terrence Malick’s masterpiece THE THIN RED LINE on Blu-ray (from Criterion, no less!), I will now be able to die happy. IMHO, TTRL is one of the greatest films ever made. I saw it twice the first week it was released in 1998 in a theatre and have watched it on standard DVD many times since. I cannot wait to see it again in HD on Blu-ray especially since it is also one of the most visually beautiful films ever made. It is not only a great war film, but a great spiritual poem that pays tribute to life in all of its forms on our planet. It will never be as popular as SAVING PRIVATE RYAN (released the same year), but great art is never embraced by a mass audience. To tell you the truth, I don’t have much faith in the general public’s taste or intelligence, the popularity of TRANSFORMERS is just one of many examples. I have been waiting for TTRL to be released on Blu-ray while so many inferior films are released in this format every week and it will be worth the wait because Criterion deserves its reputation as the best home video company for film buffs. I do not expect an audio commentary by Malick, because even more than Stanley Kubrick, he has avoided the press, so his films speak for themselves, he leaves it up to the viewer to interpret them. As much as I have loved and grown used to the original theatrical cut of TTRL over the years, I would not mind seeing a longer version (there are two versions of Malick’s THE NEW WORLD on DVD), but I am happy enough to know that thanks to Criterion, I will be able to see a beautiful HD transfer of TTRL at the very least. THANK YOU CRITERION!!!
5 Stars “Sarge, do you ever get lonely?”…
… “Only around people.”
This one peice of conversational dialogue sums up the essence of Terrence Malick’s “The Thin Red Line”, a war film like no other.
Before praising it, I will explain why it might fail in some viewer’s eyes:
1) The cast is top heavy with celebrity stars and this can be distracting outside the confines of a public cinema where the film was meant to be seen. That said, they all play their roles magnificiently. Some are cast against type, others are completely over the top like Nick Nolte and Sean Penn. James Caviezel, while not the exactly a household name in 1998, carries the picture well and personally retains a particular yet recognizable Southern face perfectly suited to his character.
2) The voiced-over thoughts of every major and minor character can be unnerving and leave the viewer without an “anchor”. All I can suggest is, get over it.
3) The film has no concise plot. The film bobs on the waves of war but it does go somewhere. It is more structured like a ‘chick-flick’, that is, as more of a slice of life than a deliberate story. You follow the characters as they make their way through the green hell that is Guadalcanal; some change, some remain untouched.
“The Thin Red Line”’s greatest achivement is on the spiritual/humanistic level and this is attained by more than just the dialogue. The visuals are overwhelming when seen on the silver screen, it will lose something on a television. In many instances the viewer is made to feel as if they are placed at the center of the action, but not in the stylised way that TTRL’s contemporary “Saving Private Ryan” does. It is more the essence of rolling hills of tall grass leaning on the wind, idyllic in the empirical sense yet fraught with hidden menace in the context of the war. The film is deliberately paced, draining every moment of the terror the soldiers experience for the viewer’s sake.
Each one of the soldiers highlighted in the story plumbs the depths of emotion in their own way: the captain’s pride in his men and his heartache at their deaths, a private’s daydream of making love to his wife as he crawls toward an enemy machine gun nest, the colonel sick at heart and torn by his personal ambition and his guilt. The film contains more than enough harrowing action but the horror of war is placed in the context of the soldier’s individual experience. In that sense, no matter how loud the gunfire, artillery, or screams this is a quiet film.
At the heart of this drama is the sense that every man fights his own war and on his own, despite the proximity of his fellows. The griefs they suffer are of the heart and spirit as well as of the flesh and are shared less because of their personal nature and masculinity. They are just as destructive if not more so.
The film’s score is the only one I’ve ever been compelled to purchase on cd. Composer Hans Zimmer weaves a beautiful and poignant aural tapestry of traditional melody with his own dark and majestic themes.
The film is long and winding and will probably take two viewings to feel it’s particular rhythm. Though the dialogue is often savage and angry the film is poetic in it’s over-all effect. No war film I’ve seen deserves the Criterion treatment more than Malick’s does and I expect their transfer to be outstanding.
5 Stars Guadalcanal 1942 -The Thin Red Line
This is one of those movies in your collection that you always knew would pop off the screen on blu ray. The lush greens of the Guadalcanal landscape, the crystal clear, blue waters that surround the island chain. The main battle scenes are on that tall, grassy hill side set against the bright rays of the sun. The contrast of the exploding shells upon the thick greens of the terrain. This is the perfect movie for blu ray! This is one of my favorite Pacific war movies. Its often been one of those movies people either love or hate. A lot of people couldn’t get used to the soldiers thoughts away from the field, which was a momentary escape from the horrors of the battle. And these thoughts are shown, pausing the battle for a moment. There are a handful of these fantasy sequences. Other folks don’t care for the narratives given by the young soldier at the beginning. “What is this war?” etc..Nick Nolte also has some reflections, but it adds to the movie in my opinion. He has eyes upon him, Travolta warns hin earlier. If you give the film a chance it developes into a gritty, brutal war epic. The battle scenes are very well done. The soldiers try several times to attack from the front, but the Japanese have a bunker and machine gun nests on the top of the ridge and rain hell down on the Americans. Some of the soldiers go mad.
The cast is surprisingly chock full of name brand actors. Sean Penn, John Cusack, George Clooney, Nick Nolte, Woody Harrelson, John Travolta etc. But make no mistake Nick Nolte is the star here. The scene of the movie for me is when Lt. Col Tall( Nolte) is on the radio with Capt Staros(Elias Koteas). Nolte wants Staros to commit all men at hand on a frontal assault. Staros refuses ” I will not send my men to their death” . He suggests a flanking move, but Nolte will have none of that talk. The following is great- Nolte without saying a word goes crazy with rage, tries to compose himself and then goes off on Staros. Its well done. Another scene that is not to be forgotten- The Japanese are finally over run and some are captured as prisoners. The utter anger and shame the Japanese feel is captured very well here. The ultimate disgrace to Japan and the emperor is on their minds- they have failed their country. Its the worst thing a Japanese soldier can do- to not die on the battlefield, but get captured.
A small detail thats in this movie that adds a little is the scenes with the natives on the island. These people were very helpful in the real battle as imformants to the Americans. In the real battle, Japanese ace pilot Saburo Sakai shoots down American ace Pug Sutherland. His plane crashes on Guadalcanal and he eventually gets the help of natives, who help him back to his fellow Americans. So to see these people in the film is cool.
The original version is a 5 star film, but blu ray will make this even more spectacular.
5 Stars I know it’s not out yet, the five stars are for the film itself, heck, I’d give it TEN stars
The Thin Red Line released on blu-ray by Criterion is simply the most wonderful news I’ve recieved this week, one of my all-time favorite motion pictures, a true work of visual, poetic, and contemplative art, focusing like only Terrence Malick can on the human condition and our world’s nature, in this film set against war and it’s spirit-devastating consecuences, in a masterpiece that bursts with both overwhelming beauty and the most gripping sadness and despair, aided by John Toll’s exquisite cinematography and what I consider to be Hans Zimmer’s best musical work by far. A film I know I’ll watch again and again, with so much common ground between characters and themes to reflect upon, and so much beauty to absorb.
I wonder if this edition’s length will be the same as the Fox dvd release and theatrical versions or if it will be expanded, like Malick’s own The New World (also a sublime film) was. I’ve read Malick shot more than six hours of footage for TTRL, and I’d love to see at least some of that re-incorporated or as an added extra, more of the astounding performances by Sean Penn, Elias Koteas, and Nick Nolte, more footage of Guadalcanal’s natural landscapes and wildlife (all filmed in Australia).
That said, I can hardly wait, and what I really wish for now is a Criterion blu-ray release for The English Patient. I remember the Criterion laserdisc for that film, another of my most beloved motion pictures. It had wonderful additional content and presentation.
Once again: excellent news, Criterion, and thanks.
Filed under: Blue Ray Movie Reviews