DVD DETAILS:
Vision
The visual transfer here is in fullscreen only, unlike the other MGM transfers of the series of films by Bronson / Thompson which are in anamorphic widescreen. Naturally, fullscreen affects the compositional sense and detracts from the use of symmetrical compositions and compartmentalized mise-en-scene work. The film retains a grim and glossy quality with a kind of downbeat urbanity. The opening dream sequence is effective and features a telling use of wide angle lenses as well as the telling suggestion that Bronson has become obsessed with his status as a dealer in death. The note of self-reflexivity introduced here is not followed through in the body of the film however. Youth culture and the pinball arcade are nicely used at the start, echoed in the effective and violently devastating final roller-rink shootout. The adult drug presence is a neat contamination in this world, the film contrasting victims with the world of the predatory drug dealers who exploit and target them. There is a concern for the intricacies of drug distribution and its manufacture on a large-scale, delighting in Bronson’s destruction of such places. Good use is made of teenage bodies in a morgue to suggest the world of young innocents being decimated by ruthless, perverse adults (later also echoed in the film Kinjite: Forbidden Subjects). Action scenes are capably handled but the overall effect here is one of routine technical functionary indifference.
Sound
The sound transfer is available in Dolby digital mono only and is undifferentiated and flat. The score at times seems to try to recall the warped psychedelia of Jimmy Page’s work on Death Wish 2 but is merely functional. In the opening scene, good use is made of a car engine that won’t start in the stillness of an undercover carpark, giving way to the screams of an assaulted woman and Bronson’s calm pronouncement that he is “death.” The script is routinely straight-forward about the issues underlying the rage and frustration felt by adults who see their children being decimated by an out of control social-legal problem. This appeal to paternal justice underlies many of the Bronson / Thompson films’ conception of Patriarchal authority. The occasional piece of script banter between minor characters reminds the viewer of the superior scripting in the previous team’s effort in Murphy’s Law. There is a minor sense of place in the ambience to select scenes, notably the fish processing factory that doubles as a drug laboratory and processing plant and much is made of the way the sounds of violence – gunfire, explosions, etc – disrupt otherwise natural locales. The score is heavy at times but remains a dated and cheap synth sounding work, made to seem dull in this transfer when it is mixed with louder sounds or gives way to voices. The climactic sequences feature a capable juxtaposition of explosions with roller-rink activity. read more
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