The Fugitive (Remastered)

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Thriller	Theatrical Trailer(s)	None
Rating		Other Trailer(s)	None
Year Released	1993	Commentary Tracks	None
Running Time	124:55 minutes	Other Extras	Cast & Crew Biographies
RSDL/Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Movie
Region	4	Director	Andrew Davis
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	Harrison Ford Tommy Lee Jones Sela Ward Joe Pantoliano Andreas Katsulas Jeroen Krabbe
Case	Snapper
RRP	$29.95	Music	James Newton Howard

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	MPEG	None
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Dolby Digital	5.1
16x9 Enhancement		Soundtrack Languages	English (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384 Kb/s)
Theatrical Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Macrovision	?	Smoking	Yes
Subtitles	English  Arabic  English for the Hearing Impaired	Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	Yes

    As Gerard chases Kimble back to Chicago, Kimble begins a race against time to piece together the reasons why his wife was killed. Suffice it to say that it has to do with the inherent corruption of the pharmaceutical industry and the lengths to which a doctor will go in order to get a drug which he stands to make millions from approved. This is an entirely believable scenario, as the amount of money it costs to buy medicines of the life-preserving variety is staggering to the point where it borders on highway robbery. In any case, the whole plot revolves around the approval of a pharmaceutical product, and it slots together nicely as a tale of murder and corruption with all the usual excitement thrown in for good measure. Unless you've been living under a rock for the past few months, I cannot imagine that you wouldn't know how the rest of the plot in this film goes, but I won't reveal anything more about it in case you have. Even if you have never seen an episode of the original television series (which I haven't), this film is well worth watching for the visual impact and the riveting performances of Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones. The photography by Michael Chapman, particularly in Chapter 16, the scene in which Gerard confronts Kimble in the dam, is particularly noteworthy for assisting the impact of the film.

Technical Note

Video

    Colour saturation was a strange beast during the original theatrical exhibition of this film, and this DVD presentation is no different. In the earlier parts of the film, the colours had a tendency to be quite undersaturated, giving everything a dull and lifeless look which certainly helped the viewer to identify with Kimble. In the middle of the film, which contains a lot of sequences in the snow, the colour saturation also had a tendency to be toned down, presumably to compensate for the way in which the skin of the actors would have reacted to the change in climate. During the Saint Patrick's Day chase, the colours were somewhat oversaturated, particularly in the green element. It is also noteworthy that this sequence received the highest bitrate from the transfer, presumably to allow for the opportunities for aliasing that occur at this point. It is also worth noting that this sequence contained the MPEG glitch that caused Warner Brothers to go back and remaster the disc.

    Shadow detail was remarkable, although not particularly so. Suffice it to say that I have seen films of far more recent vintage than this with far worse shadow detail. No low-level noise made its way into the transfer, although this is not particularly remarkable because no other format exhibited this problem. There was a couple of instances of very minor aliasing that are barely noticeable on an eighty centimeter screen unless you zoom in on them. Sadly, there were two occasions where telecine wobble picked up the slack, both of them late in the film. The first instance was quite noticeable, but the second instance was more subtle and difficult to notice. Telecine wobble is also slightly apparent during the opening credits, but this settles down before the film begins. No MPEG artefacts were seen during the transfer, and the severe MPEG glitch that was present in the original transfer has been fixed with this transfer. There were one or two film artefacts, but they were small and hard to notice.

Audio

    The score music used in this film was composed by James Newton Howard, whose other credits include The Devil's Advocate, and in this case there are no badly-chosen contemporary songs to get in his way. I am not normally a fan of Howard's work, but this is where I can make a notable exception. Although the music is fairly driving and enhancing to the film's overall excitement, it only has a vague connection to the characters of the film, concentrating instead on the events of the film, an approach that often hinders film scores. In spite of this, the music creates the appropriate manic and hysterical pace for the film, and succeeds where other film scores of this variety fall flat by eliciting some sympathy for the characters from the viewer. It is nothing particularly unique, but it does what all other scores of this kind do, and it does it well enough to make itself distinctive in spite of the style's limitations. This is one of the few films beside Star Wars where I could sit down and happily listen to the score music on a CD.

    The surround presence was truly excellent, creating an immersive field in which the viewer could feel part of the action on the screen. The directional effects in the rears were the best part of the audio experience, but the use of the centre speaker to support the dialogue, which also received strong support from the left and right channels, was remarkable. The high-frequency instruments in the score music were also well-placed in the centre speaker, without becoming weak and shrill as a result. The subwoofer was very well integrated into the overall soundtrack, adding the appropriate punch to the action sequences without becoming overly dominative at the wrong moments.

Menu

Cast & Crew Biographies

• A Full-Frame version of the movie

    The video quality is good, but it falls short of reference quality because of a few noticeable problems.

    The audio quality is brilliant, and just as immersive as the original theatrical experience of the film.

    Given how heavily publicized this film was when it first came out, the extras are just pathetic.

    I have to say it once more: ditch the snapper cases. There are good scientific reasons why the snapper case should be phased out: cardboard has a notoriously high acid content, and a professional framer who takes pride in his work will never use it for backings. When The Fugitive arrived by mail from Warner Home Video, it was shrink-wrapped and looking as if the cardboard case had been left to rot for at least several years. All sorts of dents and nicks were apparent on this case that, for all the indication to the contrary, had just come off the production line. Replacing a snapper case is all but impossible, and I am sure that Warner Brothers don't want to go to the trouble of manufacturing replacements. The cost of producing a slick for each film cannot possibly be as much as the cost of producing an entire cardboard and plastic case for each film. Enough is enough, Warner Brothers.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall