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By
NICK ZEGARAC
Penned by Carl Foreman,
director J. Lee Thompson's The Guns of Navarone
(1961) is an exhilarating WWII espionage thriller.
The film stars quintessential man of integrity,
Gregory Peck as Captain Keith Mallory, a staunch
and determined military strategist, commando and
mountain climber who is assigned the near
impossible task of taking a crack team to the
remote German stronghold on Kiros and blowing up
their impregnable fortress. That team includes
embittered explosives expert, Cpl. Miller (David
Niven), Col. Andrea Stavros (Anthony Quinn), Maj.
Roy Franklin (Anthony Quayle) and rookie solider,
Pvt. Spyros Pappadimo (James Darren). The plan,
arguably, is fool proof.
However, fate is not on the expedition's side.
After their modest fishing vessel is wrecked
during a violent storm, the troop is besieged by
one enemy assault after another. Franklin is
wounded, but Mallory refuses to give in, give up
or leave his superior officer behind. Instead, and
together with resistance fighters Maria Pappadimos
(Irene Papas) and Anna (Gia Scala), the surviving
cast members wage a not-so-private war mired in
treachery, deceptions and intrigue -- but is one
of their own a traitor?
For years, The Guns of Navarone was shown on
television with its opening sequence misprinted.
Immediately following the credits, a plane is seen
landing on a runway (shot day for night). During
the theatrical engagement, the plane lands at
night. On television, it lands in broad daylight.
In the mid-1990s, Columbia contacted UCLA
restoration expert, Robert Gitt to aid in the
preservation of the film for future generations.
The restoration then was accomplished without the
added benefit of a digital frame-by-frame clean
up. In 1999, Columbia released The Guns of
Navarone to DVD in a less than stellar
incarnation, with bumped up contrast levels, faded
flesh tones, weak colors, shimmering of fine
details and considerable grain imported into the
transfer. Now, Sony Home Video re-releases The
Guns of Navarone in a deluxe 2-disc offering that
marginally improves all of the aforementioned
shortcomings -- though the image remains far from
exemplary.
The pluses: a more refined palette of colors with
less fading. Flesh tones -- if not natural --
then, are less unnatural than they were on the
first outing. Various sequences that had an
unhealthy bleached look with a slightly faded
yellowish tint, now have a more refined and subtle
texture. Age-related artifacts are less obvious,
but nonetheless present. Owing to the fact that no
original camera negative exists, several sequences
continue to appear slightly 'thick' -- clumpy
colors, overly low contrast and a considerable
amount of grain. The audio is a 5.1 Dolby Digital
remix from the original six track magnetic stereo
stems that is aggressive in spots, but very dated
throughout and occasionally, quite strident.
Dialogue is not natural sounding. Effects crackle
during high end frequencies.
A litany of extras make this disc set worthy of a
repurchase. In addition to the four featurettes
that were a part of the original release, we also
get two new and quite comprehensive documentaries
on the film and its historical context, as well as
two additional featurettes and a brand new audio
commentary. Recommended. |
