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Label:
Name: TWILIGHT TIME
Number: TWILIGHT242-BR

THE CHASE (1966) (BLU-RAY)
Starring:  Angie Dickenson, E.G. Marshall, James Fox, Jane Fonda, Janice Rule, Marlon Brando, Robert Redford
Directed By:  Arthur Penn
Composed By:  John Barry

“Fascinating soap opera of hatred and lawlessness…a tense and violent thriller. Marlon Brando heads a terrific cast…The Panavision cinematography is dazzling and John Barry’s nervous western score combines with it to give The Chase a look and feel of its own.”
– Glenn Erickson, DVDtalk.com

“It does manage to weave a credible pattern out of the tangled loyalties and enmities, which Penn’s direction takes by the scruff and shakes into a firework display of controlled violence. Terrific performances, too.”
– Tom Milne, Time Out Film Guide

The Chase (1966) is all-star in every department, with Arthur Penn (Bonnie and Clyde) directing from a Lillian Hellman adaptation of a Horton Foote play, and a cast including the sterling likes of Marlon Brando, Jane Fonda, Robert Redford, E.G. Marshall, Angie Dickinson, Janice Rule, Robert Duvall, and James Fox. The film focuses on a small, corrupt Texas town where a prison break exposes local secrets, lies, and violence. Also featuring an astonishing John Barry score, available on this Twilight Time release as an isolated track.

LANGUAGE: English
VIDEO: 1080p High Definition / 2.35:1
AUDIO: English 1.0 DTS-HD MA
SUBTITLES: English SDH
1966 / Color
134 MINUTES
NOT RATED

Special Features: Isolated Score Track / Audio Commentary with Film Historians Lem Dobbs, Julie Kirgo, and Nick Redman / Original Theatrical Trailer

Limited Edition of 3,000 Units

  
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Reviews and Comments: (3)
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Posted by Mark Turner on November 22, 2016 3:30 AM
ALL STAR CAST, OVER DONE MELODRAMA

Imagine if you had the following line up in a film: Marlon Brando, Robert Redford, Jane Fonda, E.G. Marshall, Angie Dickinson and Robert Duvall. This film did indeed have that cast. In addition to that the film was written by Lillian Helmond based on the book and play by Horton Foote and directed by Arthur Penn who would direct BONNIE AND CLYDE the following year. With all that talent combined why isn’t this film more well-known or discussed?

A lot of that could be due to the story itself. The base of the story does seem interesting but the way it’s handled here, major talent involved in its writing or not, it plays more like a soap opera than an action film which was how it was marketed. A great trailer can make a movie but if you don’t deliver what you promise an audience will remember.

The story revolves around a small Texas town that is run by and basically owned by the Rogers family. Convict Charlie “Bubber” Reeves (Redford) has escaped with another con and is heading for Mexico. His partner kills a man, steals his car and leaves Bubber to fend for himself.

Back in town Val Rogers (Marshall) is about to celebrate his 60th birthday. The employees at the bank toast him while the wife of milquetoast and bank VP Edwin Stewart (Duvall) watches as his flirtatious wife Emily (Janice Rule) confronts Val about why she and her husband are never invited to his parties. Emily is the catalyst for much that happens in the film, a woman intent of stirring the pot, having an affair with Edwin’s married co-worker Damon (Richard Bradford) and spending as much time with a bottle as a person can without passing out.

Val’s son has his own situation to deal with. Unhappily married for the sake of his father, Jake (James Fox) has been having an affair with Anna (Fonda), the wife of Bubber. The entire town, with the exception of his father, is well aware of the affair but no one speaks up.

In the middle of all of this is the local Sheriff Calder (Brando). Living in his office above the jail with his wife Ruby (Dickinson) Calder is intent on doing his job. The job was given to him by Val and for that reason many who are considered a class beneath Val look unfavorably on Calder, seeing him as a hired hand rather than a lawman. What they don’t realize is that Calder is indeed a man of integrity, a man whose soul will be eaten by both classes before the end of the film.

More time is spent with the whole set up of the town, a dissection of the characters who make up this city and its various classes. There is the upper crust, donating millions to the building of a college Val has high hopes for. There is the middle class, the hard partying drinking revelers on a Saturday night who resent the Rogers family while working for them none the less. There are the blacks in the town who, being in the mid-sixties still, now have rights but rarely have anyone to defend those rights for them. And finally there are the teens, bound and determined to follow in the footsteps of their parents, hard partying and drinking all the way.

The ins and outs of these groups, who is sleeping with whom, develop more tension than the chase for Bubber. In thinking back we get a better glimpse of these people, their lives and their interactions than we do Bubber. Eventually Bubber is given a chance to speak about the injustices of this town and the people in it, but that’s more of a speech than character development.

As various members of the town get drunker as the night goes on, as their resentments begin to surface thanks to the alcohol, tension builds and confrontations begin. Calder is assaulted by a group of Rogers’s employees, not because they want to help their boss but because they resent him. Beaten and bloody he still attempts to find and save Bubber before this group can get their hands on him.

In watching the movie it was entertaining enough but felt too long to reach the end. Brando gives a decent performance, Redford does what he can with the part, Fonda isn’t on screen nearly as much as you would expect and no one really stands out. Reading about the film later I discovered that the story had failed as a book and play and the movie didn’t fare much better when it was released. Producer Sam Spiegel wanted a message movie, director Penn wanted a more straight forward approach and in the end Spiegel took over and cut the film the way he wanted. Penn eventually disowned the film. Hellman, who was friends with Penn, blamed him for the way it turned out and the two parted on bad terms.

Fans of the actors involved or of Penn will want to check the film out just to see how they do here. If you like movies like PEYTON PLACE then you’ll find plenty to enjoy. But for most it will not be a fan favorite. The movie is being released by Twilight Time so the usual applies here, limited number of copies and few extras but a glorious looking print involved.

Posted by JOHN SEIT on June 5, 2017 6:44 AM

Posted by JOHN SEIT on June 5, 2017 6:59 AM
I appreciate the posting of the correspondent who has given us a good study of the Plot of the movie "THE CHASE" here in ScreenArchives.Com. My comments relate to my "own experiences" of becoming a Film Buff from as young as six years of age from way back in 1952, and then later,I will jump to "THE CHASE" which was released back in 1966 (for purposes to this review of sorts).

Back in 1952 I was only Six years of age and can remember being taken to the Cinema by my parents to see a rather Adult Drama for a Six Year old, a film that has stayed in my memory - all these years later - from 1952 to this very day in 2017! The Names of Movie titles meant nothing to my Parents way back then, so it was useless to ask them for their help in locating the name of that one Film. So for Decades, I had no way of knowing the Name of that Feature Film that had so impressed me at the age of Six. That is, until the Author "Leonard Maltin" began in earnest publishing his on-going series of "MOVIE GUIDE" (Paperback Books) each year. And when Leonard Maltin began adding the "INDEX OF STARS" to the back of his "MOVIE GUIDE ANNUALS" I eventually learned of the title of that Filmed-Drama that I saw way back then in 1952, it was a film starring Ronald Reagan, Ginger Rogers, Steve Cochran and Doris Day involving the Ku-Klux Klan, a fabulous Drama that so impressed me at the tender and impressionable age of Six: The Film was called "STORM WARNING" ( in Leonard Maltin's Annual he gives it **1/2 Stars which is the same number of Stars he gives to "THE CHASE" Starring Marlon Brando. { By the way "STORM WARNING" -for me- is an excellent ADULT DRAMA which I can recommend to you dear reader (whoever you are) and hopefully Warner Bothers will keep it available to us in their Catalog for many many years to come - it is Well worth adding it to your Collection from the Warner Archive Collection }.

______________________________________________________

I now jump to the year 1966, and in April of that year I gained the position in employment as an "Assistant Projectionist" in a Main City Cinema... a business that I worked in until around the year 2000. As you can perhaps tell, I "LOVED" working in the Motion Picture Industry. Back then in 1966, as a Projectionist, we still had Carbon Arc Lamp Illumination, and I got to screen the last few Feature Films which were still being released on TECHNICOLOR Film Stock, you simply cannot beat the Combination of a CARBON-ARC LAMP-HOUSE in conjunction with a TECHNICOLOR RELEASE PRINT as there is so much more life on Screen and IMPACT to the SCREEN IMAGE, the Colors are more Truthful to LIFE. Then in the late 1960's the TECHNICOLOR PROCESS was dropped by the Motion Picture Industry ( when the accountants in the film companies were given their heads ) in order to CUT Costs to the bare minimum from the Production side of the business and they then switched to the "inferior" EASTMAN COLOR Process, which used "Poor-quality color dyes" that faded relatively quickly, and which is the "main reason" when efforts are being made to source GOOD-QUALITY FILM PRINTS for release onto DVD or BLU-RAY, EASTMANCOLOR was a major "Downgrade". Then following these "down-grades in presentation" to the the Cinema-going public in the Exhibition process, the Exhibitors were given Financial Incentives to STOP using CARBON-ARC Illumination in Favor of the comparative "Inferior": XENON-BULB ILLUMINATION which was cheaper to use, and which changed the Color-Temperature of the illumination/Light Source for Film, of close to normal DAYLIGHT Color Temperature when using CARBON-ARC Illumination, to the duller and LIFELESS color temperature when using XENON-Bulb Illumination.

____________________________________________

Where does all this fit in with the release of: "THE CHASE" you are possibly asking yourself about now? Well dear Reader, we have Sam Spiegel the Producer of "THE CHASE" as was mentioned in the earlier Review, to thank for producing "THE CHASE" on TECHNICOLOR FILM STOCK. By now you will have figured out my age which is 71 years+ plus. I would like to know the ages of ALL so-called "Social-Media-Posters" each time I read a posting on the internet, as I believe that an individuals "Life-Experiences" have shaded their perceptions & views of each Motion Picture they are reviewing, along with ANOTHER FACTOR not usually listed in the comments pages about Films being Reviewed, and that is DID THE REVIEWER SEE THE FILM ON IT'S ORIGINAL CINEMA RELEASE DATE? Or is it, as I suspect, that each NEGATIVE REVIEW being posted, is by someone who is seeing the film Many Years later from it's initial release for the "VERY-FIRST TIME" with a 2017 perspective, which is what I suspect, and is not being Reviewed in the ERA that audiences would have existed as in the Example of when "THE CHASE" was originally Released in 1966, where audiences were being given a greater context of events in their Own Neighborhoods, their own Towns/Cities/States and Countries. As I am sure the original source materials are written with a Bigger Picture in mind, to get us to think in a broader context, as to where we each can relate to the Story unfolding on the screen. But my experience of reading many random Social Media postings ( all over the Internet ), certainly the NEGATIVE REVIEWS that I have seen posted reveal that these are NOT genuinely "Social-
Media-Postings" but "ANTI-SOCIAL-POSTINGS" ... and are from "ANTI-SOCIAL PEOPLE" who just like posting Negative Comments.

In the Film "BAMBI" What did THUMPER'S Mother ask Thumper? ...Answer: "Thumper, What Did Your Father Say ?"....Thumper's Reply Was:... "If You Can't Say Nothing Nice, Then Don't Say Nothing At All" { which is possibly my ALL TIME FAVORITE MOVIE QUOTATION }.

I have a Great Fondness for the Film "THE CHASE", Starring Marlon Brando ( with His own Sister in a minor support role ), Robert Redford ( in His third Feature Film, his first two being "SITUATION HOPELESS... BUT NOT SERIOUS", and "INSIDE DAISY CLOVER"). Then follows Jane Fonda; Angie Dickinson; Miriam Hopkins; JANICE RULE ( A Favorite Actress of Mine from this Film ); Martha Hyer; Richard Bradford ( from Television's "Man In A Suitcase" from the United Kingdom ); Robert Duvall; James Fox; Henry Hull; Paul Williams; Bruce Cabot and Eduardo Cianelli = These Two actors are from the 1930's and 1940's; along with many other supporting parts. The film comes with a Terrific Score by "John Barry", which for me was my First introduction to this Composer.

Even though the film is heavy going, and initially the story may seem to be slow going at first (I assure you that the pace of life back in 1966 was more languid and slower paced back then, when compared to today) then as the plot in the film develops, it picks up pace, and as tempers flare, and emotions become raw, at least at the end of the film you can come out of the theater {or your case your lounge-room} "alive and in one-piece" [ No Spoilers in my comments here ], and hopefully by the end of the film you will not have found yourself relating to being any of the "Un-Desireable and Evil Characters" that are portrayed in the drama that you have just witnessed on-screen.

I hope dear reader you have enjoyed spending these few minutes with me, regarding a Favorite Film of mine, and hopefully you will enjoy the Two Hours Spent watching "THE CHASE" from 1966...Filmed in TECHNICOLOR and CINEMASCOPE, which I hope you will add to your favorite collection..Kind Regards from Yours Truly...John...

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