Elvis nails it in “King Creole” – 4K UHD
- Bill Kelley III
- 7 minutes ago
- 5 min read
4K ULTRA HD REVIEW / HDR SCREENSHOTS
Elvis Presley as Danny Fisher, a busboy who quickly becomes an overnight success at the Blue Shade Club in the French Quarter. (2) “King Creole” was mostly filmed in New Orleans, and premiered on July 2, 1958, in Los Angeles.
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“KING CREOLE”
4K Ultra HD & Blu-ray; 1958; PG for violence and sexuality
Best extra: A new commentary from writer/cinephile/film historian Imogen Sara Smith
THE ELECTRIFYING Elvis Presley stars in his fourth film, “King Creole,” based on Harold Robbins’ novel “A Stone for Danny Fisher,” released by Paramount Pictures. Veteran director Michael Curtiz (“Casablanca,” “White Christmas,” “The Adventures of Robin Hood,” “Yankee Doodle Dandy”), with 178 film credits, found himself under extreme pressure to get the cameras rolling. Twenty-two-year-old Presley, had been drafted into the U.S. Army, and due for basic training in only six weeks in March 1958.
The opening sequence was filmed early morning on a freshly washed street in the New Orleans French Quarter with the “Crawfish Lady,” originally scheduled as “Scene 3” in the script. Curtiz felt the scene needed to be bumped up, “since it’s more picturesque and takes us into the beautiful heart of the Quarter,” he wrote on a studio memo.
Elvis was introduced as the open-hearted Danny Fisher, a senior in high school, who lives in a second-floor apartment with a balcony overlooking the French Quarter. His first song is a duet with a crawfish street merchant, played by jazz singer Kitty White. Across the street, “Danny gets a friendly wave from one of the ladies of the night,” Leonard Maltin says during his Filmmaker Focus featurette carried over from 2020. She yells across the street, “Hey songbird, you come here tonight, and I’ll dance with you free.” He responds, “Oh, no you don’t. You gotta pay me.”
Danny is balancing between school in the morning and an evening job at a nightclub. His father, played by veteran character actor Dean Jagger, has been fired four times in the last year, losing his own pharmacy business after Danny’s mother died. Curtiz told the singer from Memphis to “underplay the role” of Danny, the rebellious singer, which he took to heart. Elvis was polite and took direction well, “because he knew he was working with a veteran,” Maltin says. Elvis considers “Creole” his best movie, and “he never seems stressed as a character.”
(1) The Gumbo man. (2&3) Danny has a view of the French Quarter from his second-floor apartment balcony and sings a duet with the crawfish lady, played by jazz singer Kitty White. (4) Danny has a sit-down conversation with his older sister Mimi (Jan Shepard).
VIDEO
The original 35mm camera negative (1.78:1 aspect) and lesser elements were scanned in 4K and wonderfully remastered in 2020, for the Paramount Presents Blu-ray Edition and 4K digital platform release in the spring of 2020. There are no signs that DNR were applied, which at the time was more common. Natural film grain was left intact, adding excellent clarity for the majority of the film. At times, a second-generation or third-generation source was used to fill in the gaps for damaged frames of the negative, and the sharpness does drop.
The longest section with a softer picture runs two minutes at the 20-minute mark when Danny’s father shows up with a quart of ice cream and cake for his high school graduation party. The only problem is that, for the second year in a row, Danny won’t graduate. He tells his sister Mimi (Jan Shepard), “Old Lady Pearson flunked me… If this keeps up much longer, I’ll be a freshman again.”
The new Kino Lorber 4K UHD disc has much better-balanced grayscale from highlights to deep shadows, plus a tighter film grain structure with no marks or scratches. And the clarity, especially in those wide shots, is more striking, while the HDR toning (HDR10 and Dolby Vision) is overall darker and cinematic.
AUDIO
The original mono soundtrack is featured on the 4K and Blu-ray with a new six-channel Dolby TrueHD. There are 11 original songs, including the opener “Crawfish,” and the No. 1 hit “Hard Headed Woman,” recorded on January 15, 1958, and filmed on the Paramount soundstage, but mysteriously cut from the film. It’s rumored that Elvis couldn’t get the lip-sync down. Still, it’s all from the “untamed” Elvis at his peak, Maltin says.
(1) Danny's high school classmates. (2) Dean Jagger stars as Danny Fisher’s unemployed father. (3) Mrs. Pearson tells Danny she’s flunking him again. (4) Walter Matthau as nightclub owner Maxie Fields and Victor Morrow as Shark holding Danny. (5) Danny and his girlfriend Nellie (Dolores Hart) take a riverboat ride.
EXTRAS
Commentary with Imogen Sara Smith – who provides an exuberant track of backstories and insight. A known expert in film noir, she says “Creole” does fall into the genre with its stark black-and-white imagery. “It shows Elvis at his best as an actor, screen presence, and as a performer,” Smith says. “I still don’t think he’s credited enough for his acting. The ‘Elvis Movies’ is a byword for ‘slock,’ but this film shows his career in Hollywood could’ve turned out differently if he had been allowed to do more films like this one.”
She credits the on-location shooting, the top-notch cast, a great soundtrack with some standout songs, and a “script that is much darker and sophisticated” that gives “Creole” its edge.
“Filmmaker Focus with Leonard Maltin” (6 mins.) – originally recorded in 2020, the veteran film historian and critic unpacks several stories in a short amount of time.
Curtiz and producer Hal Wallis deliberately decided to film the majority of the production in New Orleans, in black and white, which sets up a “credible backdrop for the movie,” Maltin says. “The first things you see are vendors calling out, singing out about their wares very early in the morning. You can tell it’s authentic.” Cinematographer Russell Harlan (“To Kill a Mockingbird”), who had been nominated for six Oscars, gives “King Creole” a film noir quality – with deep shadows and plenty of mood, which gives it a more “realistic tone.”
Wallis was the producer who signed Elvis to a long-term movie contract. There are a number of good scenes with an excellent supporting cast that includes Jagger; Carolyn Jones (“The Addams Family” TV series) as Ronnie, the woman who tempts Danny; and Walter Matthau as club owner Maxie Fields, who continually threatens the singer.
After Elvis returned from his U.S. Army service in 1960, his movies were heavily controlled by Wallis and Elvis’ uncle, Colonel Tom Parker, “who pulled all the strings,” Maltin says. In those films, “they played it safe. They never wanted to give him the kind of acting challenges I think he was capable of meeting.”
“King Creole” was a success, and, at the time, New York Times movie critic Howard Thompson wrote, “The lad can act.”
— Bill Kelley III, High-Def Watch producer
(1&2) Charlie LeGrand (Paul Stewart), owner of the King Creole, signs Danny to sing at his club. (3&4) Film noir lighting dominates many scenes, including this one with Ronnie (Carolyn Jones) and the dark alleyway with Sal (Brian Hutton), Shark and Danny.
SPECS:
100 GB disc
TRUE 4K mastering
Captured on 35mm black and white film stock, with Mitchell BNC cameras mounted with spherical lens (1.78:1 aspect ratio).
Video bitrate: Averages in the upper 70 Megabits per second range, with a running time of 116 minutes.
HDR10 maximum light level:1047 nits
Max Frame average light level: 73 nits
Box office: $2.64 million. His three previous films grossed more: “Love Me Tender” (1956) $4.5 million, “Jailhouse Rock” (1957) $3.2 million,
and “Loving You” (1957) $3.7 million.
Rotten Tomatoes: Top Critics’ 96 percent, Audiences 84 percent
Variety Magazine – Elvis Presley’s 10 Best Films – “King Creole” No. 1, “Viva Las Vegas” (1964) No. 2 and “Jailhouse Rock” No. 3.
(1&2) Danny wakes up at the home of Ronnie (Carolyn Jones), after sleeping for two days from being injured in a knife fight.