More deadly, more fun – “The Quick and the Dead: 30th Anniversary Edition” on 4K UHD
- Kay Reynolds & Bill Kelley III
- Oct 21
- 6 min read
4K ULTRA HD REVIEW / HDR SCREENSHOTS
Sharon Stone as Ellen “The Lady,” a vengeance-seeking gunslinger. (2) Right, Gene Hackman as Mayor John Herod, who gets 50 cents for every dollar in the Texas border town. He tries to entice Russell Crowe as Cort, a former gunfighter turned preacher, to take part in the four-day quick-draw shooting contest.
(Click an image to scroll the larger versions)
“THE QUICK AND THE DEAD: 30th ANNIVERSARY”
4K Ultra HD & Blu-ray; 1995; R for violence and a flash of nudity; Digital copy via Amazon Video (4K), Apple TV (4K), Fandango Home (4K), Movies Anywhere (4K), YouTube (4K)
Best extra: The new featurette “The Reckoning: Writing ‘The Quick and the Dead’”
WHEN this mid-1990s Western from director Sam Raimi first surfaced on 4K Ultra HD in 2018, it seemed an offbeat choice from Sony Pictures with thousands of other movies to be considered.
Anniversary editions normally top the criteria in Sony’s catalog release schedule of 4K mastered films. Since the birth of the format in 2016, dozens of 4K anniversary editions have been released from Sony’s rich library of films: “The Bridge on the River Kwai,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “Labyrinth,” “The Fifth Element,” Starship Troopers,” “Groundhog Day,” “The Dark Crystal,” “The Karate Kid,” “The Natural,” “Moon,” “Glory,” “1776: Director’s Cut,” “Lawrence of Arabia,” “Men in Black,” “Cliffhanger,” “The Way We Were,” “Silverado,” “St. Elmo’s Fire,” “Mony Python and the Holy Grail,” “Rudy,” “Sense and Sensibility” “Run Lola Run,” “The Mask of Zorro,” “Steel Magnolias,” “The Remains of the Day,” “Adaptation,” “My Best Friend’s Wedding,” and upcoming in December, Penny Marshall’s Best Picture Academy Award-nominated “Awakenings.”
But, earlier this month, Sony released the updated 30th Anniversary Edition of “The Quick and the Dead” housed in a stylish steelbook, adding Dolby Vision grading and packing everything, including the limited extras, on the much larger 100 GB 4K disc.
(1) Director Sam Raimi and Italian cinematographer Dante Spinotti framed many shots like a Sergio Leone Spaghetti Western. (2) A handful of composite effects have less resolution than the rest of the film. The Lady rides past a cemetery toward the Texas border town. (3) Stone rides into lawless Redemption, with a six-gun in her holster, a cigarette in her mouth, and squinting eyes. (4) The indigenous people of Redemption.
Raimi’s fun fantasy Western starred Sharon Stone, also co-producer of the production, as “The Lady,” a vengeance-seeking gunslinger, and Gene Hackman chewing scenery by the bucket as John Herod, former outlaw, now ruthless mayor of Redemption, a mean little Texas border town. Throw in 20-year-old Leonardo DiCaprio as The Kid, Herod’s young bastard son, and Russell Crowe in his American film debut as Cort, one of Herod’s old gang, who has reformed and become a preacher, and you’ve got a cast that keeps your attention.
Lance Henriksen, Pat Hingle, Gary Sinise, Woody Strode, and other terrific character actors keep this rodeo going with violence, gunplay, hangings, ambushes, and more.
The script was written by British screenwriter Simon Moore (“Traffik” miniseries) as a tribute to Sergio Leone’s Spaghetti Westerns, although he had never seen the American West until he was on the Arizona movie set in late 1993 and early ‘94. An uncredited Joss Whedon (“The Avengers,” “Serenity”) boosts “The Quick and the Dead” to grand cuisine.
Herod holds a gun-fighting contest, inviting every gunslinger from sideshow sharpshooter to mangy outlaw. Everyone must play to the death, and no competitor can refuse a challenge. The Kid wants to impress his Dad; Herod wants to force The Reverend Cort back in the game; and The Lady wants revenge for one of Herod’s foul deeds. Western fans will spot the stock characters and clichés presented with tongue firmly in cheek.
Over the years, “The Quick and the Dead” has become a cult favorite, pushing past its initial lukewarm reviews and tepid box office returns that placed it No. 93 in its 1995 worldwide box office with only $18.5 million.
(1) Leonardo DiCaprio as The Kid, tries to pick up “The Lady.” (2) Lance Henriksen as braggart Ace Hanlon. (3&4) Herod plays a deadly hanging game with his former henchman.
EXTRAS
“The Reckoning: Writing ‘The Quick and the Dead’” (19 mins) was a surprise, especially when Sony didn’t publicize its addition in its press release promoting the 30th anniversary edition. Screenwriter Simon Moore says the Western genre had always appealed to him, and he started writing on spec for “The Quick and the Dead” in his London flat. He said it was a nightmare trying to write the film, as he tried to misdirect the audience to a predetermined outcome. He first set up the project to be a low-budget film that he would also direct in Mexico. But it quickly became a juggernaut, with Stone getting between six and seven million, and Hackman coming on board for a couple of million, and it would be filmed in Arizona. It was an “alignment of the planet,” a window of three months to get the actors and the financing. In most cases, projects are in development for years, he says.
Deleted scenes (5 mins.) Seven are provided, and the most interesting is a short clip of the wedding between “The Kid” and his girlfriend.
Theatrical trailer (2:18 mins) is in the open matte format in HD.
(1&2) A gang of boys are ready for the deadly quick-draw contest, which will start when the town clock strikes high noon. (3&4) The Kid defeats the Swedish quick-draw champion. (5&6) Herod’s men capture The Preacher and force him to enter the contest with an old gun and one bullet per draw.
VIDEO
The excellent seven-plus-year-old 4K master was recycled for this anniversary edition, but with the added Dolby Vision grading and nearly identical HDR10 peak brightness. Still, its biggest upgrade is the expanded video bitrate running from 25 Megabits per second to over 30 Mbps more, since the older disc was encoded onto the smaller 66 GB disc. This gives the natural film grain more definition and clarity to the numerous wide shots from Italian cinematographer Dante Spinotti (“L.A. Confidential,” “The Last of the Mohicans”). You’ll especially notice the added clarity compared to the old enclosed Blu-ray, with the exterior shot of Herod’s house showing the finest detail of each piece of siding and wood-shingled roof.
Spinotti and Raimi filmed the Western in an open matte 35mm 4 perf, but it was matted theatrically (1.85:1 aspect ratio), the same for this 4K presentation. Plus, the frantic pace and crazy angle shots call for frantic editing.
HDR toning is bathed in a warm palette, the blacks are deep and the colors richer, giving all those blue eyes – Stone, Crowe, DiCaprio – real pop, while facial color palettes look natural throughout various ethnicities.
AUDIO
The previous Dolby Atmos soundtrack has been ported over, with its expanded effects pushed to height speakers, giving the sound design an active experience from ambient effects to gun blasts moving from front to back. The bass response is also deeper as composer Alan Silvestri’s (“Back to the Future," “Forrest Gump”) score provides a variety of moods and textures, with shadows of Ennio Morricone’s western musical phrases.
Before filmgoers came to know Raimi as the genius behind the Tobey Maguire “Spider-Man” films, fans knew him as the filmmaker behind “The Evil Dead,” “Army of Darkness,” and TV’s “Xena: Warrior Princess.”
Still, this is Stone’s show, and she puts on quite a performance – ramrod tough and desperately vulnerable. She was nominated for an Oscar in Martin Scorsese’s “Casino” nine months after her performance here as “The Lady.”
― Kay Reynolds and Bill Kelley III, High-Def Watch producer
SPECS:
100 GB disc
TRUE 4K mastering
35mm film stock captured with a spherical lens, in the 4-perf open matte format, and matted to a 1.85:1 aspect ratio.
Video bitrate: Varies from the upper 50 Megabits per second to over 100 Mbps. A running time of 108 minutes.
HDR10 maximum light level: 3235 nits
Max frame average light level: 392 nits
Box office: $18 million domestically, with a production budget of $32 million. Finished as the No. 93 box office film of the year. “Toy Story” was No. 1 at $375 million box office.
Rotten Tomatoes: Top critics’ 38 percent, Moviegoers 54 percent
Metacritic: Critics 49 percent, User score 6.9
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