Days of Heaven: Criterion Collection – Blu-ray Review

The Film:

Terrance Malick’s style is considered European in terms of his film’s style, yet his two early films, Badlands and Days of Heaven, feel strictly Midwestern. Malick was born and raised in the heartland somewhere (depending on who you ask, Oklahoma or Texas), and in these two films, he captures a certain purity about life in the heartland. In Badlands, he told the story of Nebraskan spree killers Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate, a film that captures their sociopath along side the small town charm and in Days of Heaven, he esculates this into a fleeting sonnet of the hard-working people caught between the wheat fields and the factories. But Days of Heaven is also very picturesque of middle America, almost a moving regionalism painting.

The film is famously known for two things: one is the gorgeous Oscar winning cinematography, making its HD debut a welcomed one, and the second for Malick’s last film in 20 years until 1998′s The Thin Red Line. Both are certainly of interest. The cinematography literally tells the story, evoking images of something like “Christina’s World” by artist Andrew Wyeth, a painter in the Regionalism movement. The painting features a girl looking up at a huge Victorian house along the skyline at a distance, as she looks from beyond the wheat. The painting is mimicked when Richard Gere’s character solemnly looks at the house Sam Shepard’s character lives in.

All of this is incredibly important since most of the dialogue is sparse. The film is narrated by Gere’s character’s sister, almost as if she is self-aware, yet she dances around the action, with sentences that appear random or non-descriptive. Malick’s love of man’s relationship with nature starts here, as man is at peace within this habitat, yet the characters get tense and agitated when something industrial interrupts them, like biplanes or farm machinery. It’s also of interest in the opening scene when Gere is in the Chicago steel factory prior to him leaving to the pan handle of Texas, is how claustrophobic this sequence is. The character’s find themselves amongst the serenity of nature, as Malick keeps each scene idealistic and in motion.

This all makes Days of Heaven a poetic film, something to find a calmness with the viewer, despite the cryptic nature of the film’s structure and melodrama. Widely divided at the time of its release, the film has found the masterpiece card, yet the film works better as a postcard to a bygone era, an era when the last generation of people who could just pick up and leave for the country, the plains of the heartland, and just “be”. With the pending growth of industry in America at the film’s time frame of 1900′s, it’s also a love letter from the children of the 1970s to the care free spirited ideals of man and nature.

The Blu-ray:

Audio/Video: Criterion offers a great looking HD picture, even if its source material hampers a few scenes. With warm colors of oranges and browns, little grain, high level of details, this HD transfer works better if you have a big HDTV. The DTS track is in 5.1, yet it doesn’t make itself known, outside of some nuanced ambient effects, which was the sound design Malick wanted. When all things are considered, this is a really good release.

All extras are in HD.

Commentary: This track has Art Director Jack Fisk and Editor Billy Weber, with Costume Designer Patricia Norris and Casting Director Dianne Crittenden. No surprise Gere or Malick aren’t here, as this is a very technical track that’s worth popping into from time to time, more so than a full listen.

Interviews: We get two pieces here, one with Richard Gere and one with Sam Shepard. Both are good, if not great, offering better info, in my opinion, about the film and the Malick than the commentary.

John Bailey/Haskel Wexler is another interview, focusing on the cinematography and the controversy when they left and Wexler stepped in. They talk about the work done for the film and Malick, and while technical, offers incredible insights.

Rounding out the extras is Criterion’s always welcomed Essay booklet.

Conclusion: Criterion offers up another great Blu-ray for an interesting film, more for the beauty of the film, than anything else.

The Film: Rating:

The Blu-ray: Rating: