a.k.a. Quel Maledetto Treno Blindato
film rating:
disc rating:
company: Films Concorde
year: 1978
runtime: 99′
director: Enzo G. Castellari
cast: Bo Svenson, Fred Williamson,
Peter Hooten, Michael Pergolani
disc company: Severin Films
release date: July 28, 2009
retail price: $34.95
disc info: Region Free / Dual Layer BD50
video: 1080p / color / 1.83:1
subtitles: English [incidental dialogue only]
audio: English [Dolby Digital 5.1 and 2.0]
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reviewed from a screener provided
by Severin Films LLC

A motley band of five Allied soldiers on their way to court martials and executions for a variety of offenses (from killing fellow officers to desertion to using military property to conduct a long distance relationship) are loosed into Nazi-occupied France circa 1944 after their convoy is ambushed.  With certain death facing them from either side the group decides to head for neutral Switzerland until the war is over.  But they get into things way over their heads when they accidentally kill a bunch of Allies on a top-secret mission to confiscate the experimental guidance system for a new V2 rocket…

I wasn’t overly infatuated with this Enzo G. Castellari (High Crime, The Last Shark) actioner when I first saw it [courtesy of Severin Films' 3 disc DVD release from last year], but I have to admit that it has grown on me since.  As far as pulp escapisms about cadres of no-good punks leaving their bullet-riddled marks on fascist occupational forces go, it actually works quite well.

Castellari is fine at emulating the style of earlier American World War II fantasies (notably Where Eagles Dare and The Dirty Dozen) and, with a bigger-than-average budget at his disposal, manages some genuinely entertaining action sequences.  The lengthy conclusion, in which a German train is hijacked and sent careening uncontrolled into a station with (very) explosive results, is excellent, with some obvious miniature work being its only real weakness. Castellari was something of a master of the under-funded action scene – those paying any kind of attention will likely notice the some of the setups being repeated any number of times from slightly different angles.  A bombing run by the Allies early on is even spiced up with a few quick snatches from the finale.

What startled me upon my latest viewing was just how well drawn the majority of the main characters are.  Somewhere along the scripting process at least one out of the five credited writers felt it pertinent that the audience care about The Inglorious Bastards‘ quintet of thugs with hearts of gold.  It’s a testament to Castellari and his writers that, once our heroes start dying off in flurries of Pekinpah-style slow-motion violence, we do just that.  Fred Williamson has what is probably the most satisfying role as the cigar-chomping Private Canfield, whose violent outbursts are motivated by the racism he constantly encounters in his personal life.  No one can blame him for wanting to personally machine gun hundreds of Nazi officers and fighting men into a bloody pulp.

The story is ludicrous of course, and The Inglorious Bastards never elevates itself to a level much higher than pulp nonsense – but that’s okay.  Castellari stretches every dollar to make it as entertaining a show as he can, and his stable of above-par acting talent (spearheaded by Williamson and Bo Svenson) is more than capable of carrying it the rest of the way.  Bastards… may not be the best film ever to grace the silver screen, but if it’s audacious, explosive World War II action you’re looking for then you could do far worse.

Severin Films released The Inglorious Bastards earlier on both single and triple disc DVD form, in a transfer rife with manipulation issues.  This new Blu-ray, arriving just a day shy of one year after the original DVDs, bests them in pretty much every way.

DVD (left) Blu-Ray (right)

The first major improvement is in the 1080p high definition transfer, which puts the boosted and edge enhanced DVD image to shame.  Framed at the original theatrical aspect ratio of 1.83:1, the new transfer offers up excellent color and contrast levels and even a bit of additional picture information at the left, right, and bottom of the frame.  Damage is almost non-existent on this near 30-plus year old picture, which speaks well for the hard work Severin has put into restoring it.  Due to the lack of digital manipulation the Blu-ray image can, at first, appear less detailed than its SD counterpart, but the detail is much smoother and more nuanced here, with a delicious layer of film grain backing it throughout.  The HD image certainly presents a truer portrait of the film as it would have appeared upon release.  Audio gets a bit of a bump, presented here in both Dolby Digital 5.1 and 2.0 English (the DVD version offers just the 2.0 track) – no uncompressed options are available, unfortunately.  The 2.0 track sounds quite strong for what it is, preserving the original recording just fine.  The 5.1 track is, oddly, mixed at a lower volume, but improves upon the 2.0 in the expected areas of separation and clarity.  Subtitles are available in English, but only for the brief stretches of the film where German or French are spoken.

The supplemental package is even stronger here than on the loaded 3-disc Explosive Edition DVD release, with the added benefit of being available on a single dual layered 50 GB disc.  Only one thing appears to be missing, the separate CD featuring a few tracks of the original score (disc 3 of the DVD set).  All of the other extras from the earlier Explosive Edition are duplicated – A Conversation with Enzo Castellari and Quentin Tarantino (38 minutes), the documentary Train Kept A Rollin’ (74 minutes), and the Castellari-guided tour of film locations Back to the War Zone (13 minutes) – but are all now available in HD!  The excellent feature-length commentary by director Castellari and Severin’s David Gregory is also ported over.  Exclusive to the Blu-ray are Inglorious Bastards at the New Beverly (11 minutes) and Enzo’s 70th Birthday Celebration (7 minutes), both in SD and both very fun.  The single battered and bruised English trailer from the previous edition has been upgraded to beautiful restored trailers in both English and Italian, both in HD.  An HD English trailer for Castellari’s earlier war film Eagles Over London rounds out the package.

In terms of baser aesthetics this Blu-ray is a real winner, with the crude (and, frankly, ugly) artwork and menu designs of the previous releases thankfully replaced.  This is by far one of the best looking, best sounding, and best presented of Severin Film’s many releases to date, and well worth an upgrade for fans of the film.  Highly recommended!