Figures in a Landscape (Joseph Losey)

[pro-bassoonist]

Figures in a Landscape Blu-ray REVIEW



Great addition to Kino's catalog



Pro-B

[The Great Owl]

I just finished watching my Kino Lorber Blu-ray of Figures in a Landscape.

What a great movie!

Robert Shaw (Jaws) and Malcolm McDowell (A Clockwork Orange) play two escaped prisoners who are being pursued over mountain terrain by a mysterious black helicopter. This gloriously ambiguous movie never reveals from where these two men escaped, it never reveals where they are, it never reveals who is chasing them, and it never reveals why they are being chased. A few character aspects of these men come to light during their moments of dialogue, but the movie features a great many dialogue-free scenes with the two of them simply running across fields, stealing food from a village, climbing mountains, and scrambling for cover whenever the black helicopter swoops down like a bird of prey or whenever soldiers appear in search of them. The unexplained aspects of the storyline work in its favor, and the end result is sort of like a combination of all of the great escaped-convict-on-the-run movies, like First Blood or The Defiant Ones, stripped down to their bare adventure essence. I was on the edge of my seat the entire time, and I love how the movie built up to a nail-biting conclusion. The filming locations of the mountains of the Sierra Nevada wilderness and the mountains of Spain are incredibly picturesque all the while.

I have no complaints whatsoever about the Blu-ray presentation, although I would liked to have had a subtitle option for the small handful of dialogue scenes. On Blu-ray, this simply looks like the butt-kicking 1970s adventure flick that it is.

[mja345]

Fully agree. I've expressed my thoughts on it a few times in the Kino thread. I love it. The surrealism of the film really gives it an added dimension. More people need to check this movie out because it's a true hidden gem. And it's been next to impossible to see for so many years. It never had a DVD release, was rarely shown on TV. It's a fantastic film.

[spargs]

Agreed on all counts... watched this over the weekend, it was a blind buy, and was floored by it. A film I had never heard of prior to it being announced by KL. Thank you, KL, for bringing us this wonderful film on blu!

[Kainefu]

I've never even heard of this. But that plot and that cast. I must have this. Now!!!

[mja345]

Originally Posted by spargs

Agreed on all counts... watched this over the weekend, it was a blind buy, and was floored by it. A film I had never heard of prior to it being announced by KL. Thank you, KL, for bringing us this wonderful film on blu!

Yeah, it's incredible how obscure this movie is, especially considering it has McDowell and Shaw in it.

[PowellPressburger]

Ordered this one, I'm sure I will like it. Esp with being described as surreal and the cast looks great. Still is the reason why the 1970's was the greatest decade for films.

[I KEEL YOU]

Blind buy for me as well. Ordered it on amazon at release day, but still waiting to receive it (I live in Europe, but waiting 3 weeks is still annoying )

I can tell that this is going to be my kind of movie. Looks to have beautiful cinematography and the 70s are my favorite movie decade. I don't know why I haven't heard Malcolm McDowell talk about this movie when he talks about his early career. He is obviously proud of A Clockwork Orange, and he is always mentioning how proud he is of If....., as well as O Lucky Man!.

[Gerby]

I used to have a bootleg dvd which I got signed by Malcolm McDowell at a convention. He couldn't believe anyone would have a copy of it.
It's an amazing movie, bought the blu ray now but haven't got around to watching it yet, looking forward to revisiting it.

[mja345]

Doing a little research on this film, I discovered that it actually was never even released on VHS. So, this movie was basically buried for years. For 40+ years, the only way you could see it was once in a blue moon on TV or on bootlegs. I saw it a few years ago on a retro movie channel, looked it up, and it had only 400 or so votes on IMDB. No one had seen this because you really couldn't. Reminds me of the plight of two other good films. Alan Rudolph's powerful "Remember My Name", which has never had a home video release, and Robert Altman's "Health", which has never had any form of home video release either.

[Gerby]

There are quite a few really great movies that have never had either a vhs or DVD release. The one that springs to mind the most for me is John Mackenzie's 'Unman, Wittering & Zigo'.

[mja345]

Originally Posted by Gerby

There are quite a few really great movies that have never had either a vhs or DVD release. The one that springs to mind the most for me is John Mackenzie's 'Unman, Wittering & Zigo'.

Yeah, I know there's a ton of stuff that is being released by Warner Archive and Fox Cinema Archives on MOD that had never been released on DVD or VHS. A lot of it is films from the 40s and early 50s that kind of got lost in the ether by the time home video came around.

[solovoyager]

This movie just didn't work for me. I did not understand what the 2 characters were fleeing from. Were they escaped prisoners who had committed crimes? Was it just some kind of perverse game where they were being hunted? Why were they in this particular foreign country? I had trouble understanding some of the dialogue due to the actors' accents so it's possible they could have discussed answers to my questions (and unfortunately there are no subtitles).

I see the movie overview on this site explains that they were: "escaped prisoners in an unidentified totalitarian country...Along the way, the two men are helped by "the people," who are as contemptuous of the powers that be as MacConnachie and Ansell."

I do not recall a scene where MacConnachie and Ansell were helped by "the people" either. And I do not recall it being established in the film that it is a "totalitarian country".

Sorry, but I can see why this movie was not successful when it was released.

[Gerby]

Originally Posted by solovoyager

This movie just didn't work for me. I did not understand what the 2 characters were fleeing from. Were they escaped prisoners who had committed crimes? Was it just some kind of perverse game where they were being hunted? Why were they in this particular foreign country? I had trouble understanding some of the dialogue due to the actors' accents so it's possible they could have discussed answers to my questions (and unfortunately there are no subtitles).

I see the movie overview on this site explains that they were: "escaped prisoners in an unidentified totalitarian country...Along the way, the two men are helped by "the people," who are as contemptuous of the powers that be as MacConnachie and Ansell."

I do not recall a scene where MacConnachie and Ansell were helped by "the people" either. And I do not recall it being established in the film that it is a "totalitarian country".

Sorry, but I can see why this movie was not successful when it was released.

That's for you to decide, to me this is exactly why the film is so great.

[McCrutchy]

FYI: I just took delivery of Carlotta's 2018 release of Figures in a Landscape (1970) and unfortunately, the disc has forced French subtitles on the original English audio track.

The disc also appears to be Region B locked as indicated on the packaging. It refused to play when my player was set to Region A.

Unfortunately, this is only other release of the film so far, and the Kino BD is out-of-print. Hopefully, a UK or other fully English-friendly release comes along soon.

[Marv Inc.]

Hopefully one day someone else picks this up in the states or the UK. Seems like something Indicator would be all over.