Last Embrace – Cinématographe (4k UHD/Blu-ray Combo)

Theatrical Release Date: USA, 1979
Director: Jonathan Demme
Writers: Murray Teigh Bloom, David Shaber
Cast: Roy Scheider, Janet Margolin, John Glover, Christopher Walken, Charles Napier, Sam Levene, Joe Spinell

Release Date: July 23rd, 2024
Approximate Running Time: 101 Minutes 23 Seconds
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 Widescreen / 2160 Progressive / HEVC / H.265 / HDR10
Rating: R
Sound: DTS-HD Mono English
Subtitles: English SDH
Region Coding: Region Free (4K UHD), Region A (Blu-ray)
Retail Price: $59.98

"Harry Hannan (Roy Scheider, The French Connection) is a United States government agent newly released from a long stay at an asylum following the murder of his wife during a botched mission in Mexico. Upon returning to government work, Hannan becomes increasingly paranoid, constantly questioning his sanity and who he can trust in the wake of receiving mysterious threats written in Hebrew. Hannan, along with Princeton doctoral student Ellie Fabian (Janet Margolin, David and Lisa), must unravel an arcane mystery that follows them from the streets of New York City to the rushing waters of Niagara Falls, before time runs out." - synopsis provided by the distributor

Video: 4.5/5 (4K UHD), 4.25/5 (Blu-ray)

Here’s the information provided about this release's transfer, "a new restoration from its original camera negative."

Last Embrace comes on a 66 GB dual layer 4K UHD.

Disc Size: 60.8 GB

Feature: 60.6 GB

This brand new transfer looks excellent; it is a noticeable improvement over Kino Lorber’s 2014 Blu-ray release. Flesh tones look healthy, colors look correct, image clarity, black levels, and compression are solid, and the image always looks organic.

Last Embrace comes on a 50 GB dual layer Blu-ray.

Disc Size: 32.9 GB

Feature: 25.8 GB

The Blu-ray uses the same source as the 4K UHD does for its transfer.

Audio: 4.5/5

This release comes with one audio option, a DTS-HD mono mix in English with removable English SDH. The audio is in great shape; it is a noticeable improvement over Kino Lorber’s 2014 Blu-ray release. Dialog comes through clearly, everything sounds balanced, the score sounds appropriately robust and range-wise, things sound very good, and ambient sounds are well-represented.

Extras:

Extras for this release include a theatrical trailer (2 minutes 55 seconds, DTS-HD mono English, no subtitles), an archival interview with producer Michael Taylor (10 minutes 41 seconds, DTS-HD stereo English, no subtitles), a video essay by Samm Deighan titled The Labyrinth of Last Embrace: From Hitchcockian Suspense Film to Erotic Revenge Thriller (16 minutes 33 seconds, DTS-HD stereo English, no subtitles), an audio commentary with film historians Howard S. Berger and Steve Mitchell, a J-card MediaBook slipcase and a 40-page booklet (limited to 6,000 units) with an essay titled Don’t Over Do It: A Reappreciation of Jonathan Demme’s Last Embrace written by Jeva Lange, an essay titled Embracing Excess: Last Embrace and Jonathan Demme’s Crime Films of the 70s written by Justin LaLiberty, and an essay titled What Goes Around Comes Around: Jonathan Demme’s Last Embrace Reconsidered and Rediscovered written by Jim Hemphill.

Summary:

Jonathan Demme directed Last Embrace. His notable films are Something Wild, Married to the Mob, The Silence of the Lambs, and Philadelphia.

An intelligence man who recently recovered from a nervous breakdown starts to believe that someone is trying to kill him. Is it all in his mind, or has someone marked him for death?

When it comes to cinema’s most celebrated filmmakers, they all have one thing in common: when you watch their films, there are moments that could have only been directed by them. This is especially true of Alfred Hitchcock, a filmmaker who pioneered techniques, most of which are still widely used in the present. That said, there are two ways that filmmakers pay homage to Alfred Hitchcock: camera techniques and reimagining plots from his films. Then there’s Jonathan Demme’s Last Embrace, a film that balances between these two ways of paying homage to Alfred Hitchcock.

Last Embrace is a film with two distinct halves. What starts off as a spy thriller, along the way, takes an abrupt turn into the realm of revenge cinema. The protagonist is wise to be wary of his employer's hostile intentions since his nervous breakdown; unfortunately, this creates a blind spot in which he allows someone more dangerous into his life and lets his guard down with them. When the reason someone wants to kill the protagonist is revealed, bringing clarity to the initial tension, which had primarily stemmed from the protagonist's fear.

Last Embrace has a solid cast who are all great in their roles, especially Roy Scheider (The French Connection) and Janet Margolin (David and Lisa). Cast in the roles of the protagonist and the woman who comes into the protagonist's life at an opportune time, their onscreen chemistry reinforces the evolution of their characters' relationships. The most surprising performance is Christopher Walken’s (The Dead Zone) portrayal of Eckart, the man who the protagonist works for. Despite only being in two scenes, he creates this film’s most memorable character.

From a production standpoint, Last Embrace is a film that delivers and then some. The narrative executes the setup well, builds tension phenomenally, and provides a very satisfying finale, concluding the events that preceded perfectly. Miklós Rózsa’s exemplary Hitchcockian score (Spellbound) and the visuals create a fusion that heightens mood. The most memorable moment is an assassination sequence in a bell tower; this scene is pure Hitchcock. Ultimately, Last Embrace is a solid example of a filmmaker paying homage to the cinema of Alfred Hitchcock.

Last Embrace gets an exceptional release from Cinématographe that comes with a solid audio/video presentation and insightful extras, highly recommended.

Note about the 4K screenshots: It is not possible to make Dolby Vision or HDR10 screenshots that faithfully match the experience of watching a film in motion on a TV. Instead of not having any screenshots, all of the 4K screenshots are m2ts taken with a MPC-HC player and lossless PNGs.

Written by Michael Den Boer