Review of Angel Heart (Special Edition)

Introduction

I remember loving this film when it first came out. Mickey Rourke was at the height of his (first) career, and DeNiro was guaranteed to impress. Add to that Alan Parker`s stylish movie design (this was the eighties and Parker was an ex-commercials Director), a touch of film-noirish fifties America, some steamy sex and some good old fashioned New Orleans voodoo and you had what I always considered a near perfect movie. But I had always found the ending a disappointment and as a consequence this one never found its way into my DVD tray. This new `Special Edition` (curiously released one year short of the more obvious `20th Anniversary` tag) gave me an ideal opportunity to give it a re-assessment.

Having returned to it for the first time in possibly 15 years I found myself less impressed. Which is not to say that it isn`t a first-class film. It`s just that, despite being set in the mid- 1950`s, it feels like a late-eighties movie. Stylistically, it occasionally feels like a cross between a commercial and a pop video, which for some, may not seem like a bad thing. There`s not a scene here that hasn`t been painstakingly considered.

It`s all beautifully shot of course. Parker claims on the audio commentary that he set out to "…create a black and white movie in colour" and there`s no doubt that he succeeds in that respect.

The movie kicks off in New York where Private detective Harry Angel (played superbly by Rourke who apparently pleaded with Parker for the role) takes on a case that his instincts have told him to leave alone. A dark yet enigmatic new client (played by DeNiro who Parker had wanted for the `Angel` role) asks Angel to track down a missing singer, Johnny Favorite.

All Harry`s initial contacts in unravelling the mystery are ending up brutally murdered and the case relocates to New Orleans, where the darker forces of voodoo magic seem to have a bearing on the case.

Harry falls for a girl called Epiphany (Lisa Bonet, previously known for her role in `The Cosby Show`) who seems to be a link to this darker world. Their notorious sex scene (where blood pours over them from above) is as potent now as it was then, though the shock at seeing a young family favourite `corrupted` in this way will have dissipated.

The case gets darker and more and more dangerous, with a twist in the ending that seemed horribly obvious this viewing, yet had taken me surprise when I first saw the movie all those years ago.

Video

Well, as near to perfect as it must be possible to achieve on DVD. The dark, monochromatic look is perfectly rendered here in a smart 1.85:1 anamorphic transfer.

Audio

There`s original Dolby 2.0 stereo as well as a Dolby 5.1 track which Parker himself got involved in prior to this release. They clearly had a lot of fun placing some of the scarier, atmospheric whispers and creaks into the rear speakers!

Features

ALAN PARKER FILM INTRODUCTION
Filmed at the same time as other supplemental material, this brief introduction perfectly sets the tone for the movie.

ALAN PARKER INTERVIEW
This is shorter and more interesting in my view than the audio commentary where much of the same ground is covered, only here it`s more succinct. There are some nice anecdotes, like the piece about Rourke where he and Parker walked for miles and miles together talking about the movie and where Rourke pleaded `Forget all the other guys, I`ll do the movie`. We also learn that Jack Nicholson was first choice for the `Devil` part - which is certainly not difficult to imagine.

ALAN PARKER AUDIO COMMENTARY
See comments above.

TRAILER

MAKING OF FEATURETTE
This is not quite as candid as we might like with Parker (being a sussed advertising type) showing that the voodoo scene was coincidentally slated `666`. I don`t think PR pundits would fall for such transparent hyping now, and unfortunately it undermines any of the other information included here. This should therefore be viewed as nothing more than pre-release PR propaganda.

BEHIND THE SCENES
Another press release - see above.

PERSONALITY PROFILES

PHOTO-GALLERY

RELATED DOCUMANTARIES:
NEW ORLEANS: VOODOO CONNECTION

A nicely shot 20-minute video programme using intercut interviews and supportive cut-away materials tracing the history and practices of voodoo in New Orleans. Interesting, though only obliquely related to the movie.


VOODOO - THE TRUTH
Watch for the audio volume ramping up on this one! This is really `Hollywood voodoo` versus `reality`. This 12 minute documentary explodes popular myths about voodoo - like the fact that pins being stuck into effigies was just a way of illiterate voodoo doctors keeping track of their client`s medical conditions by placing pins into the problem areas of that particular person. How disappointing!

`Voodoo is 90% healing and only 10% hexing`.

DANCE AS WORSHIP
A 6-minute look at the ritual of dance in voodoo, with the same interviewee`s.

GUIDED TOUR
A 10-minute guided tour of the New Orleans`s based `Voodoo Authentica` shop. I couldn`t help wondering how they were doing post-floods though this was clearly all shot prior to that.

VOODOO MACUMBA DANCE ENSEMBLE
A complete 5-minute dance ritual. By now I was getting bored…

Conclusion

Half horror, half film noir, `Angel Heart` remains one of the most memorable movie of the eighties. Parker`s stylistic direction will not be to everyone`s tastes, and the very considered cinematography may be far from fashionable today, though is no less impressive for that.

The performances here are all first class, with DeNiro managing to represent evil incarnate in his few brief appearances, and Mickey Rourke proving that he was the natural choice to pick up the film-noir mantle. (There can be no doubt that his triumphant return in `Sin City` must have been influenced in part by his performance here.)

Though the extras are plentiful here, they are somewhat disappointing in the final analysis. Parker is too knowing in his commentary to warm to, the `making of` featurette`s were calculated PR exercises of the day, and the New Orleans`s documentaries were, in the main part, almost entirely irrelevant.

That said, this is a first class transfer of a great movie so worth getting for that alone.