Customer Reviews

Marathon Man (Widescreen)

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

If 'Marathon Man' were being filmed today, it would feature a plot with Swiss cheese-like holes in it, mindless dialogue, and an explosion every 10 minutes. Thankfully, the 'Marathon Man' that came out in 1976 suffered from none of these weaknesses. Rather, it belongs in the same classification as 'Day of the Jackal' and 'Three Days of the Condor' when great thrillers of the 70's are mentioned.

Hoffman plays a graduate student who is still looking for answers to his father's apparent suicide years earlier. His brother (played by Roy Schieder) appears to be a businessman who has put his father's suicide behind him. What in the world can these two men have to do with a deadly Nazi war criminal on the loose? Ahh, all is not as it appears....

It's amazing to see such a stellar cast: Hoffman, Schieder, Olivier! Wow! This incredible cast and great script elevate the film way beyond the level of a typical thriller. The DVD extras are very good also. If you enjoy a good thriller and are tired of ridiculous offerings such as 'Double Jeopardy,' 'What Lies Beneath' and the like, 'Marathon Man' is like a breath of fresh air.

If you're a fan of this film - don't buy this DVD (the Paramount "Widescreen collection" 120mins as sold in the UK). It has been clumsily edited to the point that key sequences no longer make sense. The renowned drilling scene, for instance IS NOT IN THIS DVD despite the fact that it appears in on the back cover and the inlay. Check imdb - the film is supposed to be 125 minutes long - not 119. A disappointing experience for me after much anticipation, and a sad end for what in its true form is an outstanding piece of film.

What do you get when you combine top notch acting and a stellar cast? You get the 1977 action thriller "The Marathon Man" presented in it's 1.85:1 widescreen aspect ratio. The DVD transfer and Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound from Paramount Studios is excellent. The video transfer doesn't seem to contain any dust, dirt or debris and the image is very impressive, considering this film is from the 1970's. The acting is superb and the chilling performance given by Laurence Olivier as the former Nazi "Szell" is outstanding. I've always hated the sound of the dentist's drill and after seeing it in the hands of "Szell", I hate it even more. Suspense, action and intrigue, this movie has it all and after 30 years it's still highly entertaining. Only one question still remains, is it safe?

The dvd bonus features include: Theatrical Trailer, Cast & Crew interviews, Rehearsal Footage, Original "Making of Marathon Man" Featurette.

The conspiracy movies included two fictional stories, "Marathon Man" and "The Parallax View", as well as the Watergate movie, "All the President's Men" (which Robert Redford produced after giving long consideration to a movie about how Kennedy stole the 1960 election...not!).
"Marathon Man" was directed by John Schlesinger, written by the great William Goldman (based on his novel), and produced by Bob Evans. Goldman, along with Towne, is considered one of the best screenwriters of all time. "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" (1968) is an original screenplay that gets as much study as "Chinatown", and his book "Adventures in the Screen Trade" is a must-read for industry insiders. "Marathon Man" stars Dustin Hoffman as a Columbia doctoral student, obsessed with his thesis about his father, who committed suicide when he was "victimized" by McCarthyism. His brother is Roy Scheider, a super-secret agent for an organization that handles, apparently, what the FBI cannot and the CIA will not. His pal is William DeVane, and he is in league with the devil, a former Nazi dentist named Christian Zsell (played to perfection by Laurence Olivier), based on Joseph Mengele. Zsell is also known as the "White Angel". The plot revolves around millions of dollars worth of diamonds, smuggled to the U.S. by Zsell with DeVane's (and Sheider's) help. Hoffman accidentally gets involved and foils the plot. It is brilliant stuff in every way, shape and form, but coming on the heels of the Church hearings, the film plays on the public's belief that the CIA is corrupt, bent more on money and power than protecting the interests of freedom. The anti-hero is Hoffman. The backstory of his persecuted Jewish father strengthens the myth that fine liberals of conscience were the victims of the McCarthy witch-hunt. Like all films depicting McCarthyism, the victim is fictional and there are no scenes based on real events. This is because actual scenes of actual "victims," if they hold to the truth, will show actual Communists being caught in lies by public officials using perfectly normally and legal techniques of American justice.

(...)

Dustin Hoffman has the incredible ability to make suspense come alive, like no other actor. This is one of his best roles.

Bravo!!

Dustin Hoffman is Thomas Levy, history graduate student at Columbia and obsessive runner. He's obsessed too with the death of his father, another historian, who was driven to suicide by the McCarthy witch-hunts, a preoccupation distrusted both by his pompous and disagreeable professor (Fritz Weaver) and by his brother Henry (Roy Scheider). Henry is believed by Thomas to be a bigshot executive for an oil company but in fact he is an undercover agent working for some obscure special operations outfit. In this capacity he is embroiled with the plans of evil former Nazi torturer Dr. Christian Szell (Olivier) to come to America to pick up a collection of diamonds extorted from Jews during the war, now in a New York bank. Things seem to be turning nasty. People are trying to kill Henry. And indeed the bad guys seem to be taking a bit of an interest in Thomas too as well as in his new Swiss (or is she?) girlfriend Elsa (Marthe Keller).

This great thriller is one of the highpoints of 1970 American cinema. Everyone involved is at the height of their powers. For both Hoffman and writer William Goldman it was project that followed "All the President's Men". For Scheider it followed fairly hot on the heels of "Jaws". And it's one of the high points in the career of distinguished British director John Schlesinger who died just a few months back. Schlesinger's direction is brilliant. The set pieces are extraordinarily well put together starting right at the front in a brilliant scene where an initially innocuous road rage incident turns into a catastrophic road accident. And the atmosphere of New York's streets is superbly captured throughout, in the scenes that track Hoffman's running forays, in the famous scene where former inmates of Auschwitz recognize Szell in the street; and throughout; indeed it counts as one of the great New York movies.

The acting is splendid too. Hoffman and Scheider on excellent form. Keller and the plot line involving her work less well and that is perhaps the movie's weakest aspect. But it's more than compensated by Olivier whose Dr Szell, a.k.a. "Der Weisse Engel", is one of the greatest and most frightening of screen baddies and makes Hannibal Lecter look like a pussycat. (A story I remember hearing about the movie that may very well be apocryphal but is still fun. Apparently when Hoffman was required to enter a room after supposedly having been out running, he would go running for real first to create the requisite exhausted, out of breath effect. Olivier, on having this explained to him, is said to have inquired: "Why not try ACTING, dear boy?"). And of course he gets centre-stage in one of the scariest scenes ever. "Jaws" played on our fears of large unseen marine predators; "Nightmare on Elm Street" on our fear of nightmares; "Arachnophobia" on our fear of spiders. But Goldman and Schlesinger are cleverer than any of these and tap into our deepest and most primal fear of all, fear of visiting the dentist, with unforgettable effect.

This is an old favorite. I watched it again the other night. It's
been over twenty years since I saw it last, and it's still as
good today as it was back then. The first half of the movie
plays heavily on plot and character development,which serves well
during the later action scenes. This development is not boring,
it is intermingled with sequences of international intrigue,
murder, and betrayal. Hoffman plays a history student who also
happens to be a wanna-be marathon runner obsessed with the death
of his father. Without giving too much away, Laurence Olivier
gives an excellent and chilling performance as a Nazi with a
knack for dental instruments. This is one of those "I don't
know who I can trust" movies. Unlike most movies with this
premise, it creates a believable scenario,instead of relying on
the same old tired "I can't remember" trick that so many lesser
movies cheat their audience with. Once this movie kicks into
overdrive, it moves along at a fever pitch with twists and turns
around every corner. The suspense will have you on the edge of
your seat.
Thanks and enjoy,
Tom

Sad to read about the problems with the (I think, Region 2) DVD in the UK that Derek Marriott wrote about earlier, about the 5- minute gap.... It seems like some kind of conspiracy about this film, because the Region 1 version begins and ends in wide screen of at least 2:1 (I would say near letterbox) but noticed that the credit roll only shows the true "letterbox"; following the credits for the director until right after Hoffman throws the gun in the water, the format changes to about 1.85:1. It seems like Paramount is trying to please everyone by trying to compromise with the screen format -- the movie isn't completely pan and scan while its current presentation doesn't yield too much black bar space on the television like a letterboxed film would. I have yet to give the movie a rating but will have made a decision by the end, because I still have to weigh what seems to be happening with the original film aspect ratio. Is Paramount Home Video trying to find a sly way to save money? All they had to do was press a dual- sided DVD to give people a pan & scan on one side and a letterboxed version on the other. Somewhere this makes no sense, because a filmmaker wouldn't change formats like this in 1976 just to accomodate the titles. Would they? Watch what happens immediately following the credit for director John Schlesinger, which is layered over the detail of Hoffman's feet running while at a screen aspect ratio of 2:1 or more -- take the title off and the scene changes to a frontal shot of Hoffman running and the screen size expands to 1.78:1 or 1.85:1. I just don't see any point that a filmmaker would flip-flop on formats while creating a film.

The quality of the video transfer looked fine. On my screen (I purchased it yesterday), the colors seemed a bit subdued with the exception of the nighttime fountain scene with Roy Scheider. This could be just what Schlesinger intended. The contrast and blacks seemed fine and dark details didn't seem to exhibit any excessive digital artifacts. I didn't recognize any dust specs or foreign matter one usually would see from a film this old -- it looked like it just came out of the processor. There were some nice additions in the DVDs extras. If there weren't a decent amount of extras, I would have given it a snub.

Wow! This Thriller has everything...Action, Romance, Evil but believable villians, and best of all INCREDIBLE acting...Two Oscar winners star (Dustin Hoffman and Laurence Olivier) and an Oscar nominee co-stars (Roy Schneider)EXCELLENT MOVIE!!

Having watched this movie back in the 70s as an uncomprehending kid and then a couple of times on TV in the interval, I FINALLY GOT IT! The whole appeal of this movie is in the subtle way it plays to our fascist inclinations. Fascism, by the way is just the way some people have reacted or possibly overreacted to the confusion of the modern world.

Most of us immediately feel sympathy for Hoffman's 'Marathon Man' character -- a decent type trying to live positively in a negative environment ... by jogging! This keep-fit activity forces him (and us) to confront the ugliness of the urnban environment. We see the defaced building, the grafitti, the crime, and, most noticeably, we are aware of the sense of alienation he feels because the neighbourhood he lives in is dominated by non-whites, in this case Hispanics who apprently don't work and who regularly mock him as he goes out on these jogging jaunts. Imperceptibly we start to feel a little like Charles Bronson in Death Wish or Dirty Harry -- it's time to clean up these streets (a form of Fascism).

Then, as these emotions are set going, we encounter what is supposed to be REAL EVIL -- in the form of Laurence Olivier's nasty Nazi dentist. Because the earlier part of the movie has made up subconsciously sympathetic to 'Nazi' solutions, we now feel this evil all the more poignantly because we are ourselves partially implicated in it. This was how the majority of the German people felt when they were made aware of the full extent of Nazi atrocities.

These deep moral and psychological currents are what make an otherwise undistinguished thriller so compelling and memorable. Is it safe? No, far from it.