Witness

Peter Weir’s name isn’t mentioned near enough in the pantheon of great directors.  Perhaps because he was never much of a self-promotor.  His transition from Australian New Wave icon to Hollywood workhorse was accomplished with a minimum of compromises.  In short, he still made films his way, no matter in which country he was making them.  Take Witness for example, the 6th highest grossing film of 1985, which manages to look and feel more like Ingmar Bergman than Steven Spielberg.  It’s an outlier, like most of Weir’s work, and an exception that proves the rule of mainstream success.

On a rare trip away from his Amish farm, young Samuel (Lukas Haas) is witness to a murder in the bathroom of a Philadelphia train station.  He and his mother, Rachel (Kelly McGillis) are taken under the protection of detective John Book (Harrison Ford) whose suspicions of a police conspiracy are soon proved correct.  Taking shelter in a Pennsylvania Amish community, Book attempts to keep his key witness safe while struggling to adapt to the simple life of his temporary home…and the temptations of a forbidden romance.

 

Witness has a stripped down ‘80s screenplay that could only be made in America.  Yet its execution is particularly European with a poetic opening sequence that teases a movie more interested in theology than thrills .  And, of course, it’s the dichotomy between those two worlds that sets up the movie’s major theme.  Book finds himself socially, spiritually and romantically renewed by his adopted family while Rachel’s attraction seems to spring from something more personal.  Weir’s film rarely speaks when it can show, and Witness pulls off one of the most passionate relationships of the decade with only a few peeks of skin.

 

There are a few dangling participles to contend with, such as Book’s largely blank backstory.  But Weir gets by on Ford’s charisma which was at its peak and an immersive fish-out-of-water scenario that’s almost otherworldly.  Maurice Jarre’s score amplifies this even more with a heavenly chorus of synthesized notes that feels like something out of the Tangerine Dream catalog.  Witness is a beautiful film that, for all its idealization of an America that might never have been, lingers in your memory like a bittersweet dream.  

 

Which makes it particularly deserving of the treatment in Arrow Video’s new 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray set.  DP John Seale’s cinematography, shot with the natural glow of a Terence Malick film, has never looked better.  Seale’s even onboard as part of the extras, which include several other interviews, a commentary track, visual essay, vintage EPK, five-part archival documentary, 60-page booklet, fold-out poster and postcards.

 

 

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