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Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray A - America - Shout! Factory Review written by and copyright: Anthony Arrigo (18th May 2015). |
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The Film
 If you were fortunate enough to grow up in the heyday of VHS, then you know doubt have fond memories of perusing the aisles at Blockbuster or Wherehouse or whatever local mom-and-pop shop stocked all the coolest titles. Some of those memories are likely to include big box art and titles that seared themselves into your adolescent brain, even if you never actually rented them. One such title for me was “Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man” (1991), mainly because it sounds like such an odd, corporate film due to featuring two powerhouse business names. Neither company had anything to do with the making of the film, though; a fact which is made crystal clear thanks to a disclaimer text card that precedes the film’s opening. Regardless, this, for me, has long been a mythic film whose title brings me right back to the days of carefree video rentals on a Friday night. And now, all these years later, Shout! Factory has seen fit to give it a proper hi-def release on Blu-ray. Harley Davidson (Mickey Rourke) and the Marlboro Man (Don Johnson) are a couple of nomadic bikers who live by their own code, eschewing modern conveniences and societal norms. These guys live to drink, fight and screw; they’re basically contemporary cowboys. Although they live like drifters, one place both can usually be found is a small bar in Los Angeles, where they do things like arm wrestling for money and drinking heavily after playfully fighting with friends. But their favorite watering hole is in danger of being closed down thanks to Great Trust bank, who has placed a lien in the neighborhood of $2.5 million on the place. If the owner can’t come up with the money, their bar will close for good. Harley and Marlboro aren’t exactly career criminals, but they decide fair is fair and hatch a scheme to rob the bank. The duo and their buddies pull of a daring daylight heist of a Great Trust armored vehicle, but they are all nearly killed when a group of men in black bulletproof trench coats show up to stop them. See, Great Trust isn’t just a bank; it’s also a drug running conglomerate headed by sleazy president Chance Wilder (Tom Sizemore). When the guys open up their bags of “money”, they’re surprised to find bricks of pure crystal dream, a new designer drug that users drip into their eyes. Since they have no use for drugs the guys make a deal with Chance – give us $2.5 million, we’ll give you the drugs. He agrees, the exchange is made, and everyone goes back to the bar happy – until Chance sends his trench coat mafia, led by Alexander (Daniel Baldwin), to shoot up the bar, most of Harley & Marlboro’s friends, and retrieve the money. Harley & Marlboro manage to escape with the cash, but now they’re on the run from Chance’s men and their only hope of survival is to fight back and reclaim their territory. “Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man” is a total product of its time – a relic from 1991 that employs a ridiculously absurd plot, crazy designer drugs, wildly over-the-top antagonists and two lead actors who have terrible chemistry. This is because of Mickey Rourke. Don Johnson is clearly having a ball here, chewing scenery and getting deep into his character of Marlboro. Rourke, however, pretty much phones in his performance. Harley is a biker philosopher; a road traveling poet who is able to handle himself in violent situations despite not being violent nor possessing much skill with weapons. Just watch how Rourke fires his handgun; he isn’t shooting it, he’s stabbing the air with it, and looking a fool in the process. Rourke has admitted he did this film for the money – and it shows. Johnson was never much of a film star, so maybe he had less of an ego about making such a weirdly tonal slice of action cinema. Almost twenty five years later this film seems to have been all but forgotten. It isn’t hard to understand why either because, despite all the outlandish flourishes and crazy antics, at its heart lies a mid-level 90's action vehicle with only one of the two lead actors doing much to keep it interesting and lively. Rourke is only fun to watch for how terrible he is at acting. At least when someone like, say, Christopher Walken, phones in a performance you’re still watching Walken do his thing. Rourke has no thing, and watching him sleepwalk for ninety minutes almost put me to sleep with him. Johnson is the film’s saving grace – and, so too is Big John Studd, who is clearly having just as much fun as Johnson. The brands capitalized on in the film’s title will live on for many more years to come (although, somewhat ironically, the customers of both risk significantly decreased lives) but the film itself hasn’t aged too well. It isn’t bizarre enough to be ironically amusing, nor is it shot well enough to be considered a lost minor classic. No, just like the two title characters this is a relic of days gone by that will remain overlooked and only mildly appreciated by a certain demographic.
Video
Considering most early 90's mid-budget action films are typically rather bland, this film’s 1.85:1 1080p 24/fps AVC MPEG-4 encoded image is quite decent. It’s a fairly routine HD image, with strong color saturation, mildly impressive definition in daylight shots, natural skin tones and natural film grain. A handful of shots look especially impressive, with lots of crisp line work and fine minute details apparent. The print used here was obviously kept in great shape and it shows off whenever possible.
Audio
Things aren’t too dynamic on the audio front, where an English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 stereo mix handles the action. It just sounds so dated, providing nothing more than an adequate sound field in which thin dialogue, weak gun fire and a near-total lack of low end frequencies all play together quite benignly. The biggest moment comes courtesy of some helicopter machine gun fire near the climax. Otherwise, the sound mix phones it in worse than Rourke’s performance. Subtitles are included in English.
Extras
It might not be much, but there is a decent vintage featurette included here along with a theatrical trailer. A featurette entitled “vintage featurette” (SD) runs for 6 minutes and 55 seconds. Surprisingly, the film’s writer gets the most face time here, as he talks about the script and characters while walking amongst the sets. He is a very animated guy. Rourke also appears, smoking like a chimney. The film’s theatrical trailer (1080i) runs for 1 minute and 51 seconds.
Packaging
The single disc comes housed in a standard Blu-ray keep case.
Overall
Fans of bad 90's action movies will likely have fun here, even if the plot isn’t quite as outrageous or awesomely bad enough to be ironically amusing. I had fun with it thanks to a few solid actors having fun with their respective roles. At the least, I certainly had more fun watching it than Rourke apparently had making it.
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