Review: Cutter’s Way
Blu-ray: Cutter’s Way (1981)
After vaguely seeing the aftermath of a murder as a woman’s body is thrown into a dustbin in a dark back alley, yacht salesman and gigalo Richard Bone (Jeff Bridges) is encouraged by his Vietnam veteran best friend Alex Cutter (John Heard) to pursue the clues that he has and to identify who the murderer is.
When Bone, Cutter and Cutter’s wife Maureen (Lisa Eichhorn) are innocently watching a town parade, Bone spots a man whom he is sure is the one that dumped the body, though the man in question is J.J. Cord (Stephen Elliott); a local oil magnate whose powers extend in many different directions.
I always find Jeff Bridges incredibly watchable, and his performance here is great as always, but it is Heard and Eichhorn who steal the movie for me as a married couple whose relationship is both passionate and volatile in equal measure.
Cutter is a timebomb of pent-up aggression and bitterness, using alcohol to delay the inevitable explosion, yet not realising that it just fuels the inner flames burning inside of him. All while Maureen tries desperately to keep the loving emotions for her husband alive, also using alcohol to dull both the instinct to run, or act on her feelings towards Bone who she sees as being the polar opposite of what her husband has become.
The narrative constantly deviates between being a murder mystery, to a family drama, to an introspective look at life through the eyes of 3 different people, though when the climax comes it is a satisfying, yet also borderline surreal, moment in their lives.
A gritty crime drama that is wonderfully presented here by Radiance Films.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
- New 2K restoration from its 35mm interpositive
- “Mo’s Way,” a newly filmed video interview with star Lisa Eichhorn
- “From Cutter and Bone to Cutter’s Way,” a newly filmed video interview with UA Classics exec Ira Deutchman
- Archival video interview with director Ivan Passer
- Archival video interview with writer Jeffrey Alan Fiskin
- Archival video interview with producer Paul Gurian
- Archival video featurette on composer Jack Nitzsche
- Archival audio introduction by star Jeff Bridges
- Archival video introduction by director Bertrand Tavernier
- Theatrical trailers
- Isolated music track
- Newly recorded audio commentary by novelist Matthew Specktor
- Archival audio commentary by film historians Julie Kirgo and Nick Redman
- Archival audio commentary by assistant director Larry Franco and unit production manager Barrie Osborne
- Booklet with new essay by DJ and writer Margaret Barton-Fumo and an archival essay by Cult Movies author Danny Peary
Slipcover and booklet limited to 1000 copies.
Review by Dave from a disc kindly supplied by Radiance Films via Fetch Publicity.
