Review of Fugitive, The

Introduction

The original TV series had poor Richard Kimble running for decades. The movie remake had only two hours to resolve the plot. So the emphasis shifted from the `Good Samaritan` aspect of the series to a chase movie. Kimble has to clear his name and find the killer and whoever framed him. The Fugitive is all the better for this.

Richard Kimble, a prominent vascular surgeon comes home to find his wife mortally injured and her assailant still waiting. Struggling with the man, he doesn`t get a good look at him before he escapes, but finds he has a prosthetic limb. The police are sceptical of his story and charge him with the murder of his wife instead. The trial provides considerable evidence to support the accusation and Kimble is sentenced to death. On his way to prison, other convicts engineer an escape that goes wrong, leaving the prison bus lying sideways on a railway line. Miraculously escaping the subsequent train crash, Richard Kimble is determined to find the killer of his wife and clear his name. To do this he must stay one step ahead of the U.S. Marshals sent to retrieve the escapees. Leading the Marshals is one Samuel Gerard, a relentless and charismatic man, who finds, Kimble to be an intelligent and resourceful adversary.

Video

ANAMORPHIC. Just thought I`d say that. Despite what it says on the box, The Fugitive is presented in an anamorphic widescreen 1.85:1 transfer. The picture is adequate. There is the odd moment of grain, and by and large the resolution isn`t as sharp as you would expect from a reference quality image, but this in no way is distracting. The soon to be released Special Edition will have to go a long way to make it worth replacing this and a crystal clear image won`t be enough of an improvement. Directed by Andrew Davis, The Fugitive is good to look at. Surprising when most of it is shot in dreary, grey Chicago. Davis makes good use of helicopter shots of day and night cityscapes, and some of the action sequences are stunning. Most notably, the train crash and the dam escape.

Audio

The sound, presented in a DD 5.1 format is good and the action well conveyed. The music is exciting and complements the pace of the film well.

Features

Extras are limited to filmographies on this single layer disc, and for the price you can pick this disc up for, it`s no big deal.

Conclusion

Harrison Ford is Richard Kimble, who for the first 20 minutes of the film, is afflicted by some unsightly facial growth. Though the beard vanishes early on in the movie, it does assail us in flashback throughout the movie. Seriously, the character of Richard Kimble is hard to sum up. On the run for most of the film, Ford must portray the desperation, fear and determination of the character, and he does this well, but it`s only when he confronts his antagonist at the end of the film do we see another side to the character, outrage. It would always be difficult to flesh out this character in a movie like this and to his credit, Ford does well, but Richard Kimble remains a cipher and one who audiences identify with rather than understand. This movie could have failed on this were it not for the character of Gerard. Tommy Lee Jones is undoubtedly the star of this film and his charisma and talent do much to make this film enjoyable. No wonder then, that the sequel was based around him. Samuel Gerard is such a strong and likable character that you hang on his every word. Andreas Katsulas is the infamous one-armed man and is suitably repellent. Jeroen Krabbe stars as Kimble`s colleague, Charles Nichols and is competent in the role.

The Fugitive is an excellent action film and is presented adequately on this disc. The pacing is perfect and the script intelligent. You can empathise with Kimble but the star performance comes from Tommy Lee Jones as Samuel Gerard. The story builds to a stunning climax and you can come away satisfied after watching this film. Whether the Special Edition disc can offer enough to make it an essential purchase to replace this disc remains to be seen, but all those customers put off by the false package information can finally get their movie. Personally, I`ll stick with this.