Dick Tracy - The Noir Edit

Dick Tracy: The Noir Edit - Wakeupkeo

Filesize = 8 GB, Video = 1920 X 1040p AVC, Audio = 637 kbps, 5.1 AAC. Subs yes!

The 1990 film remains a powerful example of style over substance.
The set design, primary color scheme, makeup, songs, all top flight.
Story though? Originally meant for Disney, shifted to Touchstone as it was deemed too adult.
Nevertheless, this is still a cartoon.
Wakeupkeo’s intent to transform this into a Noir is intriguing, though I suspect Tracy harks back to gangster films of the 1930’s rather than post WWII Film Noir.
Straight off, the “look” of high contrast black and white is outstanding.

Using Miles Davis themes from “Elevator To The Gallows” darkens the mood immediately.
More would have been better, though I grasp dialogue interference.
The sound is a swaggering 5.1. Crank those bullet scenes, boys.
For all the trims and cuts, the narrative remains a problem.
This is a kiddee film. Violent, but aimed at juveniles.
Noir was always aimed at adults, with hard boiled themes.

The Kid is insufferable. Al Pacino’s Big Boy is a ranting buffoon.
Blame the source, not the faneditor.
This is a good, alternative view, of a disappointing movie.

Afterthought. There is an actual Noir story buried in **Dick Tracy**, although one would have to subvert the original pitch.
This would run about an hour, jettison the Kid, many of the goons, Tracy’s cops.
Typical of Noir, there is a femme fatale, smart plan, overreach, rotten end.
The stripped down story? That of Breathless.

Oh, Dick Tracy. A movie that's quite difficult to evaluate due to being completely at odds with itself. It never really decides if it wants to be Batman '66 or Batman '89 (seems to be aiming for the latter but with the villains from the former), with a very comic booky style in the visuals and in the characterizations of the prosthetic-heavy villains, but with Warren Beatty's ego apparently preventing him from subjecting himself to the same treatment and wearing Tracy's famous square nose. He just plays him as Warren Beatty in a yellow hat and coat (incidentally I always though that James Caan, who has a small gangster role in the movie, would have been a much better choice for Tracy). On the other hand one wishes that the bad guys had been played by actors whose physique naturally suggested the comic strip characters' features instead of going the goofy prosthetics route, but guess Beatty was more interested in casting stars than the right actors. Oh, well. But at least the movie is nice to look at and has some really beautiful shots here and there.

And then we get to this edit. Which is gorgeously executed, but in a way reproduces the same main problem with the theatrical cut: it's at odds with itself.

Cut-wise, of course, it's a huge improvement over the official cut, with lots of silly stuff thankfully gone (though I would have wished that a few more Big Boy lines towards the end had been cut). In that respect, it's an instant replacement disc. And the editing itself is pretty much flawless, and even includes a happy accident or two: in some of the segments in which the original score was removed, the dialogue suddenly acquires a retro quality that makes it sound a lot like a classic film (most noticeable in the diner scene with Charles Durning, Tracy, and the Kid). One even wishes the same filter was applied to the whole dialogue track. Video and audio quality is fine all through, even if it shows some very slight pixelation in the darkest areas sometimes, most likely an unavoidable side effect of the color tweaking.

Then, we get to the "noir-ization" part: the movie does generally look great in black and white, and some of the shots are just plain gorgeous this way (particularly those city landscapes against the sky), but then we suddenly get to the villains and we are reminded that we are watching a goofy comic strip, which makes us mentally shift to missing the colors. These guys feel like intruders in this film noir. And, needless to say, the added Miles Davis score is completely wonderful, but at the same time it might be "too" wonderful for this movie. It feels way more serious than the material it's accompanying. I was shifting the whole running time between considering it perfect and considering it out of place, sometimes both at once. What I would have chosen not to include is the Chinatown theme, because it's readily identifiable, and from an inmensely superior film at that, which kinda makes one think they should be watching that one instead. To quote MST3k, "never put a good movie in your bad movie".

But at the same time I enjoyed the ride a lot, and admire the bold experimental factor of it. I will much sooner rewatch this than the theatrical cut. Recommended for anyone who enjoys both film noir and pulpy/comic-strip-y narratives, as I do.

Sometimes it is nice to be wrong.

Way back in the early days of the Forum, there was much discussion of fan edit ideas for Dick Tracy, and at the time, I was not convinced a Black & White edit would work because the Primary Colour Scheme seemed so integral to style of the movie.

But Wakeupkeo has happily proven me wrong.

The alternation to Black & White, accompanied by the Miles Davis score, has given this Disney flick a whole new entertaining spin and tone.

Unlike Wakeupkeo, I do not think the original Dick Tracy was a Bad Movie. I absolutely loved the Primary Colours Design and the practical make up prosthetics. To me, it looked like the old comic strip jumped off the page into the real world. I still think it is an incredible accomplishment. To me, the big issue with the original movie was narrative and pacing.

But this edit masterfully corrects this, cutting I think over 10 minutes. Never once did I look at my watch while watching or notice anything significant missing. Well done.

As someone who has experimented with Black & White conversion with mixed results, I know how challenging it is and truly appreciate the hard work that went into this project. For the majority of the film, the Black & White looks very good. There are couple scenes (usually night scenes) where the flesh tones look off, almost like a muddy grey, such as when Tracy is on the roof before jumping through the skylight. Also, scenes where there is strong hot white light source, occasionally betrays the new Black & White reality.

The new Miles Davis score, which is essentially now Breathless's theme music, is wonderful and completely changes the tone and subtext of every scene it is used in. I loved it. I wish the entire Elfman score could have been replaced with even more Davis! There are a couple minor instances of original score spill, but technology like Vocal Remover can only do so much. There was only once scene where I felt the Davis score should have lasted longer, when Breathless meet Trudy for the first time.... the sudden fade out of the Davis score to be replaced by the background radio felt really out of place. To me, the Davis score should have continued until Breathless exited the scene.

With score replacement, comes the task of adding foley sound fx, and again for the most part this was done exceptionally well. Though I thought the added footfalls for Tracy in the end rooftop scene were too loud while the fireworks were too quiet.

All and all, a solid technical achievement and fascinating new noir narrative.

Good stuff!