The Executioner's Song

This 2 disk bluray set from Kino Lorber has both the chopped up directors cut version at 135 minutes, that version that most people dislike and with good reason... and the other disc has the original version which is 188 minutes, which I'm hoping is the full uncut 3 hour + genuine original. I haven't watched the entire movie yet on this bluray, but have given the disk a chapter by chapter preview to check out the quality and this is definetly a clear resulution high definition picture. The picture quality is absolutely beautiful here, especially the clear and crisp visuals of a young Rosanne Arquette, who plays a huge role in this classic. She's in about 90% of the scenes that I've seen so far. In my opinion, this is the best movie role that she's ever been in and a lead role at that. Tommy Lee Jones also plays his leading role part very well, being an uneducated and estranged from main stream society product of the penal system, having spent most of his life incarcerated in one way or another since childhood. He clearly does not know how to function as a free man and It shows in his acting! That takes some talent to pull that off! I'm a huge fan of both Tommy Lee Jones and Rosanne Arquette and haven't seen this movie since the days of VHS and cable TV ( many years ago ) with a recent exception of a free full movie youtube version that someone generously contributed, but that version is so blurry that I could not stand watching more than 10 minutes of it. This KL studio classics bluray version does not dissapoint! I took a gamble with purchasing this with the many negative reviews of other formats of this movie and I'm glad I did! On a sidenote, the book version, which this movie is based on by Norman Mailer is a very good read as well. Kino Lorber ( KL studio classics ) is doing a fine job restoring these classic 1970s/1980s gems, such as The Onion Field as well as many others!

No matter your stance on capital punishment, you'll find yourself fully engulfed in the tale that started this modern era of executing convicted killers. Gary Gilmore, played by Tommy Lee Jones, murders two individuals in two separate robberies and, by his own election, becomes the first person put to death in the United States since the U.S. Supreme Court ended a moratorium on the death penalty. This film takes a look back at who this man was. Sure, it only covers the last nine months of his life, but it's still quite a window. For me, it was interesting to see Tommy Lee Jones in a role before he became a big-budget movie star (this movie was made a few years before I was even born.) He definitely had his acting chops down by then as he allowed for some sympathy to be extended to this murderous thief. I do have trouble believing that Gilmore killed those two men for his girl, Nicole Baker. I can believe that he killed them in part because he was angry that she broke up with him, but beyond that...I guess I might just not know enough about this story. This was a television film but it's certainly worthy to have been shown in theatres. One warning: it is long, so set aside plenty of time to watch it. Enjoy.

This is a tragic story, that was well researched and a book written by Norman Mailer. Lawrence Schiller did all the research, as well as production of this movie, so you know that the facts as presented are as they happened. I'm also doing this audio book, 42 hours long, but wanted to see the movie. Gilmore was a brutal murderer, but he was well read, very intelligent, and had serious artistic skills. Such a wasted life in the end. Nicole Barrett Baker was an interesting person as well. This DVD is worth every penny..

I was frustrated initially because my two discs were mislabeled. The disc labeled “original version” is really the directors cut whic is about 2 hours and 15 minutes long. It’s the same version as the directors cut dvd. The one labeled “directors cut” is the one tha one that aired on US TV. That version is about 3 hours and 8 minutes long. The cuss words are edited out and at the hour and a half mark it ends, rolls credits and then plays the next half of the movie. This is full screen, not widescreen. The blue ray is a good copy, nice video and audio. I played this on my home projector with a 130 screen, it looked really good but not significantly better than the dvd version. The tv version did have extra footage some of which added to the story and some didn’t. I’m happy with this purchase but I took off a star because I also expected the European version.

First set,over a year old, and still going. second set appears to be the same quality.

This tv miniseries is excellent. However, to see the film in its entirety, I had to buy the VHS copy as the Butcher's, er, Director's cut of the movie on DVD shaves and entire hour out of the movie. The VHS tape itself, though, is terrible. It looks like it was recorded at an inadequate speed, and every few seconds the movie skips, the sound becomes garbled, lines of static run down the screen, etc. WOULD SOMEBODY PLEASE RELEASE THE THREE-HOUR VERSION OF THIS FILM ON DVD so I can just watch the darn thing. It's a crime that movies like Step Up and the horrendous Twilight series get the full blu-ray treatment and I can't even find a decent copy of this thing. Angers me.