Blu Ray Review: The Hallelujah Trail

One of the best blu ray releases of late is this John Sturges western comedy starring Burt Lancaster and available from Kino Lorber’s classics division.

It is a satirical approach, with sober narration by John Dehner, about a town ready to face a tough winter and fearing a whiskey shortage. They arrange for forty wagons of whiskey to be delivered, but the wagon train is confronted by everything from teamsters to temperance groups. This 1965 parody is headed by Lancaster but filled with recognizable favorites from the era, including Lee Remick, Jim Hutton, Pamela Tiffin, Donald Pleasence, Brian Keith, Martin Landau, and Dub Taylor.

This is the era of F-Troop on television so the offbeat, outrageous comedy herein is representative of a style that was contemporarily popular. Authenticity is achieved via Sturges’ direction, his having helmed such landmark westerns as Gunfight at the OK Corral, The Magnificent Seven, and Last Train from Gun Hill.

Kino’s blu ray is the MGM HD Master from a 2k scan of the 35mm reduction. The film had a roadshow release in its time, and the blu ray restores the roadshow overture, intermission, Entr’acte, and exit music. And while some theaters truncated the film by 20 minutes, the blu ray offers the full 166 minute film.

The Hallelujah Trail was a troubled production. Burt Lancaster didn’t get alone with Lee Remick or Brian Keith. Stuntman Bill Williams was killed in a stunt that went wrong, and the producers used the scene in which that happened, against the wishes of director Sturges. There is much more information about the film via the entertaining and enlightening audio commentary by Michael Schlesinger and C. Courtney Joiner.

The blu ray is available at this link: HALLELUJAH