Being a big fan of Tim Burton's work throughout the nineties I was thrilled when I heard of his adapting The Legend of Sleepy Hollow for the screen, and was just as thrilled when I got to see it at the cinema. I can't say how closely it follows Washington Irving's short story but the result is a wonderful mix of quirky detective shenanigans and romance in a supernatural world. Johnny Depp's character, Ichabod Crane, is something of an irritation in turn of the nineteenth century New York, with his new wave look at forensics and crime-solving. He is sent, most likely to get him out of the local authority's hair, to investigate three decapitations at the insular village of Sleepy Hollow, some distance away via a long journey through increasingly creepy woodland. There he finds the place in the grip of an apparently superstitious fear of a headless horseman, who is periodically appearing to relieve select victims of their heads. Squeamish Ichabod is initially not given to such olde-worlde beliefs, however, his opinion gradually begins to swing as he himself witnesses the strange goings-on.
Burton, in what was probably his last great film, created a tangible, beautiful dark world for 1999's Sleepy Hollow, the mist enshrouded village being a sight to revel in, and the odd characters populating the place of constant interest. Much like Ed Wood, Burton at the time trailed around with him a motley crew of regulars who were quite delightful to see recurring in his work, starting with an idiosyncratic turn from Depp himself, who probably wasn't quite a planet-sized ego as he later became. Burton's partner at the time, Lisa Marie, is prominent in the role of Ichabod's mythical mother, while Michael Gough (still the best Alfred) and Jeffrey Jones are sublime as cranky villagers trying to figure out what to do about their deteriorating population. Danny Elfman is also on hand to deliver yet another strong score which weaves its way through the film, and naturally one must mention the brooding cinematography of Emmanuel Lubezki. Sleepy Hollow holds up well twenty years later in all respects, one of the few occasions when everything comes together for an essentially Hollywood production to create an actual work of art.
Pathe released this one on DVD in the UK around 2000 and Optimum followed this up with a Blu-ray about a decade later. I have been hoping for a proper remaster, especially on UHD Blu-ray, for some time but I can't foresee it happening at the moment. This is unfortunate, although we never know what's going to appear next (when the likes of Vinegar Syndrome are remastering Flesh-Eater for UHD pretty much anything must surely be possible...). I made a comparison between the two aforementioned UK discs, and here's what I found. The DVD is fairly well specified, featuring an essential director commentary, a couple of trailers, some still/text-based features, a half-hour making of, plus a ten minute interview. Conversely, Optimum's Blu-ray is very lazy featuring as it does none of those extras! Strangely though they did take the time to put on an audio and video calibration tool, perhaps out of guilt...? Audio-wise the Blu-ray wins out, presenting the film with either a stereo or DTS-HD 5.1 choice, whereas the DVD features an inferior lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 track. The DTS track is quite powerful and delivers a strong, sweeping experience for its era of production.
The video side of things is of course won out by the Blu-ray. Firstly, the Blu-ray runs at the correct speed of 24 frames per second, as opposed to the inherent PAL speed of 25 fps. The DVD is framed slightly tighter at the top/bottom to give us what would have been the theatrical aspect ratio of 1.85:1, whereas the Blu-ray opens this a touch for 1.78:1. It doesn't make a worthwhile difference. More pleasing though is the increased resolution, giving us better detail, visible grain, higher contrast, and an all round more satisfying image. It could almost certainly be bettered these days (and I think the blacks do get swamped a little). However, it projected to a large screen reasonably well given its age. It's a shame that the Blu-ray is not carrying any real extras, in this case meaning I will keep both discs. For viewing of the film though, the Blu-ray is clearly the way to go, until we get a 4K at some stage...
