The Dark Half - 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray

Back in 2014, my colleague Mr. Duarte sat down to review the first Blu-ray release of The Dark Half (which now oddly commands a ridiculous price tag). I largely agree with his assessment of this film, but I’d give Romero’s final Stephen King adaptation effort a little more credit. Of the catalog of King stories to make it to the big and small screen, I credit Romeros’ efforts here among the more faithful to the source. Part of that comes out of Romero’s past association with King and working with the novelist so closely that he understood what irked King about changes to his novels and stories. Now I wouldn’t call this the best King novel nor would I the best King adaptation, but I think it’s a damn good one and a very creepy endeavor. 

Taking a page out of King’s real double life writing stories under a pseudonym, The Dark Half follows novelist Thad Beaumont (Timothy Hutton). By day, he’s a college writing professor and a novelist scraping out a living writing haughty fiction that doesn’t sell. By night, he writes hyper-violent pulp murder stories under the pen name George Stark - and Stark sells novels. But when Thad’s secret is exposed by a blackmailer, Thad and his wife Liz (Amy Madigan) decide to “bury” Stark once and for all in a big publicity stunt. Only Stark doesn’t want to stay dead. Manifesting into a physical form George Stark (also Hutton) goes on one last murder spree killing the people in Thad’s life one by one. 

Now there’s a thing with Stephen King books and by extension their film adaptations - you’re either fully on board with some of the crazier plot lines, or you’re not. And some of those ideas just don't fully translate to the screen. Now, an evil pseudonym comes to life and kills people, all believable within King's wheelhouse. The explanation of “Psychopomps” and the Sparrows is kind of a gloss-over piece of the storyline plot pie. They’re just sort of “there to be there," but they’re also an intricate piece of the plot you’re just asked to accept. As my colleague, Mr. Duarte pointed out in his review, the audience is in the same position as Michael Rooker’s Sheriff Alan Pangborn of just having to make some sort of sense of it and accept it all to enjoy the parts of the story that work. 

And what works is Timothy Hutton. While he and George Romero had a tough working relationship because Hutton was going full Method, his performances as Thad and Stark are killers. Hutton went deep for this little horror film and it’s impressive to see these creative decisions come to life. On one side he’s an average man panicking about the horror unleashed upon his loved ones. On the other side, Hutton looks like he’s having a devil of a good time as the manifestation of the evil Id unleashed. And when we finally get both personalities in the same room for the climax, it’s a masterful performance from an incredible talent perfectly directed and captured on film by Romero. But focusing only on Hutton would undercut the great work Amy Madigan delivered alongside a solid psycho-free turn from Rooker. This film also features the final appearance of veteran character actor and genre fan favorite Royal Dano before he passed away in 1994. 

Made when Orion was in its financial dire straits, the film, unfortunately, sat on a shelf for over two years before release and didn’t make much of a splash financially. I have a hunch that had this The Dark Half been released in 1991 when Hutton was still somewhat hot off his Oscar win, it could have ridden the coattails of Misery and not be a pre-game show for Needful Things. But that’s all speculation on my side. Sadly after this film’s release, Romero went through that years-long period where he was doing a ton of studio work doing rewrites and getting projects rolling and even greenlit but sadly without getting a film actually made until 2000's Bruiser. This time included his work on a Resident Evil adaptation. Had The Dark Half been a bigger success, we can only imagine what kind of Romero films we could have gotten.

Ultimately, the way I look at The Dark Half is Romero took a perfectly decent and entertaining Stephen King novel and made a perfectly decent horror film out of it. Perhaps not the greatest film or story from either creative personality in their respective fields, but it’s still a good creepy show for a dark night with the lights out. I’ve come back to The Dark Half several times over the years and I’m always left entertained by it. In lesser hands, this film could have been an outright disaster. In Romero's, it's a solid, well-made creeper.

Vital Disc Stats: The 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray
Thanks to Vinegar Syndrome, George A. Romer’s adaptation of Stephen King’s The Dark Half returns to physical media. The film lives a double life with a BD100 serving the 4K version of the film and a Region A BD50 offering up the 1080p version and the bulk of the extra features. Each disc loads to an animated main menu with a basic navigation system. The discs are housed in a standard two-disc black case with reversible insert art offering either the new custom art or the original poster art. If you ordered the film from Vinegar Syndrome or are a subscriber, you get a custom slipcover with a hardstock slipcase complete with a booklet offering essays and photos.

For this release, Vinegar Syndrome dug up a heck of a 2160p Dolby Vision transfer sourced from a new 4K scan of the original negative. Brass tacks, straight to the punch, it’s a beauty. Initially, I was worried about how some of the dated optical effects would turn out, namely whenever we see both Thad and Stark in the same shot, but impressively they come off well. You can still see some of the optical lines for the Stark head when the two finally meet face-to-face, but for a 35-year-old film made just before the digital revolution kicked off, it still works! Throughout the run, details are razor sharp and the moody atmospheric visuals from Cinematographer Tony Pierce-Roberts look terrific in 4K. 

Pierce-Roberts and Romero also didn’t really see eye-to-eye at times for some of the lighting schemes, but the result is one of the best-looking Romero pictures of his entire catalog. Helps when you get a guy who shot most of the Merchant/Ivory catalog at that time. Facial features, clothing textures, production design, and the amazing makeup work for Stark’s decaying face are all captured beautifully. The re-shot ending is still a mish-mash of effects. The stop-motion pieces work the best, and as George points out in the commentary if it was left to him that last shot wouldn’t exist. But small dated visual effects shots are really my only gripe here. The Dolby Vision grade is impressive letting the film’s fall-like colors shine while giving plenty of punch for primaries. The hallway scene where Stark meets the reporter and the shifting red and blue light effect with the dark shadows is dynamite stuff. Black levels are right on point. The film grain looks tight and cinematic.

On the audio side, we have what sounds like the same DTS-HD MA 2.0 and 5.1 from the 2014 disc and I have no complaints there. Overall I agree with what Mr. Duarte said in his review that the 2.0 track probably is the track that’s most authentic to the original experience, but I actually really like the 5.1 mix. It’s not overly aggressive with the sound design but its subtleties make a lot of the film work. When Thad hears the sparrows chirping, how that moves through the soundscape is great stuff. Likewise, a lot of the film’s sound design gets these little effective punches in the imaging and staging to give the surround channels some purpose and not just filler effects. With that, the 2.0 track is excellent on its own. Both tracks have strong dialog and let the haunting Christopher Young score work its magic. 

True to form for Vinegar Syndrome, we get a little old mixed with the new. All of the archival materials from the 2014 release are here, including the great commentary track between Romero and Stuart Andrews. It’s a hell of a track as the pair get into the nitty gritty aspects of making the film but in a lighthearted way that’s very entertaining to listen to. Of the new materials, we get two great chats with assistant director and long-time Romero collaborator Nick Mastandrea and then Cinematographer Tony Pierce-Roberts. While these aren’t long extras, they’re quality and give a good look at the film, including the original ending in the deleted footage. 

• Audio Commentary featuring George Romero moderated by Stuart Andrews 
• NEW My Roots with Romero - Interview with Nick Mastandrea (HD 11:31)
• NEW A Merchant Ivory Cameraman in Pittsburgh - Interview with Cinematographer Tony Pierce-Roberts (HD 10:09)
• Shadows of the Past: Locating The Dark Half (HD 5:14)
• George Romero and the City of the Living Dead (SD 10:02)
• The Sparrows are Flying Again: The Making of The Dark Half (HD 36:29)
• EPK Making-Of Featurette (SD 6:48)
• EPK Interviews (SD 7:05)
• Behind-the-Scenes Footage (SD 24:24)
• Deleted Scenes (SD 7:42)
• Storyboards
• Image Gallery
• TV Spot
• Trailer

The Dark Half finds itself in that rung of Stephen King adaptations that aren’t terrible by any stretch but aren’t often remembered among the best of the best. I think part of that is because as a novel, it’s one of the slightly better-than-average efforts from King. It’s a good book, not great. Romero made that book into a good but not amazing film. I very much like this film, I think Romero did a heck of a job staying faithful to the source and despite their creative differences, he pulled a hell of a performance out of Timothy Hutton as Thad/Stark. The Dark Half gets to turn the page on physical media with a brand new two-disc 4K UHD release from Vinegar Syndrome. The new Dolby Vision transfer is a terrific effort, the two audio options are impressive, and the mix of new and archival extras will keep you busy after the show is over. If you’re a fan of the film, it’s an easy one to call Recommended.