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Classic Clint in High Definition

Pale Rider (1985) throughout various stages of HD awesomeness

My movie collection continues to grow. It does so in the face of trying economic times. It does so during times of less than stellar releases. It does so even when space constraints demand that it cannot. The expansion of my collection is seemingly beyond my control, and although I may not be able to justify it at least I can share my reasons. Clint Eastwood.

This is the fourth time Pale Rider has been added to my collection. I suppose that statement requires a little explanation. Whereas most movie buyers add to their collection title by title, my collection evolves and in some cases that means that one movie can be added multiple times. New formats and editions sometimes warrant repeat purchases.

So what makes Pale Rider worthy of multiple slots in my collection? Firstly, it stars Clint Eastwood and is produced and directed by him. Even without the Eastwood factor it is a definitive movie in the western genre. It is also chock full of “That Guy”s, notably, Richard Kiel aka Jaws (from Bond, not the shark) and the late Chris Penn. And, last but not least, it’s simply a bad-ass movie.

“There’s nothing like a nice piece of hickory.”

The first time I remember seeing Pale Rider was on television. It’s theatrical release was in 1985 and 7 year old me hadn’t yet developed a passion for westerns that would result in an under-aged trip to the theatre. There were many subsequent televised viewings of Pale Rider. For a time it was a staple of the weekend afternoon movie.

Eventually I acquired my own copy of Pale Rider to watch at any time of day or week. This was part of a three movie VHS box-set of Warner Bros. westerns, more specifically Warner Bros Clint Eastwood westerns. The Eastwood Special Collector’s Edition box-set contains The Outlaw Josey Wales, Pale Rider, and Unforgiven.

I subsequently made revisions to this box-set as I developed into somewhat of a movie snob and became a widescreen aficionado. This was long before the “black bars” caused so much turmoil in the home video industry and widescreen or letterboxed versions of movies were quite rare on VHS. Despite this, I managed to replace each tape in the Eastwood box-set with a widescreen counterpart. I kept the box and individual sleeves for each movie because it looks cool.

This was the only time I replaced Clint Eastwood movies with other versions. Clint Eastwood is a personal favourite of mine and his movies are a focal point of my collection. There are currently 70 Eastwood related pieces in it. I currently keep all versions of each movie despite how many times it gets added.

Pale Rider was added to the collection again when the DVD was released, once again in widescreen but this time with DVD quality picture and remastered in 5.1 surround sound. It is one of 16 DVDs that I own under the Clint Eastwood Collection label.  They all share similar packaging, the dreaded snap-case style that is now discontinued but I actually like. These releases also share a lack of special features on the DVDs. Much like the man himself and the characters he plays, Eastwood’s movies don’t come with a lot of fluff.

This brings us to the current Blu-Ray edition addition. It is also presented in the now-accepted letterboxed format and the audio is TrueHD 5.1. As an experiment I compared the DVD version up-converted to 1080p format to the true 1080p Blu-Ray version. The difference is significant. Pale Rider has never looked better. This version also sports no special features and, just like the previous releases, the same cover box art is present.

In short, Pale Rider is a movie that I can watch anytime and anywhere. Having multiple copies on multiple formats just makes sense.

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