Oscilloscope Laboratories Picks Apr. 2 For The Release Of DVD And Blu-ray Editions Of Documentary Filmmaker Amy Scott's Hal

Oscilloscope Laboratories will be bringing documentary filmmaker Amy Scott’s Hal to the home entertainment marketplace on Apr. 2 as both DVD and Blu-ray production offerings.

This tribute to legendary auteur filmmaker Hal Ashby opened at the Sundance early last year, played the film festival circuit and then had a brief arthouse theatrical pop right after Labor Day.   

Unless you were lucky enough to catch Hal at one of these venues, Apr. 2 will be the next window of availability when it arrives on DVD and Blu-ray … if you enjoy the movies — even casually — then this one is a must-have come the first of April.   If you have a film library, then it is likely that you have one or more of his cinematic gems in your collection.   Harold and Maude!   Being There!   Coming Home!  Bound for Glory!   If so, Hal needs to be a companion piece.

For the record, the ARR works out to 207 days and its limited (10 screen) theatrical run produced revenues of $48,579.

Hal Ashby made absolutely brilliant films in the 1970s.   Without college or a film school education, Ashby arrived in Hollywood in 1956 and learned the craft of film editing (as an assistant) on such films as Friendly Persuasion, The Big Country and The Diary of Anne Frank.   

By the mid-60s he had advanced from assistant film editor to editor and cut such films as The Loved One and then four films for his mentor, Norman Jewison — The Cincinnati Kid (1965), The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming! (1966, nominated for an Oscar), In the Heat of the Night (1967, he won the Oscar for Best Film Editing) and The Thomas Crown Affair (1968).

Over ten years learning the craft — it served him well as a filmmaker in his own right.   It is said that he could see and assemble the film that he was directing in his head; he knew where to set up and what to shoot.

Amy Scott’s Hal covers his early film industry history and then hits its stride with a loving look back at his films, with “comments” from Ashby — drawn from tapes, letters and memos from the period — which is blended nicely  with interviews and remembrances from many of those who worked with him — Louis Gossett Jr. (The Land Lord), Jon Voight (Coming Home), Norman Jewison … it is a long and impressive list.

In May of 1970 his first film as a director hit theatres, it was the film adaptation of the Kristin Hunter’s 1966 novel, The Land Lord, which earned Lee Grant an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress and starred Beau Bridges.   

The film starts off one way, a comedy about Elgar Enders, a privileged white kid (actually 29, but still a “kid” in so many ways), who impulsively buys an apartment house in the middle of Harlem.   He plans to “gentrify” it, which lends itself to sort of a sitcom-feeling (you can imagine a television comedy spinning off of the first act of the film).   

But then Hal Ashby, takes the film in an entirely different direction come the second act.   The Land Lord becomes as an insightful look at race relationships, class and literally the attitudes of “limousine liberals.” 

 

During the Christmas season of 1971, one of the greatest romantic comedies of all time opened theatrically.   It was a strange love story blessed with a knock-your-socks-off soundtrack … and many, many laugh-out-loud scenes.   Off course we are talking about Bud Cort and Ruth Gordon in Harold and Maude.   Brilliant!

Hal Ashby had hit his stride and in the next eight years he delivered The Last Detail (Jack Nicholson nominated Best Actor), Shampoo (Lee Grant wins the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress), Bound for Glory (six Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, with Haskell Wexler winning for Best Cinematography), Coming Home (eight Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director, with Best Actor and Best Actress wins for Jon Voight and Jane Fonda) and one of the most amazing political satirical comedies ever made, Being There, complete with a genius performance by Peter Sellars as Chance (nominated Best Actor). 

Then came the “studio wars” and the decline in Ashby’s career … two days after Christmas in 1988, at just 59 years of age, he was gone.

Amy Scott’s Hal captures it all, the man, the filmmaker, the films … a must for cinephiles.

Bonus features included with Hal are commentary with filmmaker Amy Scott, who is joined by producers Christine Beebe, Brian Morrow, Jonathan Lynch and Lisa Janssen, plus a behind-the-scenes reel and the featurette titled “The Cutting Room Floor.”