The Hitcher

This release of the 4K restoration of The Hitcher comes with a slew of special features. The most important aspect is of course the quality of the film.

The anamorphic landscapes and Mark Isham's score benefit hugely. The stage: the desert, the mountains and the cloudy skies have so much more detail and texture, these beautiful timeless backdrops contrapuntal to the violence of the narrative. You can now sometimes see Ryder's big black pickup far off in the background of some scenes. It makes his presence felt where it wasn't before and his appearance in later scenes more logical. Some of the now visible details may make you reassess Harmon's directorial intent. The stickers in the window of the murdered family's car: are they far right, racist dog whistles? Has Harmon placed just placed Jim Halsey in the position of an innocent Black man caught in the American justice system, with Hauer's Ryder as the trickster aspect of the Badman?

The sound is crystal clear. The enhanced timbre and presence of the enchanting music adds a lot to the film. It's more haunting when the film is still, and the more distinct layering of sound in the action sequences increases the tension.

When it comes to the special features, the standouts are the two short films, China Lake and Telephone. China Lake was Robert Harmon's calling card. It really shows his promise as a director and his mastery of the desert as a visual medium. Telephone is by the screenwriter Eric Red. The visual quality of this short has suffered a little from the ravages of time but that doesn't detract from the tight and sometimes surprising script. There are also some of the original trailers that are fun to watch. They, as you would expect, somewhat misrepresent the film.

The main body of the special features are hours of interviews and audio commentaries. There is a lot of interesting stuff in those, but at well over ten hours they do end up becoming repetitious. Alexandra Heller-Nicholas' appraisal of the film as a critique of toxic masculinity is the exception. It is certainly a valid interpretation of the film - there is plenty in the The Hitcher to support it - but she does have a tenancy to shape the evidence to fit her thesis.

The menu system on the disk is clear and bug free; however, the sheer quantity of special features makes that part a little hard to navigate.