Disc Reviews

The Man From U.N.C.L.E 4k Review

• 27th Jul 2024

The Man From U.N.C.L.E stars Henry Cavil, Armie Hammer and Alicia Vikander as a set of spies from east, west and in the middle – set up together on a mission – but not before they all knock heads and test each other’s patience and physical abilities in a series of engaging stunt heavy spectacles.

MFU (which I will try to refer to this film as from here on!) balances a very uneven and often preposterous scale of jumbled intent, childlike humour, cheesy lines, but branded with rougher-edged action, and fairly adult humour. And yet, despite all that chaos, It works!

MFU is a slightly deviant spy film, made in an era when spy films and the retro spy were still fashionable to make. Guy Ritchie decided to give this one a decidedly different flavour. His style of shooting certainly lends itself to that, but fully supported by a full-on score from Daniel Pemberton. You will remember the music from this one.

There is a fun supporting cast including Hugh Grant, Elisabeth Debicki and Jarden Harris, all gleefully game for the full course.

The commentary track is very informative – going all the way back to talk about the original show and all of the attempts to get the franchise back to the small and eventual big screen.

The biggest offender is “Cockneys and Robbers” a fairly lazy interview with three media representatives talking very basically over Guy Ritchie’s back catalogue of films.  There isn’t much in the way of analysis, (some films are skipped over entirely) and there are persistent clips from The Man From U.N.C.L.E spliced in for no reason other than it’s the main feature on this disc.  At one point one of the film critics completely cocks up by referring to Robert Downey Jr’s wife as Emma (It’s Susan). With the lax effort put into this extra, it really shouldn’t be too much of a surprise that their facts are badly checked as they barely burrow below the surface of the material. It doesn’t even work as a decent advert for the other films as you don’t see any footage from them. Had they invited better participants, shown footage of the films, and sunk deeper, you could easily have had a feature-length extra that sold the material well and been a great delve into the director’s career thus far.  It’s a great example of a great idea for an extra being very poorly executed.  Arrow need to clamp down on the amount of media personalities they use for their extras and the quality of input these individuals are willing or capable of bringing.

That disappointment aside the rest of the bulk of the extras do dissolve into onset featurettes made for the publicity at the time of the film’s release in theatres. That’s fine that they are here for the sake of having as much material as they can muster. You get to see some of the shooting footage of the crew behind the camera and the usual talking heads promoting the film, but when you get a focus on character, stunts or effects you can at least pull some usual information from it.

Steven Hurst

Full contents:

4K ULTRA HD BLU-RAY LIMITED EDITION CONTENTS

• 4K (2160p) UHD Blu-ray™ presentation in Dolby Vision (HDR10/compatible)
• Original lossless Dolby Atmos sound
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Brand new audio commentary by critics Bryan Reesman and Max Evry
• The Hollywood Way – brand new interview with co-writer/producer Lionel Wigram
• A Lineage of Bad Guys – brand new interview with actor Luca Calvani
• Legacy of U.N.C.L.E. – brand new featurette celebrating the original 1960s TV series and its influence on the 2015 movie, featuring Helen McCarthy, David Flint and Vic Pratt
• Cockneys and Robbers – brand new featurette exploring director Guy Ritchie’s oeuvre, featuring Kat Hughes, Hannah Strong and Josh Saco
• Spy Vision: Recreating 60s Cool, A Higher Class of Hero, Metisse Motorcycles: Proper and Very British, The Guys from U.N.C.L.E. and A Man of Extraordinary Talents – five archival featurettes exploring the making of the film
• U.N.C.L.E.: On-Set Spy – four archival, bite-sized featurettes going behind the scenes on the film set
• Theatrical trailer
• Image gallery
• Double-sided fold-out poster, featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Dare Creative
• Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing by Barry Forshaw, and a reprinted article from CODEX Magazine on the film’s cinematography
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Dare Creative

The Man From U.N.C.L.E is out on 29^th July