Eye of the Needle

The Twilight Time Blu-ray release of the 1981 thriller "Eye of the Needle" brings a well-regarded thriller to bright new life.

Donald Sutherland plays a German spy code named The Needle living in England during World War II. He has a casual, friendly manner -- and a lethal stiletto that he uses without hesitation on anyone who threatens his mission. When The Needle takes photos that reveal a military secret that could turn the course of the war, the clock starts ticking: The Needle must evade the efforts of British police and intelligence to capture him, all while seeking to make contact with a German U-boat waiting to retrieve him in the waters off the Scottish isles.

When the spy's path crosses with that of a young couple living on the aptly-named Storm Island, his relentless, one-track drive stutters: The wife, a beautiful and frustrated woman named Lucy (Kate Nelligan) appeals to him in a profoundly human way he seems to have all but forgotten about. (He certainly had no eyes -- just the stiletto -- for another young woman earlier in the film.) Lucy's husband, David (Christopher Cazenova), trained as a fighter pilot, has had to sit out the war since losing his legs in an accident several years earlier. Lost in a haze of booze and rage, David gives little notice, and zero affection, to either Lucy or their young son. Love and war combine in dangerous ways that put everyone (and the fate of the world) at risk.

The film is scored by the great Miklos Rozsa, and this was his last movie. That fact is enough to bring a music historian, Jon Burlingame, to the Blu-ray's audio commentary track, where he chats with film historians Nick Redman and Julie Kirgo about the music, the Ken Follett novel upon which the movie is based, the careers of the actors in roles major and vanishingly small, and the fact that the director, Richard Marquand, went on to hell :Star Wars, Episode VI: The Return of the Jedi." (Evidently he got the assignment on the strength of this film.) Rozsa's music is also available on a separate isolated score track.

Kirgo also writes the liner notes, providing an essay that hits many of the more salient points from the audio commentary.

The film's 1080 p ti-def transfer looks gorgeous and crisp. Compared to the not-so-high-def original theatrical trailer, also included, the film's colors seem truer and its visual presentation far cleaner.

The film has drawn comparisons to Hitchcock (specifically, "Foreign Correspondent"), and it's not a stretch. "Eye of the Needle" is tense and suspenseful, able to veer into steamy eroticism and back again, and visually stylish -- even if, to modern sensibilities, there are a few unconvincing action shots and glaring holes in plot and character actions. (The era's cinematic sexism is on full display here, though in the end Lucy proves her mettle.)

Once again Twilight Time has brought out a good-looking edition of a worthy film.

"Eye of the Needle"
Blu-ray
$29.95
http://www.twilighttimemovies.com/eye-of-the-needle-blu-ray/