Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead 4K 1995 Ultra HD 2160p

The story of Jimmy the Saint making a “personnel” mistake in selecting people for a trifling case. A powerful and extremely unpleasant crime boss, paralyzed from the neck down, asks an old friend who has taken up legitimate business to scare the boyfriend of a girl his dorky son is obsessively in love with, and the goons selected by Jimmy for the case kill both of them instead. An enraged Walken orders everyone but Jimmy killed, giving his friend 48 hours to disappear. But Jimmy can't leave his friends behind, and he's just had an affair with a charming young beauty....

User Review

The movie is quality, elegant, for a viewer ‘with demands’ and ‘with taste’.

The script is very good, even fresh, despite all the limited and hackneyed action themes. About its philosophical depth, I would not ‘spill over’. For an intelligent viewer, everything lies on the surface. Simply, the banal gangster problems are approached with “universal” measures. In my opinion, the main value of the movie, as a real work of art, lies in its versatility. In the diversity of perception. From different points, sides, angles, etc. Words are cramped, but thoughts are spacious. Where Tarantino would have had another crack from the big back of his head, here there are silent but very colorful pictures. Giant contrasting ‘photos’, the brightest strokes of the cameraman's brush.

The movie can be perceived as a Tragedy. Classic or ‘little man’ (well, criminal). Handsome guy Jimmy in his prime with the face of a white clown. Been through a lot and realized a lot. Caught in the clutches of a nasty villain. And this Kashchei is pleased to mock the handsome man, since the villain himself is a paralytic confined to a gurney. Our hero is made an offer, which he can not refuse. He has already figured it all out. Jimmy calls four friends, and from his offer they, in turn, also can not refuse. They, too, have figured it out. The clod of doom rolls and grows.

The assignment they fail, of course. And the villain gets the “legal” right to take them out. Another cleaner comes along. And he takes out the Friends. Meanwhile, Jimmy takes out Kaschey's son. That retarded son is the reason the boys are killed.

Jimmy dies beautifully, like a communard on Père Lachaise. The villain Kashchey dies of indignation. It's pure tragedy.

From another angle, it's Drama. The Shakespearean framework is enveloped in psychologism.

Jimmy is the moral hero. His nickname is Saint. He used to be a gangster, then he “quit”, this time - he was forced into it. After the Failure of the Saint Jimmy is desperate to save his friends. Help your neighbor - and on this he spends his last hours.

From the proximity of imminent reprisal, each character's essence is revealed. We see how differently citizens “criminals” approach the gates of oblivion.

One is frozen with fear, hides and dies like a coward. Another - like a bird, in panic worries, saving the nest with children and wife. The third waits for the end philosophically, stirring memories and summarizing. The fourth, the main perpetrator of the collective ‘bummer’ nicknamed Critical Bill, is determined to take and win the fight. His mental mobilization and natural courage in the face of death are rewarded - with the executioner he has a draw, on the other side of the world go together, even in an embrace.

Jimmy has a beloved girl, and that she can also suffer, he realized not immediately. Because he's not a gangster. Giving up love, Jimmy saves the girl. The last moral act of the Hero - he makes a beautiful child to a young battered prostitute who wants to “break up”, become a mother and start a new life.

By design, this movie is a creche. The demise of spiders and spiders in a jar. The first thing that popped up in my mind was the comparison to an aquarium. The faces of all the characters resemble cold and wary fish faces. There is no expression on them. Predatory fish frozen in hiding. The flocks of Denver residents hover and watch. Only five frightened-to-death fish flit about. They've been tagged. They've been taken by the gills. They bang against the glass walls. They are eaten, quickly.

The decor of the movie is a narrator, a storyteller, an entertainer, an ex-con, or whatever you like. Also - intercutting videotapes with ‘farewells’ of dying old men. The last video is Jimmy's own deathbed speech. In my opinion, it's a little too artistic. The moral of the fable, which is chiseled to you and so and so, although you have long understood (as each of the characters).

The selection of actors is very accurate. The movie was ‘made’ by the Artists. Therefore, I don't waste time on individual praise. Everyone plays within the framework of their favorite roles, but in ‘Denver’ the ‘standard’ images sparkled as after washing. For example: Andy Garcia's beauty is not so catchy, but here she stands out sharply against the rest of the mass of faces, floating above them like an icon. At the beginning of the movie, he's a smarmy pretty boy. After the Sentence - a romantic hero - thin clean lines of the face, tears frozen in the depths of the eyes, tragedy in his intonations, Selflessness. Whoever their bearer is in the movie, the nobility of the soul is with him, and we can see it.

The first and last shots are interesting. An insane bandit's son breaks into a closed children's institution and molests a girl. She's not afraid of him! 'What do you want, asshole?' At the end of the movie, the murdered friends take a yacht out to sea. It's what they always wanted and wished for each other when they were alive. Ordinary people don't fear or see people like them. 'Such' live and moribund in their own world, their own aquarium. And they see ‘this glass’ all the time.

Info Video

Codec: HEVC / H.265 (90.0 Mb/s)
Resolution: Native 4K (2160p)
HDR: Dolby Vision, HDR10
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1

Info Audio

#English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
#English: FLAC 2.0
#English: Dolby Digital 2.0 (Commentary by director Gary Fleder and writer Scott Rosenberg)
#English: Dolby Digital 2.0 (Commentary by filmmaker/historian Daniel Kremer)

Info Subtitles