Bound for Glory

Rating:
Summary: SOUNDTRACK WAS FINE
Review: Unfortunately, for months I was frightened away from purchasing this movie, because one reviewer a year ago said the DVD soundtrack was such a bad transfer it was difficult to hear the dialog at certain points. Finally I decided I wanted to see this classic film so bad, I'd risk the bad sound. To my surprise and delight, I discovered no problem at all with the sound -- and I'm usually ultra-critical of fuzzy sound, which normally drives me up the wall. If, in fact, there was any sound problem on early prints of the DVD version, it appears to have now been corrected in the later prints. The viewer discovers belatedly, at the end of one music sequence, that it was tinny-sounding on purpose, because one of the characters was listening on an old-fashioned wind-up phonograph -- a nuance easy to miss if you blinked in the wrong place. In a few other sequences, the movie appears to utilize early-day recordings by the real Guthrie -- which helps rather than hinders the impact. True, the soundtrack technology in this 1976 movie is not up to modern-day Dolby Surround Sound standards -- but it's amazingly good for a 25-year-old soundtrack. Relax, and enjoy the Academy Award-winning Depression Era photography of Haskel Wexler that will make you feel you've stepped into a Walker Evans photograph of 1936 Dust Bowl refugees fleeing to the supposed golden land of California. Almost every scene is suitable for framing. Not to be missed. A "must buy" for collectors.