NOTE: The below Blu-ray and 4K UHD captures were taken directly from the respective discs.

ADDITION: Blue Underground 4K UHD (January  2021): Blue Underground have transferred William Lustig's Vigilante to 4K UHD. It is cited as being from a "new restoration, scanned in 4K 16-bit from the original 35mm camera negative, with Dolby Vision HDR and Dolby Atmos audio." It's a big leap from their own 2010 Blu-ray compared below. Every visual facet improves from more accurate flesh tones (losing their yellow hue of the 1080P) to superior lines and contrast. It has over double the bitrate of the BD and exhibits wonderfully fine grain textures. It's pretty much a perfect 2160 transfer - faithfully representing the original elements. I am very high on this 4K UHD appearance. The colors are very rich but I think the HDR application is relatively restrained here - which I appreciate. 'Wow' is an understatement. 

It is likely that the monitor you are seeing this review is not an HDR-compatible display (High Dynamic Range) or Dolby Vision, where each pixel can be assigned with a wider and notably granular range of color and light. Our capture software if simulating the HDR (in a uniform manner) for standard monitors. This should make it easier for us to review more 4K UHD titles in the future and give you a decent idea of its attributes on your system. So our captures may not support the exact same colors (coolness of skin tones, brighter or darker hues etc.) as the 4K system at your home. But the framing, detail, grain texture support etc. are, generally, not effected by this simulation representation.

NOTE: 78 more more full resolution (3840 X 2160) 4K UHD captures, in lossless PNG format, for Patrons are available HERE

We have reviewed the following 4K UHD packages to date: Cinema Paradiso (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Bourne Legacy (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Full Metal Jacket (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Psycho (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Birds(software uniformly simulated HDR), Rear Window (software uniformly simulated HDR), Vertigo (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Spartacus (software uniformly simulated HDR), Jaws (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Invisible Man, (software uniformly simulated HDR), Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds (software uniformly simulated HDR), Lucio Fulci's 1979 Zombie  (software uniformly simulated HDR),, 2004's Van Helsining (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Shallows (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Bridge on the River Kwai (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Deer Hunter (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Elephant Man (software uniformly simulated HDR), A Quiet Place (software uniformly simulated HDR), Easy Rider (software uniformly simulated HDR), Suspiria (software uniformly simulated HDR), Pan's Labyrinth (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Wizard of Oz, (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Shining, (software uniformly simulated HDR), Batman Returns (software uniformly simulated HDR), Don't Look Now (software uniformly simulated HDR), The Man Who Killed Killed and then The Bigfoot  (software uniformly simulated HDR),,  Bram Stoker's Dracula (software uniformly simulated HDR), Lucy (software uniformly simulated HDR), They Live (software uniformly simulated HDR),  Shutter Island (software uniformly simulated HDR),  The Matrix (software uniformly simulated HDR), Alien (software uniformly simulated HDR), Toy Story (software uniformly simulated HDR),  A Few Good Men (software uniformly simulated HDR),  2001: A Space Odyssey (HDR caps udated), Schindler's List (simulated HDR), The Neon Demon (No HDR), Dawn of the Dead (No HDR), Saving Private Ryan (simulated HDR and 'raw' captures), Suspiria (No HDR), The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (No HDR), The Big Lebowski, and I Am Legend (simulated and 'raw' HDR captures).

If you are fortunate enough to have a setup that allows for Dolby Atmos or Dolby TrueHD 7.1 - on their 4K UHD, Blue Underground offer audio in a robust expression in the original English language. The effects (from elevator to workshop to screams and gunfire) plus a, very 80's electronic/Carpenter-esque, score by Jay Chattaway (Silver Bullet, Maniac, Maniac Cop) that has never sounded so crisp and deep. There is other music; Vigilante sung by Hector Lavoe, Pase la noche fumando performed by Willie Colón, Juanito alimana, I Can't Laugh and Smokin. Blue Underground also offer options of DTS-HD Master in 5.1 and 2.0 plus lossy Dolby French, German and Italian DUBs. optional English (SDH), French, Spanish or Portuguese subtitles on their Region FREE 4K UHD. All 4K UHD discs are region FREE.

Firstly, the package includes a second disc Blu-ray and this is a new transfer sharing the same extras (some new!) and commentaries as the 4K UHD. The Blue Underground offers the two previously made commentaries; William Lustig and Co-Producer Andrew Garroni and a second with Lustig and stars Robert Forster, Fred Williamson and Frank Pesce. This second is more laid back by comparison and enjoyment of each other's camaraderie. There is a third, new, commentary by Troy Howarth and Nathaniel Thompson. They discuss the director's intentions to express Poliziotteschi films and spaghetti westerns but also being influenced by Italy's 'Urban paranoia' films made in the years previous to production, they identify the link to Edward Woodward's The Equalizer (1985–1989) TV series, interesting ties to William Friedkin and much more. It was great - love these guys. What is also new is 25-minutes worth of interviews in Blue Collar DEATH WISH, where we hear from writer Richard Vetere, star Rutanya Alda, associate Producer/First A.D./actor Randy Jurgensen, and others - nice to hear them reminisce. There is also a new 25-minute interview with composer Jay Chattaway entitled Urban Western focusing on his creation of the score. After that are a handful of theatrical trailers, 4 TV Spots, a Radio Spot, a 3-minute promotional reel that starts with this text: "A couple of weeks prior to principal photography, we needed a promo reel for a now defunct but then important film sales market in Milan, Italy (MIFED) to generate interest in foreign pre-sales. We desperately needed cash for the production, and these foreign distribution agreements could be leveraged for goods and services, and sometimes even cash, but that's more complicated.
So, for little money we got:
- Fred Williamson to give us a day (we told Screen Actors Guild that we were shooting a wardrobe test so he wouldn't get into trouble)
- Agfa to give us 10,000' of 35mm film stock to "test" (we ultimately shot the film primarily with Kodak)
- Panavision cameras to do "lens tests"
- Our friends and crew as free extras
- TVC Laboratories to give us free processing because its then president Dan Sandberg was (and is) a great guy
This promo was screened on a closed circuit television system throughout the halls of the convention center about every hour with a tag at the end for the sales agent's location. This resulted in sales to Scandinavia, South America and a few other smaller territories. But even more important, it put the film on distributors' radars which resulted in packed Cannes Film Festival market screenings", plus there are poster and still galleries and the package contains a collectible booklet with new essay by Michael Gingold and sports a 3D Lenticular Slipcover (First Pressing Only.)  As stated all these extras are on both included Blu-ray and feature 4K UHD disc.

One of the best of this lesser genre with stark New York street realism and helping to engender the 'revenge factor' theme of a society pushed too far. My 2010 Blu-ray review stated: "If I ever do a stint in the 'Big House' (not totally out of the question, I suppose) - I can only hope that a grizzled, leather-skinned Woody Strode type is watching my back. The Vigilante has strong appeal - we are exposed these days to so much criminal-activity news and individual human violence that tends to make for sellable, human-interest, copy. So, yes we can all get fed-up with the injustice that surrounds us. Who better to play the distraught everyman from the early 80's than Robert Forster and who better to lead the vigilante's than stalwart "The Hammer" Fred Williamson. I only wish there was more..." Vigilante is my personal favorite the Lustig oeuvre - by quite a margin. I have watched this many times. It captures this particular down-and-dirty genre so quintessentially. The 4K UHD is magnificent. If I had it in 2020 it would have made my year end Top 10. I'm thrilled with this package and can't wait for similar effort for Antonioni and Bresson's cinema in this newer format.  

Gary Tooze