War And Romance
The Last of the Mohicans centers around the love of a Mohican, Hawkeye, and that of a young English girl, Cora Munro (played by Madeleine Stowe) set against the French and Indian War during the middle of the 1700s. Hawkeye (Day-Lewis) is a trapper who along with two of his ‘brothers’ find themselves protecting Munro and other British from the continuing pursuit of Magua, a bloodthirsty Huron who has allied his tribe with the French. While on the run, Hawkeye and Munro fall in love, much to the disdain of Major Duncan Heyward (Steven Waddington) who has long sought the hand of Cora Munro.
The nearly two hour movie is a war film first, and a romantic drama second, but the genres are blended effectively. Expect large scale cannon and firing line war scenes, along with some brutal melee combat from the Hurons and Mohicans to go along with your quiet, drama-romance scenes. Overall, the pacing and length were reasonable (not too uncommon for films like this to run on far too long), but there are still enough slow and thick dramatic scenes to make it hard to watch this film very often. On that note, unless you’re particularly passionate about it, a rental will more than likely suffice.
The Blu-ray
This Blu-ray version does present itself with very good image and sound quality. There are a lot of good examples of detail in the film, from the gorgeous outdoor environments to the detail of the soldiers’ uniforms. The image quality does a nice job of making this film standout with vibrant colors and tones and crisp edges. The 5.1 DTS-HD audio track doesn’t disappoint either, and there is also support for English, Spanish, and French subtitles.
For extra features, there is a commentary track with Director Michael Mann, and, get this, an all new “Making of” documentary. That they actually recorded a new ‘Making Of’ feature with both cast and crew, including Director Mann and Actors Day-Lewis and Stowe, and others, is very unusual and actually quite impressive. This feature runs for nearly forty-three minutes and is in HD. The interviews are set against scenes from the finished movie as well as behind the scenes and production footage which is nice.
With that, let’s get to the summary…