Specifications
Red Heat Cover

Studio: Carolco Pictures
Release Date: October 29 (Original Theater Release – 1988), Color, Rated R, 1 Hr 59 min
Resolution: 2,160p (4K), 1080p (2K)
Cameras: Arriflex 35 IIC, Nikon Lenses, Ultracam 35, Ultranon Lenses
Aspect Ratio: 1.85.1, Spherical, Digital Intermediate (DI) – 4K, (2019 Remaster)
Audio: English Dolby Stereo (4 Channels)
Starring: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jim Belushi, Peter Boyle, Ed O’Ross, Laurence Fishburne, Gina Gershon
Director: Luc Besson

Rating

Entertainment:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:

Violence: Yes
Sex: Yes
Language: Bad
MSRP: $22.99 / Amazon – $17.71

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Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Ivan Danko, a Soviet police officer who is attempting to arrest a Moscow drug dealer, Viktor Rostavili (Ed O’Ross). Rostavili escapes and flees to Chicago, Illinois where he is running drug shipments back to the Soviet Union. Danko goes to Chicago and enlists the help of Chicago policeman Art Ridzik (Belushi) to capture Rostavili.

They arrest Rostavili, but he escapes again through Chicago officers who are secretly working for Moscow.

The chase through Chicago is fast and violent, but ultimately, well, this is a Schwarzenneger movie . . . .

Opinion

It is hard to believe that Hollywood movies have been using the s… and f… words for more than 30 years. I wonder which movie first dealt out these vulgarities.

Red Heat Arnold Schwarzenegger

Red Heat Ed O'Ross

Red Heat Jim Belushi

Red Heat exploding bus

The original Red Heat film was scanned at 4K, with a 4K Digital Intermediate (DI), which means it is 4K all the way from film scanning to 4K disc. As a result, it is very sharp. There are some 4K movie discs that have crossed my desk for review where the 4K release had a 2K (1,080p) DI, and although they are upsampled to 4K with algorithms that are probably much more sophisticated than the 2K-to-4K upsampling that our UHD TVs do when viewing a 2K (1,080p) movie disc, they are not really 4K. I don’t know why they do this. Perhaps it is just something that is the only alternative with their current 4K editing software. I will be much happier when all 4K UHD movie disc releases are 4K all the way through production.

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Extras are pretty good, but the most interesting one is the Politics of Red Heat, where they discuss how, in 1988, the political focus in the USA converted from The Cold War to The War on Drugs under the Reagan Administration (1981-1989). It states that the Soviet Union was moving to a more open society and democratic revolution under Mikhail Gorbachev (1980-1990, 1990-1991). Things have changed much since then.