Stiletto is a slow burn thriller and while I don’t mind these sorts of movies, there’s little suspense or thrills and sorely underwritten characters, particularly the main as portrayed with little charisma by Alex Cord.
Stiletto
(1969)
Genre(s): Suspense Thriller, Crime, Drama
Kino Lorber| R – 101 min. – $24.95 | March 30, 2021
Date Published: 03/16/2021 | Author: The Movieman
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Kino Lorber provided me with a free copy of the Blu-ray I reviewed in this Blog Post.
The opinions I share are my own.
THE MOVIE — 2¼/5 |
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Plot Synopsis: Count Cesare Cardinali (ALEX CORD) is a rich jet-setting playboy with a secret life as a professional hitman for the mob. He becomes a human target when he tries to retire, and gets embroiled in an investigation of New York’s mafia kingpin (JOSEPH WISEMAN), who had once saved his life. Quick Hit Review: Stiletto is a slow placed crime-thriller and while I don’t mind these types of movies, which I think seems to be pretty common for the 1960s (In Like Flint comes to mind), this one was on the confusing side early on. But even when things begin to make sense, I found myself disengaged with characters that aren’t terribly fleshed out and it culminates with a tension-free finale that was unsatisfying, albeit not wholly predictable, so at least there’s that. On the positive front, the movie did seem to be competently directed by Bernard L. Kowalski, whose career has been comprised of mostly television shows, including the pilot episode for Mission: Impossible and worked on Jake and the Fatman and Knight Rider to name a few, and also helmed the snake sci-fi/horror flick, Sssssss. There was a couple interesting shots, such as a dance sequence with some frames from above that looked cool. Otherwise, however, nothing that really stood out. |
SPECIAL FEATURES – 1/5 |
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The only feature is an Audio Commentary with Film Historian David Del Valle and Filmmaker David DeCotea. The movie might not be much good, but I did enjoy listening to these two as they delve out background information on the production. |
VIDEO – 4½/5 |
| Kino Lorber releases Stiletto onto Blu-ray for the first time with a new 1080p high-definition transfer taken from a 4K master. The picture for the most part does look quite good, detail is relatively sharp throughout and colors do seem to be well balanced. Though I can’t really compare it to any previous DVD releases, I have to assume this is a significant upgrade over anything that has come before. There were a few minor specs but otherwise it’s a pretty clean transfer. |
AUDIO – 4/5 |
| As with most of KL’s releases for older films, the disc comes with a standard but perfectly serviceable DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 track. Given there’s really not a whole lot of action, at least in terms of explosions and gunfire, this is a fine lossless track, dialogue comes across with good clarity and I didn’t notice any significant popping though I did discern some minor hissing here and there, however nothing I’d consider all that distracting. |
OVERALL – 2½/5 |
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Stiletto is a slow burn thriller and while I don’t mind these sorts of movies, there’s little suspense or thrills and sorely underwritten characters, particularly the main as portrayed with little charisma by Alex Cord. The Blu-ray release does at least have adequate video and audio transfers and the included commentary is worth listening to. |
Check out some more 1080p screen caps by going to page 2. Please note, these do contain spoilers.