More car business in River’s Edge in 1986

River’s Edge is a 1986 crime drama, staring Keanu Reeves, Crispin Glover, Ione Skye, Daniel Roebuck and Dennis Hopper and is available on iTunes in HD. It was directed by Tim Hunter, who has had a prolific television career with spanning dozens of cult television shows including: Hannibal, Dexter, Mad Men, Deadwood, Homicide: Life on the Street, Eerie Indiana and Twin Peaks. It was written by Highly rated by critics, and a modest success at the box office, the film is unavailable on Blu-ray, so I thought I’d have a look at the iTunes version to see if it worth your time.

River’s Edge 1986. Bored teenagers hanging out.

River’s Edge tells the bleak story of a group of teenage friends, who through apathy and indifference conspire to hide the murder of the girlfriend of one of their members. The body lies on the ‘River’s Edge’ for several days until one of the group notifies the police.

Comparisons to Twin Peaks are interesting, while both concern the murder of a girl, whose body lies on a river-bank, Twin Peaks is a mystery whose characters are caught up in events they don’t fully understand. River’s Edge is more concerned with social issues; although we don’t see the killing, we are never in any doubt who the murderer is. River’s Edge’s characters chilling indifference driven by deprivation and broken homes is what holds our attention. However, both take time to create tone and texture.

iTunes 1080p Review

Keanu Reeves and Chrispin Gloover in River’s Edge (1986)

Compared to an earlier DVD release I had lying around River’s Edge, the iTunes version is much sharper, has better grain and is a little bit warmer in color. Otherwise the transfers look very similar. There might be a few percent difference in framing (the iTunes edition is slightly wider on the top) but it’s hard to to be sure.

Some scenes appear to have had DVNR applied to reduce grain (possibly to improve compression), it doesn’t look terrible, but motion throws up some artifacts.

There is a little artifacting on areas of motion that is not objectionable.

Conclusions

River’s Edge – You know you are in trouble when Dennis Hopper looks freaked out.

The iTunes HD edition of River’s Edge is overall 4 out of 5: Good. I’m bumping up from fair, because it’s a small film. The occasional noise reduction means it’s more of a sideways step from the DVD than a clear improvement, though. An unfiltered Blu-ray of the same transfer would have room for improvement, but as it stands the iTunes edition is worth your time, at least as a rental.

FTC Disclosure: I am an iTunes affiliate advertiser, this means that if you click on one of the links above, I get a very small amount of money.