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  Directed by
  Starring
  Specs
  • Widescreen 1.85:1
  • 16:9 Enhanced
  • Dual Layer ( )
  Languages
  • English: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
  • French: Dolby Digital Mono
  Subtitles
    English, French
  Extras
  • Theatrical trailer
  • Production notes
  • Animated menus
  • Digitally remastered

Any Which Way You Can

Warner Bros./Warner Home Video . R4 . COLOR . 116 mins . M15+ . NTSC

  Feature
Contract

Over the years Hollywood has been responsible for countless numbers of big name cinema duos. Riggs and Murtaugh, Walker & Travett, even Turner & Hooch, and who can forget Clint and Clyde… Who?

Well that’s a very good question, as only the most loyal of Eastwood fans will remember this role, despite its bi-annual showing on television. Any Which Way You Can is the follow up to 1978’s Every Which Way But Loose in which the monkey loving hysteria continues. Oh, that’s right, you remember it now? The monkey movies with Clint Eastwood? Spot on! The orang-utan is back and up to more banana throwing mischief then ever before.

The storyline runs as follows. Clint drives a truck and likes to hit people for money, but after a while he realises that he’s starting to enjoy hitting people more then he should, so he threatens to quit. However, and this is the humorous irony apparently, just as he quits he gets a fantastic offer by a group of shady mobsters for one final fight. Of course getting involved with mobsters is going to cause nothing but trouble, especially when you throw in the same motorcycle gang from the first movie and a poop-shooting orang-utan.

"Right turn Clyde!"

Ultimately Any Which Way You Can is a fun action movie with just the right combination of witty one liners and jaw breaking action. The film does tend to drag a bit in places, but in its defence this film came out in 1980 when films were created as two-hour journeys instead of 90 minute fast action thrill rides.

  Video
Contract

I may as well start off with the bad news, Any Which Way You Can comes to us in the American NTSC format. A big disappointment considering what I’m about to say below…

The film itself is presented with an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and is widescreen enhanced. The overall clarity and detail is surprisingly good considering the age of this film (released 1980). Grain is quite noticeable throughout the film, but never really distracts too much from the clarity. The colour looks a little washed out, but is otherwise spot on.

Aliasing isn’t a problem and film artefacts are minimal compared to what I expected. The layer change is pretty obvious at 35:14 as it is in the middle of a scene. Overall this is a very good transfer considering the film has aged over two decades. The biggest disappointment is the lack of PAL formatting and I do hope Warner Brothers will reconsider their obvious decision to persist in releasing films here in the format.

  Audio
Contract

How could I possibly even consider bagging out the Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack when it starts off with Clint Eastwood singing the opening number? OK, the opening song is a little on the rough side, but the rest of the soundtrack is quite good. To receive a Dolby Digital 5.1 mix the original source has obviously been remastered, which is strange considering they seemingly couldn’t even afford to transfer it to PAL. Anyway, the dialogue comes off sounding very clear. Audio synch is quite fine, except in the few singing scenes when it's pretty obvious our actors aren’t doing it live.

The surrounds get a couple of chances to do something, especially later in the film. The subwoofer has less of a chance to do anything spectacular, but can be heard from time to time. Overall it is quite a good soundtrack with the remastering coming up a treat.

  Extras
Contract

Well we may have got digital remastering for the audio and video, but the extras have been kept to a barebones minimum. We have a filmography for the one, the only, Clint Eastwood. We have a list of the cast and crew and a few production notes elaborating on the making of the film. There is also a two and a half minute trailer for the film presented with an aspect ratio of 1.85:1.

  Overall  
Contract

Overall it is really hard not to like Philo Beddoe and his monkey Clyde. Despite its age, NTSC transfer and lack of extras, this disc could still be worth checking out if you feel like a few funny jokes and a couple of fast left hooks. This is vintage Eastwood before he started directing and taking up soppy mature romance films. However who really cares about Clint? In the end it's the monkey that steals the show, and so he should. Any Which Way You Can is well worth a look in!


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      And I quote...
    "...a fun action movie with just the right combination of witty one liners and jaw breaking action."
    - Nathan Clark
      Review Equipment
    • DVD Player:
          Pioneer DV-636
    • TV:
          LG 80cm
    • Speakers:
          Pioneer
    • Audio Cables:
          Standard RCA
    • Video Cables:
          standard s-video
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