Kino Lorber Studio Classics continues to release Paramount Studio films with this 1951 film "Detective Story" directed by William Wyler and starring Kirk Douglas as an unmerciful detective who hates criminals, especially a seedy "doctor" (played by George Macready) who it turns out has a most unfortunate past connection to his wife (played by Eleanor Parker) as a multitude of events unfold on one busy summer day in a police precinct. Also starring William Bendix and Lee Grant (in her film debut).
Looking quite good in HD, a definite upgrade over the barebones 2005 Paramount DVD, now including the theatrical trailer (along with several others) and an audio commentary by author/film historian Alan K. Rode. Good film based on a play does show its stagy origins but is most worthwhile otherwise, if a bit melodramatic and coincidence driven.
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Detective Story
Rated: Format: DVD
PG-13
IMDb7.5/10.0
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| Additional DVD options | Edition | Discs | Price | New from | Used from |
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| Genre | Drama, Mystery & Thrillers |
| Format | DVD |
| Contributor | Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Parker, William Bendix, Cathy O'Donnell, George Macready |
| Language | English, French |
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Product Description
The hectic pace of a New York City detective takes a toll on his marriage.
Genre: Feature Film-Drama
Rating: NR
Release Date: 25-OCT-2005
Media Type: DVD
Product details
- Aspect Ratio : 1.33:1
- Is Discontinued By Manufacturer : No
- MPAA rating : PG-13 (Parents Strongly Cautioned)
- Product Dimensions : 0.01 x 0.01 x 0.01 inches; 1.6 Ounces
- Media Format : DVD
- Release date : October 25, 2005
- Subtitles: : English
- Studio : Paramount
- ASIN : B000ANVPUG
- Best Sellers Rank: #80,508 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
- #4,426 in Mystery & Thrillers (Movies & TV)
- #14,487 in Drama DVDs
- Customer Reviews:
Customer reviews
4.6 out of 5 stars
4.6 out of 5
234 global ratings
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Top reviews from the United States
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 15, 2022
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 17, 2021
More of a melodramatic character study than a straight film noir. Kirk Douglas is good as usual, and has a number of good actors to play off of. Still remains quite topical, even if explicit discussion of its main thematic concerns were hampered by the Production Code. Its strongest, longest-lasting element is as a snapshot of its time. Despite the popular myth of post-WWII America being some idyllic Rockwellian paradise, Detective Story grants a view of the tensions swirling beneath the surface. The only things I don't think quite worked were some overcooked forays into Freudian psychology and an overly sanctimonious Hollywood ending. Overall I can't say that it was great, but it was very good.
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 3, 2017
An embittered cop leads a precinct of characters in their grim battle with the city's lowlife while wife Parker suffers from neglect. From 1951 we have some very good performances and some WAY over the top ones too. Eleanor Parker is always way over the top and this is no exception, I would love to know who pinned her for movies. Kirk Douglas was awful too. He hit the top and flew over it. He is the Detective in question who seems to have more baggage then the entire squad and he takes it out on the alleged criminals. This is the cop that gives cops a bad name. I get the times this took place in but....please! This would have gotten 3 stars but most of the rest of the cast is excellent. William Bendix, Lee Grant and the rest. it takes place all in the precinct and when shocking things come to light....well, you have to watch and keep in mind 1951.
4 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 16, 2021
Kirk Douglass starts off as an absolute jerk, then proceeds to get worse.
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 12, 2021
I have lived Kurt Douglas in several roles, and I came across Detective Story. Talk about a gem. Great performances all around, with Eleanor Parker performance standing out, but the story, with it's nuanced grit and exploration of societal mores was superb. If you have never seen this and are a Film Noir enthuiast, do yourself a favor and watch this.
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on May 9, 2017
So many have reviewed this film as realistic and powerful. And it is both. I've never seen a police film as intense as this one!
All the performances were Academy Award performances - not only Douglas and Powell but Bendix and especially Howard McMahon,
who played the Lieutenant!!! Director William Wyler brought out the best in all of the actors, Lee Grant, Joseph Wiseman, Michael Strong
and especially Cathy O'Donnell! After Mary leaves Jim, he unfortunately is fatally wounded, but does let the young couple go and does pray
an "act of contrition" - therefore bringing LOVE and FORGIVENESS into his heart!!! Douglas, I know, is a strong actor - but he proved with his
talent that he could be a "real" man - not a "mask" of masculinity!!!!
All the performances were Academy Award performances - not only Douglas and Powell but Bendix and especially Howard McMahon,
who played the Lieutenant!!! Director William Wyler brought out the best in all of the actors, Lee Grant, Joseph Wiseman, Michael Strong
and especially Cathy O'Donnell! After Mary leaves Jim, he unfortunately is fatally wounded, but does let the young couple go and does pray
an "act of contrition" - therefore bringing LOVE and FORGIVENESS into his heart!!! Douglas, I know, is a strong actor - but he proved with his
talent that he could be a "real" man - not a "mask" of masculinity!!!!
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 9, 2017
Well, it is definitely and old-fashioned story, but in its time this must have caused a bit of a stir for its realism. Almost all of the action takes place in a NYC detective's squad room. Kirk Douglas plays a detective as true believer, a guy who gives no quarter in the pursuit of justice for the criminal. The plot takes him into a areas of moral ambiguity where he is uncomfortable. It's a little pat for today, but Douglas and the rest of the cast are good and it's an interesting look at a pretty good movie for the era.
2 people found this helpful
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 25, 2020
Great cast ! Will remind you of Barney Miller , but much more drama than humor. Kirk is at his best, showing us all how hating will destroy you in the end. This movie has it all, love and forgiveness, hate and bitterness, everything in between.
Top reviews from other countries
Spike Owen
4.0 out of 5 stars
It's intense at the 21st Precinct.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 10, 2011
An assortment of detectives and an assortment of criminals, all gathered together under the oppressive 21st Precint roof. It's a day that nobody present will ever forget, for better or worse......
Directed by William Wyler {Best years Of Our Lives, Ben-Hur & Wuthering Heights} and starring Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Parker, William Bendix, Cathy O'Donnell and Joseph Wiseman.
Detective Story is based on the smash hit Broadway play by Sidney Kingsley, adapted by Phillip Yordan and Robert Wyler, it's with much relief to me that the worry of it being a stagy production never actually materialises. Practically set on one bleak, but quite excellently appropriate set {creation courtesy of Hal Pereira & Earl Hedrick}, Detective Story manages to rise above its very simple plot by boasting interesting characters in a pot boiling story just waiting to peak. Each character has much to offer the film, be it oddly quirky or overtly intense, within the confines of this particular precinct, the characters create engrossing drama.
It's a difficult film to sell without giving too much away, by outlaying the character persona's and mental fortitude's, I personally feel that it will dull the impact of this influential crime genre piece. It's got real raw emotive acting, particularly from Kirk Douglas as Jim McLeod and Eleanor Parker as his wife Mary, while its technical aspects {watch Lee Garmes' camera glide like a third party witness} are impressively high. And with it embracing as it does, morality themes, it also doesn't lack for interest to the cranial head scratching crowd. It's by definition to me an all encompassing picture, one that is now sure to be a perennial viewing in my home. It's not a standard fare crime picture, and it most definitely is a talky film, but it works incredibly well, so one can only hope that many others will feel the same as me, namely that it is a fine and essential genre piece. 8/10
Directed by William Wyler {Best years Of Our Lives, Ben-Hur & Wuthering Heights} and starring Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Parker, William Bendix, Cathy O'Donnell and Joseph Wiseman.
Detective Story is based on the smash hit Broadway play by Sidney Kingsley, adapted by Phillip Yordan and Robert Wyler, it's with much relief to me that the worry of it being a stagy production never actually materialises. Practically set on one bleak, but quite excellently appropriate set {creation courtesy of Hal Pereira & Earl Hedrick}, Detective Story manages to rise above its very simple plot by boasting interesting characters in a pot boiling story just waiting to peak. Each character has much to offer the film, be it oddly quirky or overtly intense, within the confines of this particular precinct, the characters create engrossing drama.
It's a difficult film to sell without giving too much away, by outlaying the character persona's and mental fortitude's, I personally feel that it will dull the impact of this influential crime genre piece. It's got real raw emotive acting, particularly from Kirk Douglas as Jim McLeod and Eleanor Parker as his wife Mary, while its technical aspects {watch Lee Garmes' camera glide like a third party witness} are impressively high. And with it embracing as it does, morality themes, it also doesn't lack for interest to the cranial head scratching crowd. It's by definition to me an all encompassing picture, one that is now sure to be a perennial viewing in my home. It's not a standard fare crime picture, and it most definitely is a talky film, but it works incredibly well, so one can only hope that many others will feel the same as me, namely that it is a fine and essential genre piece. 8/10
10 people found this helpful
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Mr. M. Sanders
5.0 out of 5 stars
Detective Story
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on February 15, 2011
Minimal sets - maximum story...
This is what the film Detective Story is all about.
The story relies on a strong storyline and superb acting which uses minimal sets and minimal scenes - maybe you can almost count the scene sets used in this film on one hand.
Kirk Douglas stars as the driven NYPD cop, enforcing the law with an almost puritannical, evangelical zeal. He works hard, maybe too hard and his zeal is starting to destroy him.
The main scene set in this film is the Police office - it's a bit like an allegory of New York's Grand Central Station, with people like the trains passing through or stopping each with their own story, from the ditzy shoplifter to the hardboiled burglars
Although this film is minimalist in the sets it uses, the director really wrings out the most he can from them, aided by the superlative acting abilities of the key charachters like Kirk Douglas, William Bendix etc.
The Kirk Douglas charachter puruses with zeal a young man accused of theft from his employer, the Bendix charachter finds out the offender has a good heroic war record, yet this counts for nothing in the eyes of Douglas' charachter.
Interwoven with this thread, is an on-going case that Douglas pursues against an illegal abortionist he tried to indite but did not get a conviction, something that turns into a personal crusade.
Douglas comes face to face with the Doctor and the Detective goes too far, a situation that has ramifications for the Detective - however, this merely sets the scene for the climax of the film, which I won't spoil for you but the whole tension of the film is ramped up notch by notch until the final scene which you will find really nails it.
As I said earlier, there are very few Scene Sets in this film, but they are used wisely and with the superb acting of the cast, builds a fine film.
This is what the film Detective Story is all about.
The story relies on a strong storyline and superb acting which uses minimal sets and minimal scenes - maybe you can almost count the scene sets used in this film on one hand.
Kirk Douglas stars as the driven NYPD cop, enforcing the law with an almost puritannical, evangelical zeal. He works hard, maybe too hard and his zeal is starting to destroy him.
The main scene set in this film is the Police office - it's a bit like an allegory of New York's Grand Central Station, with people like the trains passing through or stopping each with their own story, from the ditzy shoplifter to the hardboiled burglars
Although this film is minimalist in the sets it uses, the director really wrings out the most he can from them, aided by the superlative acting abilities of the key charachters like Kirk Douglas, William Bendix etc.
The Kirk Douglas charachter puruses with zeal a young man accused of theft from his employer, the Bendix charachter finds out the offender has a good heroic war record, yet this counts for nothing in the eyes of Douglas' charachter.
Interwoven with this thread, is an on-going case that Douglas pursues against an illegal abortionist he tried to indite but did not get a conviction, something that turns into a personal crusade.
Douglas comes face to face with the Doctor and the Detective goes too far, a situation that has ramifications for the Detective - however, this merely sets the scene for the climax of the film, which I won't spoil for you but the whole tension of the film is ramped up notch by notch until the final scene which you will find really nails it.
As I said earlier, there are very few Scene Sets in this film, but they are used wisely and with the superb acting of the cast, builds a fine film.
8 people found this helpful
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W. A. D.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Dated but interesting!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 17, 2014
To fully enjoy this film version of the Broadway hit play one must see it in historical context . Detective story was virtually a "first" in its depiction of the "realities" of police life. Now it feels rater trite and cliched but on its release it was almost shocking in its depiction of the then "sordid" realities. Bowdlerised from its stage version so that the wife's abortion is never spelled out the film is still quite enjoyable if a little "over the top" and overtly "theatrical". The DVD provides an excellent transfer which combines good definition with excellent sound and contrast ratios.
3 people found this helpful
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Kymberly
1.0 out of 5 stars
it won't play
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on July 4, 2022
I ordered this as a normal UK compatible DVD, unfortunately the dvd will not play, my machine ejects it instead of playing, can't work out what the problem is but beware if you order this
Peter G
4.0 out of 5 stars
Detective Story
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on March 12, 2012
When I first saw Detective Story it was a second feature to something else I wanted to see. What that other film was I can't remember because it paled into insignificance in direct comparison to this powerful drama. Over the years police work has provided the basic scenarios for many films and this psycological conflagration, from a hit play by Sidney Kingsley, has got to be one of the best. It gave career chances to the players with the lead, Kirk douglas (one of the most memorable things he was in), Lee Grant and Joseph Wiseman coming through particulaly strongly and shows what an excellent director William wyler was when he had compelling material. Social realism doesn't seem to live like this any more. I bet it was great in the theatre too.
7 people found this helpful
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