We all know the No.1 hit theme song by John Parr, we all know Emilio Estevez and his fellow Brat Pack gang… and hopefully we all know the movie that followed hot on the heels of fellow Brat Pack coming-of-age classics Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club.
40 years to this very month after hitting theaters, St. Elmo’s Fire has today been released on 4K Blu-ray for the first time, and has been given the Dolby Vision HDR and Dolby Atmos surround sound treatment.
Directed by Joe Schumacher, who went on to direct The Lost Boys and Batman Forever, and starring many of that gang – Emilio Estevez, Rob Lowe, Andrew McCarthy, Demi Moore, Judd Nelson, Ally Sheedy and Andie MacDowell – the teen flick follows a clique of recent college graduates as they adjust to the growing pains and responsibilities of adulthood, trying desperately to keep their friendship and youth intact by hanging out at their favourite watering hole, St. Elmo’s Bar, while trying to launch their careers and establish themselves and their relationships.
It’s a quintessential, all-in coming-of-age drama of its era and a very 'real' movie about self-absorbed college kids grappling with the post-university transition. Critics panned St Elmo’s Fire for its unlikeable characters and petty melodrama – but that’s bratty college kids for you, right?
What Schumacher did was play out a friends drama that, in my opinion, managed to incorporate all the new and relatable emotions of that uncertain and place-finding time in your life – the innocence, the love and the jealousy, the simultaneous feelings of freedom and restraint – through interesting (but sure, not largely likeable) characters, via the most magnetic and compatible bunch of young actors and actresses of that moment.
The cold-stone classic of the Brat Pack genre was well made and produced back then, shooting for mainstream appeal, but it was high time for it to get the 4K treatment.
The 4K Blu-ray, which has been released today in special 40th-anniversary format, features a 4K scan of the original 35mm film negative, and is bolstered with Dolby Vision (and HDR10) HDR, while the stereo audio has been Dolby Atmos-fied for those with Atmos soundbars or compatible speaker packages – because who wouldn’t want to hear Rob Lowe’s iconic saxophone scene in surround sound?
The disc also features commentary with Schumacher and a separate special featurette with him, the original ‘making of’, the theme song (Man in Motion) music video, and 12 deleted scenes. Consider me sold.
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