Though known as the decade of the blockbuster, the 1980s started on an incredibly disturbing note with two thrillers that had the gay and lesbian community up in arms: the comparatively obscure Windows and one of the most controversial films of the decade, William Friedkin's Cruising. Beset by protests during its on-location production in New York City and legendary for its wrangling with the MPAA (including 40 minutes of graphic sex footage Friedkin added simply to give himself room to negotiate and get what he needed), the film was largely reviled upon its release but has since seen its reputation escalate considerably. Now a bona fide cult film, a compelling example of giallo-inspired American cinema, and a powerful showcase for star Al Pacino, this ambiguous and wildly rewatchable film has aged remarkably well and stands proudly in the pantheon of its creator.

When dismembered body parts start turning up in the water around Manhattan, it becomes clear that the nocturnal leather scene is harboring at least one knife-wielding serial killer who seems to be moving around the bar and public cruising areas. Captain Edelson (Sorvino) decides to present an offer to rookie cop Steve Burns (Pacino), who bears a resemblance to the victims, to get a shot at becoming a full-fledged detective if he goes undercover to try to smoke out the killer. Though he enjoys a quiet home life with his girlfriend, Nancy (Allen), Burns agrees and rents an apartment under a false name. At night he goes out and learns the very specific customs of the culture, but tracking down the killer will come at a much higher cost than he could have anticipated.

Much of the furor over Cruising centered around perceptions that it was a negative portrayal of the gay community and perpetuated the Hollywood tradition of presenting anyone outside the straight mainstream as villains, an escalating issue since the introduction of the modern MPAA system in the late '60s. Those claims are hard to pin down on the actual film though; even with a disclaimer added at the beginning of theatrical prints, the film operates in an unsettling gray area where the identity of the killer (or killers) is hardly settled for good, particularly in the haunting epilogue that creates the impression of a murderous cycle that shows no signs of stopping and a metaphor for the devastating plague of AIDS that was about to hit. Stylistically the film has had a surprisingly extensive influence as well, ranging from Lucio Fulci's New York Ripper to more recent productions like Knife + Heart.

However, the real reason to keep coming back to the film is the little things: Joe Spinell (the same year as Maniac, a perfect co-feature) as a bigoted cop; Don Scardino (now a big TV director and also seen in the 1980 slasher He Knows You're Alone) as the representative of mainstream gay life; a young Powers Boothe giving a vivid tutorial in hankie etiquette; an even younger James Remar with a ridiculous haircut; Gene Davis (the nudist slasher in 10 to Midnight) as a sassy cross-dressing hustler; and a killer proto-punk soundtrack engineered by Jack Nitzsche including The Germs and Mutiny. The film's back story is just as fascinating, from its origins as a pulp mystery novel (not involving the leather scene) by Gerald Walker, with other directors attached to direct it including Brian De Palma. Friedkin came aboard thanks to real-life NYPD detective Randy Jurgensen, who had gone undercover to investigate a similar string of slayings and had worked with Friedkin on The French Connection. Jurgensen himself plays a major role in the film, which draws all of its details from real-life crimes including Paul Bateson, the radiologist from Friedkin's The Exorcist who himself was convicted of murder in the gay kink scene and may have been a serial killer as well. The film did no favors for Friedkin's career at the time, coming off of the financial disappointments of Sorcerer and The Brink's Job; of course, all three films have since been reappraised to varying degrees and now hold up extremely well. Adding to this film's mystique is the wide variety of versions over the years, with Friedkin tweaking the MPAA by inserting fleeting, subliminal shots of hardcore-ish penetration into two of the murder scenes. At least one eagle-eyed video technician noticed and fogged the shots on the film's VHS release from CBS/Fox, though it did appear full strength on an early Magnetic Video VHS edition as well as a Hong Kong laserdisc. One of the stronger club sequences around the 38-minute mark was also cut in many prints and video editions (including the laserdisc and most tapes), though it was restored to its original length when the film was given a theatrical and DVD release by Warner Bros. in 2007. Unfortunately that version was essentially ruined by some baffling alterations including a hideous strong blue tint applied over the entire film and ridiculous digital filters applied over Pacino's frenetic, drug-induced dancing scene. The opening disclaimer was also removed and replaced with a looooong crawl of the film's title across the screen that awkwardly bled over into the opening shot. At least this marked the first correctly framed version of the film, which was shot hard matted at 1.85:1. An HD version later popped up on Cinemax and various digital platforms, again with the irritating 2007 alterations.

In 2019, Arrow Video announced a Blu-ray release of Friedkin's film in the U.S. and U.K. touting a "brand new restoration from a 4K scan of the original camera negative, supervised and approved by writer-director William Friedkin." Of course that raised the question of what condition the film would be in given Friedkin's penchant for revising his films, most notoriously The Exorcist and the last scene of Sorcerer. Thankfully this is most definitely not the 2007 reworking of the film; the colors here shift away from that oppressive blue tint and have actual flesh tones, albeit with an aggressive overall intensity here that's quite different from how it looked theatrically. Pacino's dance scene is now back as it was originally filmed, and the film is completely uncut including the subliminal shots and the other odds and ends of footage that have drifted in and out over the years back in place. The opening disclaimer is gone again (as Friedkin prefers), this time replaced with a more organic pair of stylized title cards for Pacino and the film's title that thankfully don't demolish the opening scene. The DTS-HD MA audio options include the theatrical 2.0 stereo mix and a 5.1 mix supervised by Friedkin; the latter is subdued but effective with some of Nitzsche's score and the city sound effects nicely spread out discreetly to the front and rear channels. Optional English SDH subtitles are also provided. Ported over from the prior DVD are an audio commentary by Friedkin (mostly production-oriented and one of his stronger tracks compared to the infamously absurd one he provided for The Exorcist), the trailer (now in HD and much better condition), and two Laurent Bouzereau featurettes, "The History of Cruising" (21m5) and "Exorcising Cruising" (22m31s) with Friedkin, producer Jerry Weintraub, Jurgensen, Scardino, Davis, Remar, actors Richard Cox and Jay Acovone, Sonny Grosso, James Contner, Bud Smith, Mark Johnson, and casting director Lou DiGiaimo. New to this release is an audio commentary by Friedkin and always welcome Mark Kermode, who provide a very engaging conversation about the film without overlapping very much with the prior track. They chat about everything from the original casting of Richard Gere to the ongoing protests, the censorship issues, and the amusing circumstances of James Franco and Travis Matthews' Interior. Leather Bar, an odd attempt to make a film about (but not recreating) the much-discussed missing 40 minutes from the film. It's also interesting to hear Friedkin's opinion of Pacino shift around over the course of these extras given the 12-year time gap, with the director either chiding his lack of preparation or praising the quality of innocence and discomfort he brought to the role. Either way, it's an important and endlessly absorbing film finally given its due and still one of the most transgressive films in mainstream American history.

After Friedkin's passing, Arrow Video brought the film back out in a 4K UHD edition with a second Blu-ray of bonus features with the film itself sporting a new 4K restoration from the 35mm camera negative. What you get here is quite the pleasant surprise: the ominous theatrical disclaimer is back at the beginning, and the color timing is finally back to the way it was theatrically with that chilly gray and black aesthetic that really amps up the creepy factor. The HDR-10 compatible Dolby Vision brings out the nuances in the darker scenes very well here, while the striking daylight exterior shots improve quite a bit as well. Here you get three audio options -- the DTS-HD MA 5.1 and 2.0 stereo, and at last, the theatrical mono track is here and very welcome after a long time in the wilderness. English SDH subtitles are included as usual, and both commentaries are ported over. A new audio track pulls together fascinating interview material with contributors to the complex and haunting soundtrack including Don Bolles, Kenny Margolis, Louis X. Erlanger, Carole Pope, Madelynn Von Ritz, and Shawn Casey O'Brien, with Fun City Editions' Jonathan Hertzberg. It's a must for any fans of the film's soundscape, starting with a memory about how The Germs' roots here go back to the creation of Sorcerer and then weaving through the various avant-garde, punk, and rock scenes at the time with Nitzsche overseeing most of the process. It's a great tour through New York City music history around the turn of the '80s with a lot of very different personalities bouncing off of each other. Finally you get another audio option, a 2019 alternate music score by Pentagram Home Video originally issued on vinyl by Death Waltz. The video extras on the UHD kick off with the essential "The Backroom," a collection of cut, alternate, and deleted scenes: "Why Take the Job?" (56s), a brief workprint chat with Allen and Pacino; an illustrated 3m35s recreation with surviving audio of the notorious cut scene with Spinell and Mike Starr involving some nightstick shenanigans; a slightly different 2m40s workprint edit of the porno booth murder; five samples of on-set audio with loud noise from protesters outside, plus a new interview with on-set sound mixer Kim Ornitz (10m38s) about the experience; the French disclaimer opening and credits, Spanish disclaimer, alternate "Lorimar has presented" end credits, and the alternate 2006 and 2018 openings cited above along with a brief 1m13s comparison. Finally you get comparisons between the two sequences that were censored in most presentations of the U.S. (apart from the legendary initial Magnetic Video VHS edition) to tone down some of the club friskiness. Also on the first disc are the archival "The History of Cruising" and "Exorcising Cruising" from the earlier Blu-ray, a teaser and trailer, four TV spots, five test TV spots, TV spot optical tests, and photo galleries devoted to promotional items, key art, musical releases, Jane Wechlser on-set sketches, and set items.

The bonus Blu-ray is a wealth of new and freshly repurposed material starting off with "I Want To Be the Curator" (38m29s), a lengthy and fascinating interview with Allen about the unusual process of being cast for a film that no formal script at the time and going through the process with Friedkin (who only allowed her to see her own scenes). In "Walking the Line" (71m13s), Jurgensen appears for an extensive account of how the project originated on a plane ride with Friedkin and the strange path the whole process took with the source novel playing virtually no role at all in the result. He also goes into his own undercover experiences tracing back more than a decade before, which took him through the various subcultures of the city that ended up providing much of the material seen in the final film. "Cut Offs" (55m) with editor Bud S. Smith covers the unorthodox editing process of the film (hot off of the already exhausting Sorcerer) working with the sometimes disconnected footage that was being compiled from the challenging shoot. In "Who's That Guy?" (13m42s), actor Jay Acovone (who went on to Stargate SG-1) looks back at coming out of acting training and landing a role here as bar patron Skip, while "Pounding the Beat" (46m57s) features actor Mike Starr clearly having fun reminiscing about spending so much time playing Spinell's cop partner and getting quite a bit of screen time. In "The Boy on the Bus" (37m30s), actor Mark Zecca discusses being right out of acting school in 1979 and exploring the very diverse club scene in the West Village when he got cast in a film drawing heavily on the sexually freewheeling scene he knew at the time. In "Mineshaft Memories" (33m41s), Wally Wallace, former manager of the Mineshaft, covers the crazy history of the heavily frequented leather club that played a pivotal role in the fantasy fulfillments of the era. A 41m10s Q&A with Friedkin from a 2022 BeyondFest screening covers the overall history of the film and its eventual critical and fan reappraisal, complete with questions from the audience, while "Breaking the Codes" (13m2s) is a very entertaining breakdown of the meanings of the various hankies and their placements charted here by writer-actor David McGillivray who categorizes the various sexual proclivities at play here. Also included are a hefty production stills gallery (116 images) and Jim Hubbard's short film "Stop the Movie" (11m51s) capturing footage of the real protesters around the shoot, with optional filmmaker commentary. The package also comes with a 120-page book with articles from The Village Voice and The New York Times, essays from the film’s extras cast, an intro from William Friedkin, and an archive interview with Pacino.

ARROW FILMS (UHD)

ARROW FILMS (BLU-RAY)

WARNER BROS. (DVD)

Updated review on February 23, 2025