Witness (DVD, 2005, Special Collector's Edition)

Witness is a pretty decent film. The story begins with a young Hamish boy witnessing a brutal murder on his first visit to a big city. John Book (Ford) then enters the story, a tough city cop who has to protect his witness.
The film examines the class of two cultures, the Amish and city folk. Book slowly begins to be influenced by the Amish way of life and begins to fall for an Amish girl. The idea of a cop going being influenced by foreign values has been done since (Black Rain, Red Heat) but never as well. At times you feel like you're watching two separate films, one about the Amish and a fairly conventional cop thriller.

Witness is very well written (Raymond Frensham refers to Witness as a template in his book Teach Yourself Screenwriting). Barely a scene is wasted and all of them work within the story. The soundtrack and the film in general is very eighties. Due to the stories simplicity and audience expectations I don't think Witness would get made today.

The DVD contains a short documentarily which is fine. Witness is not the kind of film you want to analyse but a film that tells a story well.