As a seven-year-old in a small Western Pennsylvania town, my only window into New York City was the noon news on WOR. And NYC seemed like the end of the world, like The New York Ripper and Maniac in real life.

The Warriors goes even further, never telling us that it takes place after the end of the world but it sure doesn’t have to.

This is a movie so violent that Paramount Pictures temporarily halted their advertising campaign and released theater owners from their obligation to show the film. In 1979, it frightened people. Today, it’s a beloved cult hit.

Cyrus (Roger Hill), leader of the Gramercy Riffs has asked each of the five hundred gangs of the city to send nine unarmed people to Van Cortlandt Park. He asks for a truce among the gangs. Since they outnumber the cops three to one, he believes that they can run the city.

The Warriors, a gang from Coney Island, include leader Cleon (Dorsey Wright), his second-in-command Swan (Michael Beck), Fox (Thomas G. Waites), graffiti artist Rembrandt (Marcelino Sánchez), Snow (Brian Tyler), Cowboy (Tom McKitterick), Cochise (David Harris), Ajax (James Remar) and Vermin (Terry Michos).

As they listen to Cyrus, a shot rings out. It’s fired by Luther (David Patrick Kelly), the insane leader of the Rogues. He blames the Warriors, as Vermin watches him fire that killing bullet, and the entire city of New York City is suddenly against the Warriors, who must fight the whole way back to Coney Island. Cleon is killed and the gang doesn’t even know how much trouble they’re in.

On the way home, they encounter the Turnbull ACs, the Orphans — their member Mercy (Deborah Van Valkenburgh) sees something in Swan and leaves — as well as the Baseball Furies, the Lizzies and the Punks. The gang is separated and some of them are arrested and injured, but everyone makes it back home, just in time to have to battle the Rogues, just as the Riffs arrive, having learned that the Warriors weren’t the ones to blame. Cue “In the City” and a walk down the beach.

Sounds simple, but it isn’t. The Warriors transcends gang movie formula of the past and presents the gangs not as a social problem but as a belief and protection system. The book that it’s based on — Sol Yurick’s The Warriors, which was based on Xenophon’s Anabasis — almost was an AIP movie in 1969. I can only imagine how incredible that would have been.

Director Walter Hill, who wrote this with David Shaber, wanted this movie to be a living and breathing comic book with splash pages introducing each scene. The budget wasn’t there for that but unlike so many comic book movies, this film understands the spare narrative of comics. The subway scene, where rich kids get on and sit across from Swan and Mercy and he makes her stop fixing her hair…that’s incredible. It says everything, that he has pride and finally accepts her and wants her to have it as well.

What I love most is the influence this movie has had on Italian films, from the DJ that voices the action in Zombie 3 to the near-sequels of Enzo Castellari, 1990: The Bronx Warriors and Escape the Bronx. Often, those movies are seen as post-apocalyptic films but in truth, they recapture the look and feel of The Warriors. 1990 was even shot in New York and has some of the same energy on an even smaller budget.

The Arrow Video 4K UHD and blu ray releases of The Warriors are overflowing with extras that will add to your love of this movie. You get exclusive new 4K remasters of both the Theatrical Cut and the 2005 Alternate Version of the film sourced from the original camera negative, supervised by Arrow Films and approved by director Walter Hill. In fact, the theatrical cut has never been in the correct aspect ratio before.

Inside limited edition packaging with a reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Laurie Greasley, you get a double-sided poster of that art, six postcard-sized reproduction ar tcards, gang logo stickers and a 100-page perfect-bound collector’s book containing new writing by film critic Dennis Cozzalio.

There’s new audio commentary for the theatrical cut by film critic Walter Chaw, author of A Walter Hill Film, a new interview with Hill in which he’s quite honest about the film and how much others contributed, a roundtable discussion between Josh Olson (A History of Violence), Lexi Alexander (Green Street) and Robert D. Kryzkowski (The Man Who Killed Hitler and then Bigfoot) discuss their love of The Warriors and the work of director Walter Hill, new interviews with editor Billy Weber and costume designer Bobbie Mannix — which is worth the price of this set, as she explains how she outfitted all of the gangs, as well as another feature that shows all of the actual work — as well as an appreciate of the score, that score isolated from sound design, a new look at the film locations and archival extras.

If you love film, you owe it to yourself to own this.

You can get the 4K UHD and blu ray from MVD.