55 Steps Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		2.5

55 Steps Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman May 6, 2021

Everybody’s here to help me. That’s why I need help!

2017's 55 Steps walks into a crowded marketplace occupied by countless films based on this true story or that true story that depict the fight for justice and human rights in some form or fashion. Unlike some of the others, though, this film is neither inspiring nor particularly interesting. The true story behind the film is certainly to be applauded in the larger fight for patient rights and advocacy but the film adaptation finds no creative force as it plays on the screen. It's at best a capable film and at worst a stale rendering that is structurally predictable and emotionally flat. The film offers little incentive to invest in the story or the characters and even less opportunity for the story to resonate once the credits roll. As a utilitarian example of its genre it's fine but there's little on offer to elevate the film beyond a description that simply says "generic."

San Francisco, California, 1985: mental patient Eleanor Riese (Helena Bonham Carter) is forcibly medicated against her wishes and locked in a room with no bathroom facilities and no accommodations of any kind save for a simple, small mat in the middle of the floor. She's left to suffer emotional trauma, the medication's side effects, and relieve herself on the floor. When she's finally allowed her freedom again, she telephones a patient's rights advocacy center and demands to meet with a lawyer. She soon meets with Colette Hughes (Hillary Swank), a recent law school graduate who also has a decade of experience in nursing and mental health care under her belt. Colette agrees to take the case which has implications well beyond Riese and her hospital; she and Colette will be representing some 150,000 patients throughout the state. As Colette and her partner Mort Cohen (Jeffrey Tambor) take on the better funded hospital system, Colette and Eleanor grow closer together in friendship.

In 55 Steps, audiences are taken on a flat trajectory journey they have seen before. Between the rather bland characters and uninspired courtroom scenes there's practically no spark, no sense of urgency or connection or want to rejoice in the highs and suffer in the lows with the characters. This is a soulless movie that shouldn't be so devoid of passion, but it is. Granted, the movie's focus is less on the case and more on how the case engenders a friendship between two unlikely individuals, but even here there's little feel for the sincere, intimate bonds that grow through the film. It's all rather underwhelming in development, action, and resolution. The film is emotionally detached even as emotional attachment is to be its center. It's a curious cinema experience that does well to line up all of the necessary pieces and players but ultimately fails to deliver even on a simple concept that should, for a skilled filmmaking crew, be of little challenge.

Even the film's top talent can't make much of the tepid script. There's scant chemistry between Swank and Carter, the former of whom brings little feel for character growth or growing connection to Eleanor. She's plays the part capably at a fundamental level -- she's believable as a lawyer and a good person who is doing the job for all the right reasons -- but the performance lacks that spark of life and true sense of friendly intimacy and growth with Eleanor that the picture needs to thrive. Carter is likewise fine at the fundamental level but struggles to build a real rapport with Swank. Carter's ability to walk the line between an individual capable of caring for herself and functioning with some degree of normalcy while also carrying that persona that's just a bit too off kilter to live without any aid is quite good. She understands the character's mental makeup and conveys that dichotomy quite nicely. One can see the growth and change as she's freed from the prison of the medication that inhibits and harms her and as she comes to realize that her case is going to be bigger than herself. That even carries into and through her friendship with Colette. The film just can't quite allow these two excellent actresses to let go and bond the way the story demands.

55 Steps Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

55 Steps arrives on Blu-ray with a well capable and highly efficient 1080p transfer. The image toes the line of Blu-ray greatness, offering a positive and impressive filmic image that is naturally and effortlessly sharp. Textures excel across a number of key locations, including the mostly spartan hospital interiors (Eleanor's room and various corridors, mostly), courtrooms, apartments, and so on and so forth. The picture is never wanting for greatly increased location definition and it is also not wanting for improved close-up skin and clothing details, either. Viewers will enjoy positive and highly revealing facial features in close-ups as well as view fine, individual strands on Carter's frazzled hairstyle. Color reproduction is fine if not a mite off from perfectly tuned contrast. There's certainly a feel of tonal airiness inside the hospital where the bland white and gray location elements offer little color variety to enliven any scene inside, but contrasting, brightly colored clothes do stand out nicely therein. Attire and more colorfully abundant locations enjoy more fully realized color depth output. Skin tones appear effectively accurate and black levels are fine, too. There are no serious source or encode issues to report, either. This one holds serve throughout.

55 Steps Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

55 Steps marches onto Blu-ray with a proficient DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack. The film's sound design is not particularly robust, favoring straight forward and straight ahead audio cues and elements. The surrounds do pick up the occasional activity burst, mostly in the form of modest atmospherics that help to better set the stage within a couple of different locations, such as within hospital corridors or inside busy legal offices. Otherwise, there's little in the way of back channel activity. Music is largely the property of the front channels but it does play with commendable width and impressive foundational definition. Dialogue is the name of the audio game here, though, and it is a rock in the center channel. It's well prioritized and lifelike in delivery from beginning to end.

55 Steps Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This Blu-ray release of 55 Steps contains no supplemental content. The main menu screen only offers options to "Play" the film and toggle "Subtitles" on and off. No DVD or digital copies are included with purchase. This release does not ship with a slipcover.

55 Steps Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

55 Steps limps rather than walks confidently through the material. Here's a film of minimal ambition and fledgling emotional content that certainly means well but can't find that central spark to propel the story forward, not as a courtroom drama and not as a story of burgeoning friendship between two disparate individuals. The performances from two very gifted leads are not quite so dynamic as they might have been, particularly where it counts in their growing connection to one another. Sony's featureless Blu-ray does deliver quality video and audio presentations. Rent it.