Applesauce Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		3.0
Overall		3.5

Applesauce Blu-ray Movie Review

Hardcore Indie

Reviewed by Michael Reuben November 22, 2015

New York-based writer/director Onur Tukel is a truly independent filmmaker. Not only does he write and direct, but he also produces, acts and edits, and his films are made on such tiny budgets that, as he is quick to point out, nearly all the shots have to be closeups, because he can't afford to pay extras. Tukel's films rarely play beyond the festival circuit, and he still works a day job to support himself.

But Tukel deserves to be better known, because he has a keen eye for the absurdities of modern life and a unique feel for genre cinema. The latter quality is no doubt what attracted the interest of MPI's Dark Sky label, which released Tukel's previous film, the vampire comedy Summer of Blood, the story of a misfit for whom vampirism seemed like winning the lottery—until he discovered that he was still the same guy, only now with fangs and bloodlust. (Unfortunately, Summer of Blood has yet to be released here on Blu-ray, although there is a Region B release in the U.K.)

Tukel's new film, Applesauce, contains elements of both horror and film noir, but it is primarily a dark comedy about the law of unintended consequences and the dangers of being too honest with friends and loved ones. He has said that the title was suggested by the setting in New York City ("the Big Apple") and the plot's odd combination of elements (making it a sauce). After a screening, though, a viewer pointed out that all the film's disasters result from acquiring knowledge, just like in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve ate an apple from the infamous tree.

After premiering at the Tribeca Film Festival earlier this year, Applesauce is now being released by Dark Sky on Blu-ray, DVD and VOD.

A key figure in Applesauce is a DJ named Stevie Bricks, who Tukel has said was inspired by Eric Bogosian's character in the Oliver Stone-directed Talk Radio (1988). Bricks is played with sly understatement by Dylan Baker, an indie legend for Todd Solondz's Happiness but more widely known for numerous character parts (e.g., J. Edgar Hoover in Selma). Among his other antics, Bricks reserves an hour every Tuesday for listeners to call in and confess the worst thing they have ever done for an audience eager to hear sensationalist stories.

An avid listener is Ron Welz (Tukel), a Brooklyn high school teacher married to the brittle and vaguely dissatisfied Nickki (Trieste Kelly Dunn, Banshee). On the evening when Ron finally works up the nerve to call in and make his confession on the air, Nickki interrupts him before he can finish, because they are late for dinner with their friends, Kate (Jennifer Prediger) and Les (Max Casella, The Sopranos). Nickki tells the other couple why she and Ron were late, which naturally prompts everyone to pressure him until he tells his story at dinner. It dates back to college, when Ron accidentally caused an injury to a stranger, serious and permanent but not life-threatening. Nickki, Les and Kate are appropriately shocked.

The problem is that Ron's example prompts other disclosures, and both marriages shortly become strained as incidents are revealed that probably would have been better left in the past. Worse still, Ron receives a horrific package in the mail that refers directly to his college experience, known only to his wife and their two friends. Other "deliveries" follow, in unlikely places that tread a fine line between hilarious (if you're the audience) and terrifying (if you're Ron). Clearly Ron has acquired a stalker, but when he reports the incidents to the police, the mismatched pair of Brooklyn cops (Kevin Scanlon and Ariel Kavoussi) who respond—Ron refers to them as "Andre the Giant" and "Betty Boop"—inspire little confidence that the investigation will produce any answers. Although Ron is initially convinced that Les is behind it all, he rapidly becomes so paranoid that he sees suspects everywhere. Eventually, in the best noir tradition, he ends up consulting a private investigator and following leads to a dark nightclub.

The strain affects Ron's performance in the classroom, where he is already on thin ice, due to both the sensitivity of the topics he explores (Alternative Approaches to War, using the 9/11 attacks as an example) and the delicacy required for handling a culturally diverse student body. An ongoing battle with a student named Rain (Zazie Beetz), who refuses to put away her cell phone during class, leads to a protest from her mother (Lisa Tharps), in which the school principal (Jahmani Perry) seems to bend over backwards to appease the parent.

Tukel is frequently compared to Woody Allen in his depictions of neurotically articulate people who consider themselves highly intelligent, even as they keep doing one stupid thing after another, but his filmmaking style has more in common with the rude taste of Robert Downey Sr. in such underground classics as Putney Swope. The language and depictions of sexuality are more frank, and Tukel likes to prolong scenes to the point of discomfort, then puncture the tension with shock effects. It's his way of skewering his characters' pretensions, all the while leaving you wondering whether there may be a grain of truth in what they're saying.

The most common criticism of Applesauce is that none of the characters are "likable", but that's exactly the point. Tukel doesn't believe in happy endings so much as the inevitability of human error. Early on, he gives the viewer a strong hint about who is harassing Ron, then confirms it halfway through the film, while saving the full details until the end. The explanation suggests a karmic sense that fate will eventually balance the scales for whatever wrongs we commit, even if it takes years. This is the lesson that Ron is trying to convey to his class and that Rain believes she doesn't need to hear. "Why should I be listening to you?" she asks Ron. "It's adults that start the wars." Ron doesn't give her the obvious answer, which is that time catches up with all of us, and soon enough she too will be one of the screwed-up adults—and who knows what price she may have to pay for things she does now, thinking they don't count?

Applesauce Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Applesauce was shot by Tukel's usual cinematographer, Jason Banker, whose documentary style is well-suited to creating the deceptively realistic surface of the film's increasingly bizarre tale. Tukel has said, both in interviews and the accompanying commentary, that he wanted Applesauce to look more polished and professional than his previous films, but he also acknowledged the constraints imposed by time and budget. The digital cinematography is clear and detailed, but it has the flat, two-dimensional appearance of locations that haven't been lit to create depth, contrast or shadow. Color shadings differentiate scenes in general, but specific colors rarely pop from the frame, as they might in a film lit by a Hollywood crew and finished in a professional DI suite. Dark Sky's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray appears to accurately reproduce the completed film and, in that regard, deserves high marks technically. But there is no mistaking Applesauce for anything other than a low-budget independent production. For some tastes (including mine), that adds to the experience.

Dark Sky has placed Applesauce on a BD-25 with an average bitrate of 19.98 Mbps, which is adequate, given the film's digital origination and also because many of the scenes involve long takes of conversation. The compression has been carefully performed, so that several frenetic sequences get the bandwidth they need.

Applesauce Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Applesauce's 5.1 soundtrack, encoded in lossless DTS-HD MA, also reflects the film's budgetary limitations, in that it focuses primarily on dialogue and music, with only the essential sound effects such as clinking glasses in a restaurant or machine noises in a laundromat. The dialogue is clear, even when characters are speaking over each other. The music has been carefully chosen, in several widely varying styles. Composer Michael Montes (Ping Pong Summer) wrote the foreboding horror-style score for strings, which has wide dynamic range and sometimes reaches into deep bass notes for effect. Jazz musician Grant Draper organized a trio to record upbeat tunes for horn, bass and drums to accompany specific portions of the film, such as the opening. An additional group of jazz musicians recorded music to be used in what might be called transitional sequences. You will know them when you see them. Thanks to good quality portable recording equipment and a skillful mix, these disparate accompaniments help Applesauce navigate its often abrupt shifts in tone.

As usual with Dark Sky releases, an alternative PCM 2.0 track is included.

Applesauce Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Commentary with Writer/Director Onur Tukel: Tukel recorded this commentary in August 2015 on his 43rd birthday. It's a wide-ranging and often meandering discussion, in which the filmmaker routinely shoots off in some unforeseen direction, only to lament that the scene he wanted to discuss is now over. It's unlikely that Tukel suffers from writer's block, and his scripts are obviously a result of disciplined revision and restructuring of the raw material that his busy mind churns out at a rapid pace. The attentive listener will learn the origins of the story (some of which is true), the casting history, the extended production schedule (which was subject to many interruptions), interesting stories from the set and scattered reflections on the themes of the film—in no particular order.



• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 1.78:1; 13:16): The seven scenes are not individually listed or selectable. Many of them are additions or extensions to the scenes involving the Stevie Bricks radio program. The final deleted scene is the complete and uncut parody of Orange Is the New Black (here retitled "Life in Orange"), portions of which play during the film.



• Blooper Reel (1080p; 1.78:1; 8:46): These long takes show one scene being rewritten on the fly and another (the Chinese food scene) suffering from unique prop "issues".



• Trailer (1080p; 1.78:1; 1:37): "A disturbing new look at complex relationships."



• Additional Trailers: At startup, the disc plays trailers for Summer of Blood, Call Me Lucky and Deathgasm, which can be skipped with the chapter forward button and are not otherwise available once the disc loads.

Applesauce Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Applesauce isn't a horror film by any definition; so ignore any descriptions that call it a "horror comedy". Awful things happen in it, but there's no real gore, and horror fans awaiting a feast of blood will be disappointed. At the same time, anyone looking for a relaxing comedy where nothing has to be taken seriously will be equally disappointed; Applesauce goes to uncomfortable places, and it doesn't hesitate to make viewers squirm with discomfort (if not outright revulsion). The laughs often come in the lines that are thrown away, or in what's not said, or in recognizing the absurdity of an entire situation. If that sounds like your kind of comedy, then Dark Sky's disc is highly recommended.