6.9 | / 10 |
Users | 5.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
The story of the life of Dido Elizabeth Belle, the illegitimate daughter of Admiral Sir John Lindsay of the Royal Navy and an enslaved African woman, Maria Belle. Recognized by her father, she is sent to live in the household of William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield, her powerful and wealthy great-uncle. As debate rages regarding the legitimacy of the slave trade in Britain, she comes of age as gentlewoman, though her place in society is precarious.
Starring: Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Tom Wilkinson, Sam Reid, Sarah Gadon, Miranda RichardsonRomance | 100% |
Biography | 35% |
History | 34% |
Period | 25% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
French: Dolby Digital 5.1
Spanish: Dolby Digital 5.1
Portuguese: Dolby Digital 5.1
Turkish: Dolby Digital 5.1
English SDH, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Bulgarian, Croatian, Hebrew, Hindi, Icelandic, Korean, Mandarin (Simplified), Polish, Romanian, Serbian, Slovenian, Turkish
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
UV digital copy
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
In some ways, 2013 might be thought of as the cinematic “year of the slave”, with Steve McQueen’s harrowing epic 12 Years a Slave crowning many critics’ top film lists and going on to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. The frightening randomness of what happened to Solomon Northup was one of the most devastating aspects of that film, and much the same random aspect plays into what might be thought of as the “flip side” to traditional tales of woebegone slaves, another 2013 film, Amma Asante’s Belle. Dido Elizabeth Belle was a real person who managed to escape a life of slavery by having the supposed good fortune of being a mixed race child whose father was a high ranking British Navy officer. Though the film doesn’t really dwell on the matter, historical records suggest that Belle’s mother was a slave and that Belle’s father had taken the woman as his personal concubine after having captured a slave ship in some kind of sea skirmish. While that perhaps puts at least a partial lie to this character’s seeming nobility within the film, it doesn’t alter the rather remarkable fact that this man did bring his young “Mulatto” (as they were termed) child back to England, depositing her with his famous uncle, Lord Mansfield, where Belle was raised in a bizarre kind of netherworld where she was well educated and lived a free woman’s life, albeit one constrained by her dark skin and assumed racial identity. Belle imagines its titular character’s life (there isn’t much in the actual historical record about Belle’s day to day existence), while knitting her peculiar story in with Britain’s growing awareness of the horrors of the slave trade (Lord Mansfield was instrumental in striking down some laws pertaining to slavery in his role as Lord Chief Justice). Perhaps a bit too glossy for its own good, Belle is the kind of sumptuous historical epic that harkens back to an earlier era of filmmaking. It’s grand, opulent and beautiful to watch (courtesy of amazing sets and costumes), but thankfully it also has an unusual amount of emotional resonance. This is not the overpoweringly horrific emotion of 12 Years of Slave, but a perhaps appropriately British sort of reserved abhorrence about the cruel practice of treating human beings as ownable objects.
Belle is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. According to the IMDb, this was shot digitally with the Sony CineAlta F56, and the results here are unusually sumptuous and well realized. Colors are accurate and very nicely saturated, and the outdoor location shots offer some beautiful depth of field. Clarity is exceptional, and contrast is also strong, helping to overcome some minimally lit scenes (director Amma Asante seems to favor natural lighting, or at least lighting that is not overtly theatrical). Some brief CGI elements are a bit on the soft side, but otherwise this is a sharp and appealing looking transfer with no artifacting issues of any note.
Belle's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix isn't bombastic in any meaningful sense, but it's subtly attuned to both the pastoral setting of Kenwood House as well as the more urban environment of London, with nicely placed ambient environmental effects helping to create vivid, lifelike sonics. Dialogue is cleanly presented and Rachel Portman's evocative score fills the surrounds very nicely. Dynamic range is somewhat limited in this period drama, but fidelity is top notch and there are no problems of any kind to discuss.
- Belle: The Story (1080p; 4:08) traces the broad outlines of the plot.
- Gugu Mbatha-Raw Breakout Role (1080p; 4:03) profiles the leading actress.
- The Power of Belle (1080p; 5:31) features interviews with writer Misan Sagay, who discusses what Belle's story means to her.
- From Painting to Screen (1080p; 4:38) features more of Sagay, here discussing the painting of Belle and her cousin which hung at Kenwood House for decades and which helped to inspire this film.
- The History Behind the Painting (1080p; 4:55) gives some of the backstory of the work of art.
I'm frankly a sucker for well appointed historical dramas, and so I was perhaps more willing than some to let some of Belle's patent artifices slide. The basic story here is so remarkable, no matter how much fictionalizing was actually done to it, that the sheer oddity of Belle's predicament makes for a compelling viewing experience, no matter what temporary dramatic stumbles Sagay's screenplay forces upon her. Tying Belle's story into Britain's awakening of conscience is a trickier ploy, and not one that this film fully pulls off, or at least integrates organically. Absolutely opulently designed, and beautifully filmed and scored, Belle also benefits from uniformly excellent performances. It may not be "real" history, but Belle comes Recommended.
2007
2015
Warner Archive Collection
1939
2019
1998
2008
Fox Studio Classics
1953
2007
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2014
2016
Fox Studio Classics
1960
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Warner Archive Collection
1935
2017
2009
2015
2009
2016