Boys Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		1.5
Video		2.0
Audio		3.0
Extras		3.5
Overall		2.5

Boys Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Brian Orndorf February 11, 2018

1996’s “Boys” was probably never destined to be a quality movie. Writer/director Stacy Cochran takes on the impossible task of filling 87 minutes of screen time with her adaptation of a James Salter short story that was only eight pages long. In terms of screenwriting endeavors, that’s a Hail Mary pass, and one Cochran is unable to complete despite her best intentions to taffy-pull anything from Salter’s work to help beef up the dramatic potential of the project. “Boys” is the rare feature where nothing really happens during the run time, watching Cochran quickly lose interest in character arcs and mysteries, leaving the film to gradually fall asleep. There’s a cast of young talent who seem eager to make something interesting out of all this filler, and while the effort is appreciated, the viewing experience is a complete drag.

After experiencing a strange night on the town that’s triggered interest from local cop Curry (John C. Reilly), Patty (Winona Ryder) elects to go for a horse ride to clear her head. When she experiences an accident that throws her to the ground, her seemingly lifeless body is discovered near a boarding school, with student John (Lukas Haas) concerned about her well-being and respectful of her request to avoid any outside attention. Taking Patty back to his dorm room for safety, John triggers curiosity from his classmates, who notice something strange going on with one of the building’s most defiant students. John, fearing discovery from school caretakers, decides to join Patty on a trip to the local county fair, where the pair gets cozy while hashing out the details of Patty’s evening and her plans to hide permanently from Curry.

There’s no plot to “Boys,” just a series of encounters between loosely defined characters and their clichéd problems. Cochran struggles to get something going in the feature that could be considered dramatic, establishing a mystery surrounding Patty’s evening at a bar, where she flirts with baseball player Valentine (Skeet Ulrich), embarking on a night of heavy drinking and reckless decisions that leave her shaken the next morning, confronted with questioning from Curry. The Valentine incident is detailed in flashbacks, with post-injury Patty recalling fragments of weirdness from the night while she’s tended to by John, but “Boys” isn’t a puzzler, with little time put into the subplot, which is never brought to a full boil, making final revelations about the night in question anticlimactic.

Without the central draw of the blacked-out night for Patty, “Boys” is left with boarding school interactions between John and his fellow students, which don’t end up anywhere profound either. While it has the ingredients for a teen romp, Cochrane tries to play the reality of the situation, with John the aspiring writer with disciplinary problems letting his imagination go wild around his find, falling in love with a half-conscious woman who doesn’t provide answers to his questions. More lively interplay is found with the kids, with outsiders trying to decode John’s newly secretive behavior, while the young man works to keep Patty comfortable, building a tentative bond with the stranger. There’s potential for thinly veiled horndog antics, but Cochran would rather stage scenes where the two main characters stare at each other or deliver comatose banter that’s intended to secure some type of soulful connection, keeping the picture airless, not engrossing.

Things happen between Patty and John very quickly in “Boys,” which moves from the dorm, where the visitor regains her strength, to a county fair, giving the two lighted, spinning distractions to cover for their leisurely stroll. The two embark on a game of confession, with Patty putting together her actions from the previous evening, while John shares his daddy issues, facing a future of business management as dictated by his controlling father (Chris Cooper). Sexuality is a sudden addition to the mix, introducing the delicious possibility that everything up to this point has been brewing within John’s imagination, but Cochrane doesn’t head in that more logical direction, keeping things very literal and bland, while additional supporting characters meant to identify Patty’s penchant for troublemaking add nothing to the overall flow of dysfunction. “Boys” would be wonderful as something purely ridiculous, but Cochran aims to be sincere with her take on a single night between strangers that ignites implausible attraction.

Boys Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The AVC encoded image (1.85:1 aspect ratio) presentation doesn't offer much life for "Boys" on Blu-ray, working from an older master that fails to bring out the best in the film's cinematography achievements. Detail is difficult to find, with baked-in filtering robbing most shots of truly textured surfaces, finding close-ups smooth and school environments flat. Colors are muted, with skintones mostly bloodless. Only the most aggressive hues, such as Patty's blood red lipstick and select costuming, come through with any vigor. Delineation struggles at times, with solidification dominating a few scenes. Speckling is periodically detected.

Boys Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The 2.0 DTS-HD MA sound mix extends a basic listening experience for "Boys," which is a soundtrack driven film, but doesn't emphasize the music in a traditional way. This quietness appears to be an inherent issue, keeping songs identifiable but non-essential to the overall track. Instrumentation remains. Dialogue exchanges are acceptable, with an adequate read of vocal range and emotional outbursts. Atmospherics are limited, but crowd bustle is detailed during the county fair sequence and barroom visits.

Boys Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Commentary features writer/director Stacy Cochran.

• Audition Tapes (28:56, SD) feature early acting aspirations from Lukas Haas and Skeet Ulrich, who, interestingly, is reading for the part of John despite looking nothing like a teenager. Winona Ryder can be heard off-camera.

• Production Featurette (4:07, SD) is a very '90s EPK offering that interviews Ryder and Haas on the set of "Boys," where they both go into salesman mode to deconstruct their characters, motivations, and detail the overall story. Ryder is particularly impressed with the "little kid from 'Witness'" and his professional contribution.

• Selected B-Rolls (3:49, SD) survey the production effort as Cochrane manages her crew around the county fair sequence and police precinct building, working to perfect shots and guide the actors, who engage in small talk as set-ups are created.

• Music Video (3:42, SD) for the song "Alright" by the band Cast is offered.

• And a Theatrical Trailer (1:55, SD) is included.

Boys Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

"Boys" tries to be a few things, including a soundtrack-driven film featuring a few semi-famous bands from the Alternative Nation years, including Del Amitri, Squeeze, Smoking Popes, The Stone Roses, and Cruel Sea, who contribute perhaps the worst version of "She's Not There" ever recorded. It also has designs on becoming a forbidden love story, but for that to be successfully achieved, one must actually like the characters. John is mostly made up of attitude and leer, while Patty is enslaved by her vices and bad choices, making their coupling something to fear. Again, Cochran doesn't make it easy on herself by trying to spin an entire movie out of eight pages of source material, but her general disregard for the absurdity of it all is disappointing. There's no dramatic value to "Boys," with its weightlessness and pointlessness frustrating to watch.