6.4 | / 10 |
Users | 4.8 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.2 |
A naive but stubborn cowboy falls in love with a saloon singer and tries to take her away against her will to get married and live on his ranch in Montana.
Starring: Marilyn Monroe, Don Murray, Arthur O'Connell, Betty Field, Eileen HeckartRomance | 100% |
Drama | 55% |
Comedy | 14% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.55:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.55:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 4.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: DTS 4.0
German: DTS 4.0
Italian: Dolby Digital Mono
Japanese: DTS 4.0
Spanish: Dolby Digital Mono
Spanish: Dolby Digital Mono (Spain)
Thai: Dolby Digital 2.0
Turkish: Dolby Digital 2.0
Japanese only available on Japanese menu settings
English SDH, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish, Cantonese, Croatian, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Korean, Mandarin (Traditional), Norwegian, Polish, Swedish, Thai, Turkish
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
By the mid-1950s, Marilyn Monroe had grown tired of the ditzy screen persona she had adopted for Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, How to Marry a Millionaire, and The Seven Year Itch. Hoping to land some more serious, dramatic roles, she began studying under Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio—where she learned "The Method"—and also renegotiated her contract with 20th Century Fox, giving herself an unprecedented degree of creative control over the sorts of parts she could subsequently take. Whether she ever fully utilized that control is a matter of debate (or perspective). Her first film under this new arrangement was 1956's Bus Stop, based on the acclaimed play by William Inge and directed by former Stanislavski disciple Joshua Logan, who encouraged Monroe's new acting approach. If not a straight drama, Bus Stop is at least less of an outright comedy than most of Marilyn's 1950s films—the thriller Niagara and the western River of No Return excepted—but it still finds her in the role of a "dumb blonde," the kind of typecasting she was rarely able to shake. In this case, though, her character—a wayward nightclub singer looking to make it to Hollywood—has a bit more to offer, to some extent even mirroring the struggles that Monroe herself went through before becoming a star.
By 1956, the three-strip Technicolor system of Niagara and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes was considered too bulky and expensive, phased out by 20th Century Fox in favor of single-pack film stock, an ultra-wide Cinemascope aspect ratio, and DeLuxe Color processing. While Bus Stop may not have those inimitable Technicolor tones—with their creamy highlights—the film's DeLuxe Color look is still a thing of beauty, especially here in this 1080p/AVC-encoded presentation. The picture is wonderfully vibrant—see Chérie's Blue Dragon costume, or the interplay of warm skin tones and cool shadows during the fight scene in the snow—and clarity is greatly improved over previous home video editions, with crisp closeups that reveal ample skin and clothing textures. (I spotted two or three noticeably softer shots, but these are rare exceptions.) As usual, Fox's restoration work is excellent; there's nary a speck on the print, no major color or contrast fluctuations, no compression issues, and no sight of digital noise reduction, edge enhancement, or excessive color/contrast boosting. The film's natural 35mm grain structure is present in every scene, giving the high definition image a rich, organic quality that's the next best thing to seeing a projected print. Overall, another great catalog transfer from the Fox vaults.
20th Century Fox has given Bus Stop a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 4.0 mix that's true to the film's original quadrophonic stereo sound design, which used the Westrex 4-track recording system widely in use at the time. If you have a multi-channel home theater set-up, most of the audio will emerge from the front speakers, but you'll also hear appreciable engagement from the rear speakers at key points in the film, usually in the form of light ambience and swelling music. Frequent 20th Century Fox composers Alfred Newman, Lionel Newman, and Cyril J. Mockridge provide the orchestral score—which sounds great here, clear and full and never brittle—and the film also has a main theme from arranger Ken Darby in "The Bus Stop Song," performed by the Canadian singing quartet The Four Lads. As with the video transfer, there are no substantial age-related problems here—no popping, overt hisses, splice crackles, or peaking—and dialogue remains clean and stable throughout. The disc includes a number of dub and subtitle options; see above for the complete details.
The only extras on the disc, unfortunately, are the film's theatrical trailer (HD, 2:25) and a collection of trailers for additional Monroe movies from 20th Century Fox. Surely there's some old Turner Classic Movies Marilyn Monroe retrospective 20th Century Fox could've dug up, licensed, and included here.
Bus Stop is often cited as the film that made critics sit up and take Marilyn Monroe seriously as an actor, and not just another pretty face and stunning figure. While Monroe is good here, the movie itself—an old-fashioned romance that leans heavily on 1950s morals and an everyone- deserves-a-second-chance message—is nothing special. The film's brand of folksy, home-spun comedy hasn't particularly aged well, and co-star Don Murray is progressively more and more grating as the yokel cowboy who practically hog-ties Marilyn into romantic submission. Minus the lack of special features, 20th Century Fox's Blu-ray release is stellar—all of the films from their Monroe series have looked wonderful—but Bus Stop is only a must-buy for the biggest fans of the iconic bombshell.
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