Color of Night / Playing God Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		2.5
Audio		2.5
Extras		0.0
Overall		3.0

Color of Night / Playing God Blu-ray Movie Review

A Pair of Disney Castoffs

Reviewed by Michael Reuben June 19, 2013

The story behind Richard Rush's Color of Night is at least as interesting as the loopy tale on screen. As detailed more extensively in the separate review, the critically acclaimed director of the 1980 sleeper, The Stunt Man, battled throughout post-production with producer Andrew Vajna over the film's final cut, until a heart attack landed him in the hospital. Vajna's version was ultimately released to theaters in 1994, where it flopped, while Rush's went to video, where it has lived on ever since.

Mill Creek has paired Color of Night with Playing God, a film completed in 1995, which sat on Disney's shelf for two years after a rocky preview process. When the result was finally released, it had been edited into a film of uncertain identity, but outlines of an earlier and more interesting film remain. With David Duchovny in his first lead role since achieving success on The X-Files and a then-unknown Angelina Jolie as his love interest (except that their romance was virtually cut from the film), Playing God still has its moments, especially when Duchovny is narrating with deadpan wit, or when Timothy Hutton's dandyish villain is tearing up the screen.

For a discussion of Color of Night, please see the Color of Night Blu-ray review.

For a discussion of Playing God, please see the Playing God Blu-ray review.

Color of Night / Playing God Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Color of Night 1.5/5

Color of Night was released by Disney's Hollywood Pictures division. Given the erratic quality of Disney's own catalog releases on Blu-ray, it is no surprise that the quality of the masters they provide to Mill Creek is all over the map. The master provided for the 1080p, AVC-encoded presentation on this double feature Blu-ray is among the weakest I have seen in this series and certainly does not do justice to the late Dietrich Lohmann's (Deep Impact) colorful photography. The source material is in poor shape, with plenty of knicks, speckles, scratches and splotches. The overall image is soft, poorly defined and noisy, although here and there the image stabilizes for the duration of a few shots, e.g., in the scenes where Willis and March are in the swimming pool together.

Colors are generally weak and less than fully saturated. A notable (and important) example occurs in several key transitions between gray and red, as the film shifts between Capa's crippled vantage and a more objective point of view. These changes should strike the eye forcefully, but they don't register with the appropriate impact, because the colors are washed out.

Overall, this strikes me as an old transfer prepared for DVD and never updated. The results on Blu-ray are superior to what appeared on DVD, which suffered from such severe edge enhancement that halos were apparent even on small screens, but it is far from the quality that Blu-ray has to offer even from weak source material.

For additional screenshots, please see the Color of Night Blu- ray review.


Playing God 3.5/5

Photographed by Anthony Richmond (Legally Blonde ) in a stylized, slightly over-exposed style that exaggerates the Southern California sun, Playing God looks far superior on Mill Creek's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray than it did in its 1998 DVD appearance. The source material is in decent shape with very little print damage (far superior to the accompanying Color of Night), and sharpness and detail are superior throughout. Colors in many scenes appear to be somewhat bleached out by contrast, but in others (e.g., the Russian nightclub) they are fully saturated, which indicates that the bleaching is by design and consistent with DP Richmond's visual concept for the film.

The average bitrate of 19.00 Mbps is somewhat low for a film that has a number of scenes of rapid action, including shootouts and an extended car chase near the end, but these are counterbalanced by lengthy dialogue scenes with little or no movement. As a result, compression artifacts are minor to non-existent.

For additional screenshots, please see the Playing God Blu-ray review.

Color of Night / Playing God Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Color of Night 3/5

According to IMDb, Color of Night was released to theaters with a Dolby Digital soundtrack, which was becoming the norm for major theatrical releases in 1994. However, Rush's preferred cut, which is the only version that has been available on video, has never had more than a stereo track. Even the DVD released by Disney's Buena Vista Home Video in 1999 had only DD 2.0. If the studio spent the money to provide a 5.1 mix for Vajna's theatrical version, they obviously were unwilling to go any further after it flopped at the box office.

The Blu-ray offers the standard 2.0 track as lossless DTS-HD MA 2.0, and it gets the job done. The dialogue is clear, as are the essential sound effects. However, there is virtually no surround presence or even much sense of stereo separation. The score by Dominic Frontiere (who also scored The Stunt Man) sounds good enough, though the reproduction lacks any depth or subtlety. The track is dominated by variations on the title song "The Color of the Night", which is performed over the closing titles by Lauren Christy and was the only element from the film nominated for anything resembling a genuine award (a Golden Globe).


Playing God 2/5

Playing God was released to theaters with a 5.1 soundtrack, and the DVD released by Disney's Buena Vista Home Video in 1998 was encoded with Dolby Digital 5.1. However, in a move more commonly seen from Echo Bridge, Mill Creek has provided only a 2.0 track encoded as DTS-HD MA 2.0. The track gets the job done, providing clear dialogue and reproducing the lively score by prolific British composer Richard Hartley, who has composed for numerous U.K. TV series and films, although he will probably be best remembered for orchestrating The Rocky Horror Picture Show. But Playing God is, at least in part, a gangster film, and it involves several shootouts, one car chase and several settings with distinctive sonic environments. The omission of its original multi-channel soundmix is inexcusable, and I am docking its score accordingly.

Color of Night / Playing God Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

A trailer for each film is available from the popup menu during playback.

Color of Night / Playing God Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Although I have great affection for Color of Night, I would never try to defend it as an effective murder mystery. Most of its "secrets" are obvious, and the story itself is ludicrous. The film falls under the heading of "guilty pleasure", but it's also the kind of bad movie that reflects good intentions and serious effort by a director of genuine talent. Now in his eighties, Richard Rush is unlikely to make many more films (if any), and everything in his regrettably small body of work deserves a look. The same might be said of Playing God, which Disney has consistently mistreated, in theaters, on DVD and now on Blu-ray. Someday Disney may learn to treat its catalog with respect, but until then this double feature from Mill Creek appears to be the best version we can get of either film.