7.5 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
After escaping Jack and his gang, Jesse Pinkman goes on the run from the police and tries to escape his own inner turmoil.
Starring: Aaron Paul, Jonathan Banks, Matt Jones (XLVIII), Charles Baker, Todd TerryDrama | Insignificant |
Crime | Insignificant |
Action | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.38:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 16-bit)
French: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 16-bit)
English, English SDH, French, Spanish, Arabic, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Korean, Mandarin (Simplified), Mandarin (Traditional), Norwegian, Swedish, Thai
Blu-ray Disc
Two-disc set (1 BD, 1 DVD)
DVD copy
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 4.5 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 3.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
With El Camino, it is not quite yet the end of the road for Breaking Bad, Vince Gilligan's instant classic television show about a science teacher and his pupil protégé who manufacture a methamphetamine empire. Though the series' final episodes wrapped up a number of crucial plot strings, there was more story to tell. Gilligan returns to write and direct El Camino, a two-hour follow-up film that resolves Jesse Pinkman's (Aaron Paul) story in narratively rich, visually adept, and emotionally satisfying construction.
The picture quality is striking. The opening scene featuring Jesse and Mike speaking lakeside offers exceptional facial detail in close-ups: fine lines, pores, and hairs are not just readily visible but intimately reproduced, allowing audiences access to the characters beyond the superficial. Such clarity remains throughout, with Pinkman's scars and shaved head stubble ranking highly amongst the standout visuals. Clarity never falters throughout. The movie is beyond tack-sharp with every item and environment enjoying exceptional visual richness, ranging from a vacuum shop to a welding company, from a comfortable home to a hellish concrete pit. Fabric textures are impeccably complex and revealing as well, allowing viewers the opportunity to study fine line definition and fabric density in every close-up. Colors are rich and robust, healthy and many. Daytime and well-lit scenes obviously enjoy the most color crispness and vitality but, to be sure, there's no shortage of enjoyable tones in every scene, all of them full, crisp, and effortlessly revealing and rich. Skin tones are excellent and black levels are impeccably deep and accurate. There is some mild noise in low light, such as a scene when Jesse acquires a couple of firearms at the 85-minute mark. There are no other source or encode shortcomings to note; this is a terrific presentation from Sony.
El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie pulls onto Blu-ray with a high end DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack. While the sound elements are more frequently subtle and subdued than not, the track nevertheless makes full use of the sound design and expresses its content with purpose and precision. The soundtrack's most prominent feature, beyond dialogue (which is of a steadily excellent quality), is its music. It's very full, robust, and rich, expertly spaced with the bulk handled across the front but it's not without a well defined back channel component and a healthy and hearty and balanced low end output. There are a couple of action scenes of note, most prominently a shootout and a subsequent explosion towards film's end. The gunshots are convincing for detail and output depth, but the explosion does feel a little more unsubstantial than it should. Still, the net effect is positive enough. Atmospherics are well positioned and detailed, whether light city din or natural environmental detail in a couple of unique locations, particularly at film's end. In sum, this is a very well rounded soundtrack.
El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie contains several extras, including audio commentaries, a making-of, and deleted scenes. A DVD copy of
the film is
included with purchase. This release also ships in SteelBook packaging; there is currently no standard packaging release. See below for a brief
overview of the SteelBook and please click the "packaging" tab above for a few photos.
El Camino reveals not only a postscript story to one of the best shows ever to grace television but it proves the viability of intermixing television and film within the same storyline. Gilligan and Paul both are in fine form, the former behind the writer's desk and the camera, the latter in front of the lens. The film is compelling, perfectly paced, and an excellent final touch on the Breaking Bad universe (nevertheless, one can only hope for more content to come). Sony's Blu-ray release of El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie is in fine form top to bottom. First-class video and audio support a great film and a quality assortment of bonuses, as well as a unique SteelBook case, all making this a disc that is easy to highly recommend.
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