7.2 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Sixty-ish spouses Vladimir and Elena share his luxurious Moscow apartment. He's a wealthy businessman; she's his former nurse who has clearly "married up." Estranged from his own hedonistic daughter, Vladimir has no respect for his wife's unemployed son, who is constantly seeking handouts for his family. But when a sudden illness and an unexpected reunion threaten the dutiful housewife's potential inheritance, she must hatch a desperate plan.
Starring: Nadezhda Markina, Andrey Smirnov, Aleksey Rozin, Elena Lyadova, Evgeniya KonushkinaForeign | 100% |
Drama | 96% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Russian: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Russian: LPCM 2.0
English
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region B (locked)
Movie | 4.5 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 5.0 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Winner of Un Certain Regard - Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, Russian director Andrei Zvyagintsev's "Elena" (2011) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of British distributors New Wave Films. The supplemental features on the disc include the film's original theatrical trailer and a video interview with the Russian director. In Russian, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-B "locked".
Elena
Presented in an aspect ratio of 2.35:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Andrei Zvyagintsev's Elena arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of British distributors New Wave Films.
From start to finish the film looks very crisp and sharp. There is a wide range of very well saturated cool colors. The outdoor footage, in particular, looks fantastic - depth and fluidity are simply superb (see screencapture #5). There are no traces of problematic lab tinkering. When projected, the film also remains very tight around the edges. There is some extremely light banding that I noticed during a short sequence early into the film, but its presence is far from distracting. There are no serious purely transfer-specific anomalies to report in this review. To sum it all up, Elena looks quite impressive on Blu-ray. (Note: This is a Region-B "locked" Blu-ray disc. Therefore, you must have a native Region-B or Region-Free PS3 or SA in order to access its content).
There are two standard audio tracks on this Blu-ray disc: Russian DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and Russian LPCM 2.0. For the record, New Wave Films have provided optional English subtitles for the main feature. When turned on, they appear inside the image frame.
The film is complimented by a beautiful score by award-winning composer Philip Glass (The Qatsi Trilogy). Thankfully, the lossless 5.1 track allows the strings to shine in all the right places. Surround movement is limited, but there are important sounds and noises that are exceptionally well defined. The dialog is crisp, always stable, and very easy to follow.
If Andrei Tarkovsky was still alive and directing films today, I believe that many of them would have looked like the films of Andrei Zvyagintsev. They would have probably tackled very similar themes as well. Elena, Zvyagintsev's third feature film, is elegantly shot and impressively acted. It is his most intimate film to date, offering a fascinating glimpse at a polarized society where everyone's sense of what is right and wrong appears to have been erased. New Wave Films' technical presentation of Elena is excellent. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
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