7.6 | / 10 |
Users | 4.1 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
San Francisco architect Max Klein miraculously survives a plane crash and emerges a changed man. When Max's bizarre behavior alienates his wife and son, an airline psychiatrist puts Max in touch with guilt-ridden fellow crash survivor Carla Rodrigo, who lost her 2-year-old in the disaster. Working together, can Max and Carla find their way back to emotional equilibrium?
Starring: Jeff Bridges, Isabella Rossellini, Rosie Pérez, John Turturro, Tom HulceDrama | 100% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 4.5 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
In the twenty years since its first release, Peter Weir's Fearless continues to defy easy description or categorization. It has elements of tragedy, satire, supernatural thriller, psychological drama and an indefinably foreign quality that one associates with some avant-garde experiment from a European auteur—except for the familiar American locations and the people who look just like average U.S. city dwellers. One of Weir's many achievements in Fearless is creating the visual equivalent of the experience of the film's protagonist, who sees everything in a new light. Even a shopping mall, that most prosaic of places, looks different through Weir's camera (with the assistance of cinematographer Allen Daviau, who photographed E.T.). So effectively capturing a sense of dislocation comes at a price. Fearless was a critical success but a box office disappointment, and it has never been a hit on home video, despite a devoted following. Its DVD release was a full-frame edition with a weak transfer, and for many years the only way to view the film in its original aspect ratio was to acquire the increasingly rare laserdisc. The situation has now been remedied thanks to a fine presentation through the Warner Archive Collection ("WAC"), which was undoubtedly the only vehicle for a cult favorite like Fearless to reach its fans on Blu-ray.
Fearless' cinematographer, Allen Daviau, began his career shooting Steven Spielberg's early short Amblin', from which the director's production company took its name. In his extensive work with the Spielberg in the Eighties, Daviau became noted for a deceptively simple style of lighting that created an illusion of depth. Daviau's lighting is well represented on WAC's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray, which has been taken from nearly pristine source material, with only a few occasional speckles to indicate that this is anything but an A-list title. I don't know whether the transfer is recent, but certainly no previous releases reflect anything near this quality in sharpness or detail, which are superior throughout. A fine and natural-looking grain pattern is evident, and no indication of high-frequency filtering, artificial sharpening or other inappropriate digital manipulation are in evidence. Black levels are appropriate, which is essential for key scenes like the grief counseling session, where darkness surrounds the participants. The color palette ranges from the odd green of the corn in the opening shot to the blues, grays and whites of the San Francisco sky and the more garish colors of the mall that Max and Carla visit during Christmas shopping season. A scene where Laura Klein leafs through a portfolio of her husband's drawings reveals a wide range of vivid colors. The average bitrate of 21.61 Mbps is at the low end of the spectrum for Warner releases, but Fearless has only one major action sequence, which is the main crash scene. The compressionist appears to have allocated the available bits appropriately so that artifacts are not an issue.
When Fearless appeared in 1993, digital multi-channel formats were just beginning to come into general use. Fearless was released in Dolby Stereo Surround, and that mix has been provided here as lossless DTS-HD MA 2.0. The sound editing is extremely sophisticated, with precise uses of silence, or the removal of all sounds except music, or a voice, or some other element that is meant to take over the soundfield. Although the sound design depends on these kinds of effects more than any use of the surrounds, there is still a fair amount of surround activity when the mix is played through a surround decoder: voices at the crash site, turbulence during the flight, rattles and buckling during the air disaster, etc. The dialogue is generally clear, and the musical score by Maurice Jarre (Lawrence of Arabia) is powerful and moving.
Other than a trailer (1080p; 1.33:1; 2:02), the disc has no extras. Note that, although the trailer is formatted as 1080p, the source is not of high quality.
Despite stellar work all around, the sole Oscar nomination for Fearless went to Rosie Perez for her performance as grieving mother Carla. If you only know Perez for her typecast loudmouth roles in such films as White Men Can't Jump and It Could Happen to You, you will be amazed at the emotional range of which she is capable when given the opportunity. She enters the film screaming in panic, then has to play despair, grief, shame, suspicion, joy, embarrassment, courage (in a quietly stunning scene with Max's wife) and, finally, a unique form of love. It's a tour de force that fully stands up to Bridges's extraordinary work. Highly recommended.
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