6 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 2.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
A Latina spin on Jane Austen's "Sense and Sensibility," where two spoiled sisters who have been left penniless after their father's sudden death are forced to move in with their estranged aunt in East Los Angeles.
Starring: Camilla Belle, Alexa PenaVega, Wilmer Valderrama, Nicholas D'Agosto, April BowlbyComedy | 100% |
Romance | 80% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.78:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
English, Spanish
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (C untested)
Movie | 2.5 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
If Jane Austen were alive today, she would arguably be the hottest “commodity” in Hollywood. For over 15 years now, one adaptation after another of Austen’s rather small novelistic output has reached either the small screen via television or the large screen of the multiplex, and more often than not these adaptations have been hugely popular. Though Austen first got the lavish big screen treatment as long ago as 1940’s Laurence Olivier-Greer Garson Pride and Prejudice, and then sporadically got everything from a Broadway musical (1959’s First Impressions, a flopola based on Pride and Prejudice) to a wave of BBC miniseries in the 1970s, for some reason the 1990s and beyond seemed to be prime territory for a rather overwhelming new wave of Austen adaptations. Some of these, like the iconic 1995 BBC Pride and Prejudice with Colin Firth, hewed quite closely to Austen’s original conceptions. Others, like Amy Heckerling’s Clueless, took an Austen source novel (in this case Emma) and completely reinvented it in a different setting and with a radically different tone, at least at times. While everything from Pride and Prejudice to Austen’s other “big” alliterative offering, Sense and Sensibility, have been offered up in fairly straight and narrow adaptations, there have been a number of really inventive reworkings of Austen’s novels through the years. Bride and Prejudice was a colorful Bollywood updating of Austen that seemed to fit perfectly within the confines of Austen’s sometimes rather astringent social commentary. Lost in Austen was an often hilarious British miniseries about a modern day London lass who finds herself transported back to the Bennet household and begins to wreak considerable havoc. So on the face of it, there’s certainly nothing wrong with imagining Austen in a new setting. Unfortunately a wealth of good intentions can’t save From Prada to Nada, a Latino version of Sense and Sensibility which updates the Dashwood daughters Elinore and Marianne into two Beverly Hills girls, Nora (Camilla Belle) and Mary (Alexa Vega), who must deal with the sudden death of their father and the dissolution of what they thought was their lavish inheritance.
From Prada to Nada debuts on Blu-ray with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. This is a generally decent enough looking transfer that's especially vibrant in terms of well saturated color. The image, while certainly sharp most of the time, harbors right at the edge of excellence a lot of the time without ever managing to ever muster that final dollop of clarity to push it into the really great arena. Fine detail is pleasing, if not overwhelming, and the film bears no trace of DNR, though there are some artificial sharpening artifacts from time to time. Occasional aliasing also hobbles this transfer, though it's never a huge issue. Overall, this is a wonderfully colorful film which exhibits strong gradations of hues, excellent contrast and black levels, but which still never quite gets to the sharpness factor videophiles have come to expect from transfers of new films.
From Prada to Nada's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 mix may not be the most over the top immersive affair in recent memory, but it's a lot of fun, especially with regard to the relentless use of source cues, which include everything from Katy Perry's "California Gurls" to multiple versions of the old chestnust "Cielito Lindo." Dialogue is crisp and clear and there are several excellent moments of well placed environmental sounds scattered around the soundfield, notably as the girls walk through the brightly colored streets of East Los Angeles. A lot of the film is quieter, two or three person dialogue sequences, and as such there isn't a lot of opportunity for incredibly immersive effects to begin with. Fidelity is excellent throughout the film, with really good dynamic range.
For the record, some of the film's characters speak in Spanish and there are encoded English subtitles for those moments.
I've absolutely loved several of the reworked Austen adaptations through the years, and so I had high hopes for From Prada to Nada. Unfortunately, despite a promising premise, the film just kind of falls flat, with uninspired writing, performances and direction. It's especially sad since it's obvious the filmmakers had noble intentions. Those intentions may not have paved the road to hell exactly, but the destination here is decidedly mediocre and isn't anywhere near caliente enough.
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