Joy House Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		2.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		2.5

Joy House Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov July 20, 2023

Rene Clement's "Joy House" (1962) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber. The supplemental features on the release include an exclusive new audio commentary recorded by critics Howard S. Berger and Nathaniel Thompson and vintage trailer for the film. In English or French, with optional English SDH and English subtitles. Region-A "locked".

The widow

In New York City, an aging mob boss (George Gaynes) forces his wife to admit that she has been cheating on him with a younger man. The mob boss then vows to give his wife a souvenir she would cherish for the rest of her life -- the head of her secret lover.

At the French Riviera, several American hitmen track down Marc (Alain Delon) and then greet him at his posh apartment. In the bathroom, they try to force him to repent while recording a message for the mafia boss but much to their dismay repeatedly fail. Frustrated by the resistance they decide to skip the message and transport him to a secluded beach where they quickly prepare to cut off his head.

Somehow Marc manages to get away from the hitmen and hides in a large mission known for taking care of the area’s poorest men and women. A few days later, while visiting the mission, the wealthy widow Barbara (Lola Albright) and her housemaid Melinda (Jane Fonda) meet Marc. They like him a lot and instantly agree that he belongs in the large Gothic castle they call home -- to work, at least initially, as a chauffeur.

The Gothic castle becomes the perfect hideaway for Marc, but then Barbara and Melinda begin clashing for his attention and love. However, while the competition is underway, Marc makes an unexpected discovery and realizes that he is a lot more than a toyboy for the two women.

Rene Clement’s Joy House credits Day Keene’s 1954 novel of the same name as the source of the original material that inspired it. However, there are some significant discrepancies between the film and the novel. For example, in the novel, the fugitive is an amnesiac who struggles to reconstruct his past while being tracked down by Californian cops all the way in Chicago. Also, the transition from the mission to his new home and relationship with the wealthy employer materialize differently.

In the grand scheme of things, however, the discrepancies feel irrelevant. It is because Clement recognizes and preserves the key element of the original story -- the fugitive is forced to participate in a multi-layered theater. Also, Clement effectively retains and improves the noirish identity of the original story.

The improved noirish identity of the film has an undeniable Hitchcockian quality, though it is difficult to speculate that Clement might have aimed to imitate the work of the great master. The free-floating erotic undertones, for instance, would have been significantly toned down if the intent was to produce a legit Hitchcockian thriller.

The film can be seen in two versions, English and French, which are identical content. The English version is the one to see because everyone, including Delon, speaks English. However, it must be acknowledged that the quality of the select exchanges is not very good. (Delon’s accent can be quite thick at times and when he speaks fast it is not always easy to understand what he says).

Clement worked with one of the greatest post-war French cinematographers, Henri Decae. While predictably elegant, Decae’s work in this film is difficult to compare to his work in similar noirish masterpieces like Bob the Gambler, Elevator to the Gallows, Purple Noon.

The suspenseful soundtrack was created by Georges Auric, whose credits include such masterpieces of French cinema as Beauty and the Beast, The Wages of Fear, and Rififi.

Joy House Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in an aspect ratio of 2.35:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Joy House arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber.

Joy House was recently restored on behalf of the French studio Gaumont, but the technical presentation of the restoration is extremely disappointing. What is the problem? It appears that the party that prepared the restored master did so with incorrect film-to-video presets. (Basically, all of the data was flagged and output incorrectly). As a result, the entire film is covered with chroma noise. Also, the native dynamic range of the visuals is either compromised or effectively collapsed. You can see what the chroma noise looks like here. You can see how the dynamic range of the visuals is compromised here and here. This is not a new issue for masters that are prepared on behalf of Gaumont. For example, it is present on this release of A Man Escaped from 2010, but on Joy House it can be so severe that large areas of the film begin to look as if they have been heavily filtered. It is a shame because this issue is easily avoidable if the party that finalizes the master properly encodes the data. Image stability is very good. The entire film looks clean as well. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-A or Region-Free player in order to access its content).

Joy House Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There are two standard audio tracks on this Blu-ray release: English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 and French DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. English SDH (for the English version) and English (for the French version) subtitles are provided. When turned on, they appear inside the image frame.

The original English audio is very healthy. However, certain exchanges may present a few problems for viewers that find Alain Delon's accent to be too thick. Dynamic intensity is very good. There are quite a few areas where Georges Auric's music sounds terrific.

Joy House Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer - a vintage trailer for Joy House. In French, with English subtitles. (4 min).

• Commentary - this exclusive new audio commentary was recorded by critics Howard S. Berger and Nathaniel Thompson.

• Cover - reversible cover with vintage poster art for Joy House.

Joy House Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Even though Joy House was recently restored on behalf of Gamount in France, it looks pretty bad on Blu-ray. It is because the master that was supplied to Kino Lorber to prepare the Blu-ray release is faulty. This is unfortunate because Joy House is a wonderful noirish thriller with a lot of style.