7.3 | / 10 |
Users | 3.8 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.8 |
Jean Valjean, a Frenchman imprisoned for stealing bread, must flee a police officer named Javert. The pursuit consumes both men's lives, and soon Valjean finds himself in the midst of the student revolutions in France. Based on the acclaimed epic novel by Victor Hugo.
Starring: Liam Neeson, Geoffrey Rush, Uma Thurman, Claire Danes, Hans MathesonRomance | 100% |
History | 55% |
Period | 54% |
Melodrama | 37% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
French: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Japanese: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Portuguese: Dolby Digital 2.0
English, English SDH, French, Japanese, Portuguese, Arabic, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
UV digital copy
Region free
Movie | 4.5 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
The world never changes.
Surf the web for a moment and look the sheer number of filmed adaptations of Author Victor Hugo's celebrated literary masterpiece, Les
Misérables. There may not be a book out there with more variations floating around the cinema landscape (The Bible excluded) and of such
varying sizes, scopes, ambitions, styles, and qualities, including the wildly popular Broadway musical of the same name. From the Oscar-nominated
1935 film starring Fredric March and Charles Laughton to the
freshly-finished 2012 Musical starring Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe and including numerous versions from around the globe and staged in any
number of ways, there's no shortage of options for both the longtime Les Mis fan or the newcomer fresh off a read of Hugo's novel or merely
curious as to the staying power that is the multi-year tale of a French revolution-era convict. One of the finest adaptations of them all is Director Bille
August's (The House of the Spirits) 1998 Les Misérables, a riveting, strongly acted, smartly made, and dramatically satisfying telling of
the tale of Jean Valjean's journey towards freedom and redemption.
Hard decisions.
Les Misérables isn't the sort of flashy, visually explosive title meant to dazzle TV buyers on the showroom floor. Instead, it's a fairly reserved, slightly dim, mildly soft image that does translate well to Blu-ray, even if it doesn't jump off the screen in every scene. Once the film gets past its uninspired opening with dim colors and poorly defined details, it settles into a pleasant, film-like production that produces adequate details and suitably natural colors beneath an extremely light grain structure. The image isn't alive with striking and complex textures, but it does capture basic facial lines well, and it also picks up rough clothing surfaces and period building textures well enough. The movie plays through a lot of darker stretches and gray surfaces that don't push a display's color capabilities to its limits, but brighter scenes reveal vibrant greens and splashes of color across better-lit and more resplendent settings. Black crush is a problem at times, as is light noise in darker scenes and a hint of blocking in a few places, but overall Sony has done a rather good job with a movie that doesn't really command much of a striking visual presence by its very design.
Les Misérables arrives on Blu-ray with a balanced and satisfying DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack. The presentation produces rather good musical clarity. The opening title score enjoys natural flow and stage presence. One of the climactic moments enjoys superior presence, the track playing rather big, sweeping cinematic music with flair and natural aggressiveness that suits the moment very well. Light atmospheric effects are nicely implemented, whether trotting horses that are apt to appear in any speaker and traverse the entire stage or the general era city din that effectively transports listeners to the locale. Gunfire enjoys an aggressive presentation later in the film. The surrounds carry a fair amount of information in a natural, balanced sort of way, whether specific effects, light ambience, music, or gently reverberating dialogue in a courtroom scene. The film's general dialogue plays accurately and clearly from the center channel. This is a good, natural sound presentation from Sony.
Aside from a UV Digital Copy code, all that's included is the supplement A First Look at 'Les Misérables' (480p, 3:36), a brief look at the cast and the story, comprised primarily of film clips and short interview snippets.
Billie August's 1998 take on Les Misérables isn't heralded as the classic it deserves to be. It's a brilliant film adaptation of one of the world's great works of literature, one that's strikingly simple and streamlined but nevertheless filling and greatly satisfying. It captures the essence of Hugo's story beautifully, largely through the wonderful performances of Liam Neeson and Geoffrey Rush who share an uncanny screen chemistry and feed off of one another's characters and motives along the way to shaping one of the great tales of freedom, redemption, self-discovery, second chances, and promises kept. Sony's Blu-ray release of Les Misérables sadly lacks even a basic supplemental package, but the studio has delivered satisfying video and audio presentations. Highly recommend on the strength of the film.
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