6.8 | / 10 |
Users | 5.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
Down-on-their luck brothers, Lars and Ernie Smuntz, aren’t happy with the crumbling old mansion they inherit… until they discover the estate is worth millions. Before they can cash in, they have to rid the house of its single, stubborn occupant: a tiny and tenacious mouse.
Starring: Nathan Lane, Lee Evans, Vicki Lewis, Maury Chaykin, Eric ChristmasFamily | 100% |
Comedy | 36% |
Action | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
German: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
English, English SDH, French, German
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 5.0 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 1.0 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
Director Gore Verbinski's (The Ring, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl) Mouse Hunt is a "sophisticated" Comedy of errors, full of goofy slapstick and (hit or miss, mostly hit) wit. Verbinski tries to elevate the material while still in many ways turning its attention to the lowest common denominator. This was Verbinski's debut film and it's easy to see the promise in it. The story is simple but there's an air of elegance to it. He crafts it lovingly and with keen attention to narrative and photographic detail even if the material is more cartoonish than serious, when phoning it in would have still earned the studio a pretty penny. But Verbinski brings out the best in what could have been a bottom feeding film, bringing an aesthetically agreeable and comically on-point misadventure to the screen with humor, enthusiasm, and charm to spare.
It's Mouse Hunt, not exactly the world's foremost motion picture, so expectations for a good picture quality might not be super high (and it's approaching 25 years old at that). But this looks terrific. Paramount is really bringing its A-game right now and Mouse Hunt couldn't look more filmic, sharp, and practically perfect on Blu-ray. The movie is a textural powerhouse. Not only is it finely grainy, preserving its natural film quality state, it's also replete with exceptionally well defined details throughout, and particularly in the old house the brothers inherit. All of the dust and wear around the house – worn woods, warped wallpaper, cobwebs hanging about, scuffs on the hardwood floors – look marvelous. It's a target-rich environment, so to speak, for rugged and ragged and high yield textural delights. Of course faces and clothes look great, too, for sharp intimacy and picture-perfect detail, but it's the house that really looks striking. The color palette is a bit depressed by design. The movie's colors are depleted to give it a weathered appearance right from the bleak, rainy, blue and black dominant funeral scene forward. Lighting is generally low and there's a slightly warm cast to the picture inside the old house where shades of brown, primarily, but also some blacks and grays and maybe very dark reds, live and thrive. It's not vibrant by any means, but it is extremely faithful to the intended aesthetics. Add perfectly complimentary flesh tones, expert black levels, and no evidence of either print wear or encode problems and there's absolutely nothing to keep this transfer from five-star perfection.
Mouse Hunt scampers onto Blu-ray with a very well rounded DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack. The film opens with organ music and saturating rainfall, the former nicely spaced and airy in detail, the latter with fine immersive saturation all around the listener, soaking the scene (and the home listening area, practically) with good pelting presence (a few sewer drips to follow offer some discrete fun, too). It's a positive pace setter for the audio delights to come. The various action scenes featuring the brothers (comically) attempting to capture the mouse are a delight, whether a series of traps cracking shut all over the stage or just simple things like swats with makeshift weapons. A nail gun fires its deadly daggers with depth in one mid film scene as the mouse scampers away from the darting projectiles which move and swoosh with great, thunderous depth from its perspective. Music is impressively large and healthy with fine fidelity through the range and both positive subwoofer and surround usage. Light atmospherics, perfectly positioned and at just the right volume, allow the audience to feel all the more immersed into the house. Finally, lifelike, center positioned, and organically prioritized dialogue round this excellent track into fine and finished form.
This Blu-ray release of Mouse Hunt contains deleted scenes and a pair of trailers. No DVD or digital copies are included with purchase. This
release does not ship with a slipcover.
Mouse Hunt could have been a throwaway movie, and maybe at its core it is a fairly forgettable picture built on a premise fit for disposable entertainment, but it has several positives working to its benefit, namely Verbinski's rookie, but well capable, craftsmanship; Evans' and Lane's enthusiastic performances; and the picture's excellent production design and capable (particularly for its age) special effects. It's a pleasant surprise, certainly not a classic but a very agreeable little time killer that is far better than it has any business to be. Paramount's Blu-ray includes some deleted scenes and trailers and a terrific lossless soundtrack, but the highlight here is absolutely the five-star video transfer. Recommended!
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