7.5 | / 10 |
Users | 4.7 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.1 |
A Chicago playwright uses self-hypnosis to find the actress whose vintage portrait hangs in a grand hotel.
Starring: Christopher Reeve, Jane Seymour, Christopher Plummer, Teresa Wright, George VoskovecRomance | 100% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Fantasy | 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 2.0 Mono (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: DTS 2.0 Mono
English SDH
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
UV digital copy
Region free
Movie | 4.5 | |
Video | 3.5 | |
Audio | 3.5 | |
Extras | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Somewhere in Time was greenlit by Universal only because the head of production owed director Jeannot Szwarc a favor. Then it was savaged by critics upon release (at a time when print reviews had far more influence than today) and twice given a lackluster treatment on DVD. Nevertheless, the film has sustained its popularity for 34 years on the strength of Richard Matheson's romantic screenplay (based on his novel Bid Time Return), the heartfelt lead performances by Jane Seymour and Christopher Reeve, Szwarc's restrained, intelligent direction and the haunting score by John Barry, the theme of which was heard most recently during the "In Memoriam" segment at the Academy Awards. Matheson, who passed away in 2013, is best known as a writer of science fiction and horror. His novel I Am Legend has been adapted for the screen multiple times and has also been cited as an inspiration for George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead . His story "Button, Button" inspired Richard Kelly's The Box; David Koepp wrote and directed a feature film based on the novel Stir of Echoes; and Matheson himself wrote the screenplay for the 1973 cult classic, The Legend of Hell House, based on his novel Hell House. He also wrote many episodes for Rod Serling's original The Twilight Zone . Somewhere in Time shows a different side of Matheson. It, too, has a sci-fi element in the form of time travel, but in this particular story time represents something other than a technological challenge. Somewhere in Time is a love story, and like all great love stories, it concerns lovers separated by obstacles that seem insurmountable. There can be no greater obstacle than the fact that the lovers exist in different eras. In Matheson's story, traveling through time becomes their solution. It is also their curse.
As described in the documentary, "Back to Somewhere in Time", cinematographer Isidore Mankofsky shot the film with different stocks for scenes set in 1912 and those in the present. The Fuji stock used for scenes in 1912 produced lighter colors and a softer image, which Mankofsky further softened with diffusion filters. Universal's two DVD releases of the film disappointed fans with a weak transfer and a lack of 16:9 enhancement. The presentation on this 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray is a huge improvement, though not without the usual issues found on Blu-rays from Universal's catalog. The strongest element is the palette. The present-day scenes have saturated colors, realistic and, where appropriate, deeply rich. A good example is the Grand Hotel's historical gallery where Elise McKenna's portrait hangs. The 1912 scenes lean toward the delicate pastel shades of the Impressionist paintings that Mankofsky and director Szwarc studied as a guide to staging some of the key scenes, especially those on the beach where Richard and Elise stroll as a couple. Detail is generally quite good, although, as noted, the image for the 1912 scenes has been deliberately softened and diffused. Nevertheless, the fine points of the period costumes are readily discernible, and so are facial details. Detail only falls off as the image moves away from the camera's focal point. Black levels, when there is black to be seen, are generally solid, with a slight shading toward grey in the 1912 scenes. Here again, the diffusion is probably the cause. As usual, Universal has followed their video-not-film approach, but in this case the very nature of the material seems to have constrained them. Imagery from 1912 shouldn't look like video, and by and large it doesn't, probably because Mankofsky's diffused images simply resist such transformation. Still, the effort has been made, primarily through digital sharpening, which isn't so severe as to cause edge haloes or, in most frames, noticeably "pop" figures out of the background beyond the intent of the original photography. But the electronic "enhancement" does coarsen the film's natural grain. Most of the time, the effect isn't intrusive, but it does make some shots noisier than they needed to be, without conferring any real additional sharpness. The effect is more pronounced in the contemporary scenes than the 1912 sequences, but it can be observed in both. I suspect, though, that many viewers probably won't notice. At an average bitrate of 31.99 Mbps, the disc has more than enough bandwidth to handle the demands of Somewhere in Time without artifacts.
The film's original mono mix is presented in lossless DTS-HD MA 2.0. It's a wonderful mix, with simple sounds like horse hooves or a radio broadcast used sparingly and to great effect. As much as one would like to have John Barry's score in stereo, it sounds quite good in mono, with decent fidelity and good dynamic range, and so does the selection from Rachmaninoff that Barry selected for a key plot point in the story. The dialogue has been carefully mixed for intelligibility, and it had to be done carefully, because, as Szwarc notes, Barry was a composer who was willing to risk placing underscoring beneath important dialogue.
Universal first released Somewhere in Time on DVD in 1998 with only production notes and a trailer. In 2000, it released a "Collector's Edition" with an array of extras that have been ported over to the Blu-ray, with the omission only of the production notes and the cast and crew listings.
Somewhere in Time was rescued by fans, but its durability over the years has elevated it beyond the status of cult classic. It belongs on anyone's list of great cinematic love stories. (I would offer a more detailed argument, except that it can't be done without revealing much more of the plot.) Universal's Blu-ray isn't perfect, but it's such a major advance over any version released to date that its shortcomings should be overlooked, especially since a new version is unlikely. Highly recommended.
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