Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.5
Overall		4.5

Strange Darling 4K Blu-ray Movie Review

JT Mollner's second feature STRANGE DARLING (2023) has arrived as a two-disc "Special Collector's Edition" courtesy of UK label Icon Film. The special features on the standard Blu-ray include cast/crew interviews and trailers. The package also offers a few collectables. In English, with optional English SDH. Both the 4K UHD and the BD-50 are region free.

Last month, my colleague Justin Dekker wrote about the US Blu-ray courtesy of Magenta Light Studios. For Justin's assessment of Magenta's a/v presentations, please click here.

I second Justin's recommendation that if you haven't seen Strange Darling yet, it's best to approach it with little-to-no premeditated knowledge about the plot and story as possible. That's exactly how I initially went into it.

The Lady and The Demon.

Strange Darling 4K Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Magenta has put the feature on a BD-66 and a BD-50. The UHD disc supports HDR10. The movie is unabashedly proud to declare in the first title card that it was shot on celluloid. Cinematographer Giovanni Ribisi has given many interviews in print, digital, and on podcasts regarding his work on this picture. I will make references to two technical-heavy interviews he gave to American Cinematographer (AC) and Filmmaker Magazine (FM) and relate how the photographic aspects are reflected in Magenta's transfer. Strange Darling was filmed in 4-perf 35 mm in the native ratio of 2.39:1. Ribisi told writer Sarah Fensom of AC that his primary camera was an Arricam Lite due to its light weight, modularity, and almost tank-like design. Exteriors were shot on the Kodak Vision3 250D 5207. Mollner and Ribisi sought an "explosive color saturation" and pushed a stop on the 250D so texture and contrast are more pronounced. You can see these attributes for the exteriors captured outside the home owned by Frederick (Ed Begley Jr.) and Genevieve (Barbara Hershey). For example, notice how vivid the colors and greenery appear in Screenshot #s 5 and 13. Ditto an extreme long shot (#15) outside a hotel and in an Oregon forest (see frame enlargement #s 12 and 30-31).

Interiors were shot on the Kodak Vision3 500T 5219. The hotel scenes called for some special lighting. Ribisi stated to Fensom that he output the lamps with 500-watt incandescent bulbs and employed Jem balls as his key lights. Whenever more light was needed, Ribisi supplemented them with 1'x4' Aladdin LEDs. Amber and red were the primary colors for the hotel interiors. (See screen capture #s 1, 7-8, 16-17, and 24-25.)

Ribisi went with a nighttime blue look for the scenes inside The Demon's (Kyle Gallner) truck. The DP explained to interviewer Daniel Eagan of FM that he utilized just one camera with a 1,000-foot magazine. Ribisi chose the Cooke 35–140 mm Anamorphic/i SF Zoom lens "for its image quality." I think this was a wise choice because it really brings out smaller details. For instance, I could see tiny pimples on the face of The Lady (Willa Fitzgerald). (See #2 and other shots of her in this scene.) Ribisi said that he employed a "French over" technique, which means that two characters are facing each other in the same direction.

When the action shifts inside Frederick and Genevieve's house, Ribisi revealed to Eagan that he lit seven rooms (mainly from outside through the windows) and used as many as 20 or 30 lights. You can see how bright one of the table lamps is when the couple sit across from each other in Screenshot #s 4 and 6.

In some shots, black and white gradually shifts to color (and vice versa). You can see B&W images from an identical frame in the UDH (downsampled to 1080p) and BD transfers in capture #s 22-23. While watching the film, you will periodically see white speckles grace the image. I believe that was Mollner and Ribisi's intention because they want to transport viewers back to genre films of the '70s and '90s as well as remind them of the film stock they're looking at.

I watched the 4K and Blu-ray discs across consecutive days. The 1080p does an excellent job of preserving some of the more finite details. But there is an important difference between the two (aside from the HDR). Grain was more visible and prominent in the 2160p transfer.

The UHD carries a mean video bitrate of 69.6 Mbps for the feature while the whole disc boasts an overall bitrate of 74.5 Mbps. The MPEG-4 AVC-encoded Blu-ray displays a very healthy average bitrate of 36891 kbps.

Screenshot #s 1-15, 17, 19, 21, 23, 25, 27, 29, 31, 33, & 35 = Icon Film 4K Ultra HD (downscaled to 1080p)
Screenshot #s 16, 18, 20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 32, & 34 = Icon Film Blu-ray

The 97-minute feature is accompanied by twelve scene selections.

Strange Darling 4K Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Icon has supplied an English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 Surround mix (3325 kbps, 24-bit), which is the lone sound track on both discs. This seems to be the same audio track that Justin reviewed. To add to his comments, I would says that when music and f/x are deployed along the surround channels, they demonstrate perfect balance and symmetry between SL and SR. Both musical underscore and songs sometime produce high-end sounds, which I could hear coming from the front-center. Composer Craig DeLeon's original score reminds me of Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury's music for Alex Garland's Men (2022), particularly the louder moments.

I watched Strange Darling with the optional English SDH during one viewing. They are complete and accurate. I set my Subtitle Position setting to -14 on my Panasonic player and was able to fit all the text on the bottom black border.

Strange Darling 4K Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

All extras are consolidated on Icon's 1080p Blu-ray:

• UK EXCLUSIVE Cast and Crew Interviews (23:40 runtime altogether, 1080p) - these are all spoken in English (not subtitled). When you select this extra with your remote, a popup allows you to watch individual interviews with the following:
  
  1. Writer/director JT Mollner (5:57) talks about his writing process, the vision for this movie, what Willa Fitzgerald brought to the role of The Lady, how he decided to cast Kyle Gallner, his career dream of casting Barbara Hershey, and the process of getting Ed Begley Jr. for a bit part.
  2. Co-star Willa Fitzgerald (2:49) discusses the two main characters, their archetypal qualities, collaborating with Mollner, and the importance of genre filmmaking.
  3. Kyle Gallner (5:09) gives a character profile of The Demon, his character's mindset, working with and getting to know Fitzgerald, Mollner's approach to directing (e.g, use of lenses), his observations of Strange Darling's cinematographer, the horror/thriller genre hybrid and its impact on pop culture.
  4. Director of photography/producer Giovanni Ribisi (7:44) reflects on his early career as a child actor, the origins of his interest in filmmaking, the POV differences in being an actor versus a DP, specific lighting schemes he incorporated into Strange Darling, the most challenging scene to photograph, how he became acquainted with Mollner, movies that have inspired him (with focus on DPs), why he chose to shoot on 35 mm, and his favorite DPs (past and present).
  5. Producer Steven Schneider (2:01) gives his initial impressions of Strange Darling's screenplay, the pitch to Miramax, and working with Mollner as well as Ribisi.

• Full Trailer (1:47, 1080p) - Icon and Miramax's official trailer for Strange Darling presented in 2.39:1 anamorphic widescreen (average bitrate: 31414 kbps) and accompanied by an LPCM 2.0 Stereo track (2304 kbps, 24-bit).

• 0:30 TV Spot (1080p) - a half-minute spot that's nicely put together. It's more like a short trailer.

• 0:30 Digital Spot (1080p) - a half-minute spot for Strange Darling that appears in 2.39:1 and is 16x9 friendly. It has voice-over, critics' quotes, and the film's Tomato Meter rating.

• 0:15 TV Spot (1080p) - a condensed version of the longer TV spot.

• 0:15 Digital Spot (1080p) - this has a full shot of reviewers' star ratings for the film.

• Four Bespoke Art Cards - a quartet of postcard souvenirs from Strange Darling (see Screenshot #36).

• A3 Poster - a foldout poster with an image of The Lady (see Screenshot #37).

Strange Darling 4K Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Strange Darling hails from the Tarantino School and while that sometimes produces mixed results across various films, here the narrative structure works quite well. The timing and placement of the chapters keep viewers guessing as they arrange (and rearrange) the film's jigsaw pieces. The HDR10 presentation on Icon Film's UHD yields deeper and richer colors, as well as a finer grain structure, than the standard Blu-ray. German label Capelight Pictures recently released a LE Mediabook with Dolby Vision, an encode this release lacks. However, the Icon includes nearly 25 minutes of cast/crew interviews as well as trailers, which the Capelight has apparently not brought over to its package. (The interviews with the cinematographer and co-star Kyle Gallner are really good, albeit relatively brief.) I don't know how much a difference the DV makes over the HDR10 since I haven't seen the Capelight. The real deal breaker would be if Capelight has an Atmos mix but it appears the two-disc set only has DTS-HD MA 5.1 in English and German mixes. I guess either release would be good investments. Icon's Collector's Edition comes STRONGLY RECOMMENDED!