6.6 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 2.0 | |
Overall | 2.0 |
The story begins on Louis Drax's 9th birthday, when a lifetime of curious mishaps culminates in the boy's near-fatal fall. Desperate to reveal the strange circumstances behind the young boy's accident and dark coincidences that have plagued his entire life, Dr. Allan Pascal (Dornan) is drawn into a thrilling mystery that explores the nature of the sixth sense, testing the boundaries of fantasy and reality.
Starring: Jamie Dornan, Sarah Gadon, Aaron Paul, Aiden Longworth, Molly ParkerThriller | 100% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH, Spanish
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
UV digital copy
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 2.0 | |
Video | 4.0 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 2.0 |
The 9th Life of Louis Drax is one of those purported mysteries where devoted armchair sleuths are probably going to be asking, “Well, it can’t be that obvious, can it?”, only to have the denouement of the film prove that yes, indeed, it can in fact be that obvious. The film has a generally intriguing presentational style, and a really winning performance by young Aiden Longworth as the titular Louis Drax, but the “mystery” as to what’s going on with a perhaps deeply troubled little boy will be patently obvious to anyone who has ever dealt with or even read about psychological issues between parents and their children. The film is pretty relentlessly narrated by Louis, even after he falls into a coma, not to mention having been pronounced dead and taken to the morgue where he’s about to undergo a postmortem before sputtering back to intermittent breathing. Louis’ life has been, to borrow a certain Lemony Snicket title, A Series of Unfortunate Events, one calamitous accident after another that began with a breech birth, moved on to a chandelier falling squarely on his baby crib, and continued through bouts of food poisoning, broken bones, electrocution and various and sundried other mishaps. Already certain armchair sleuths may be suspecting something other than bad luck is at play, and while a real attempt at not posting spoilers will be made here, for those whose suspicions are already piqued, it may be best to not even read further, since (as alluded to above) that old truism about Occam’s Razor turns out to be, well, true, for The 9th Life of Louis Drax.
The 9th Life of Louis Drax is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. This is yet another film where technical data is in short supply online, but this appears to be digitally shot and boasts a generally extremely well detailed image. That said, there's perhaps a higher incidence of SFX work than in a typical mystery film, including some greenscreen material, where backgrounds at least can look pretty soft. The palette hasn't been overly graded, though there are occasional trips down the by now rote "yellow brick road", so to speak, with some scenes drenched in a buttery hue that tends to smooth out fine detail. Several interior scenes in darker environments don't offer a wealth of shadow detail. In better lighting and without any overt color grading, detail levels are uniformly quite pleasing. Commendably, despite the prevalence of water imagery, and a number of scenes with light wafting through the liquid, there really aren't any issues with banding.
The 9th Life of Louis Drax's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track offers some good immersion in a number of crowded scenes, as in Louis' trip to Sea World with Peter. There's also some really good differentiation in ambient reverb as the film ventures between the coma ward where Louis is kept after the accident and several outdoor scenes (either "contemporary" or flashback material). Dialogue is cleanly and clearly presented, though young Longworth has a tendency to swallow a syllable here and there.
The 9th Life of Louis Drax features an extremely charismatic cast, but it tips into turgid soap operatic territory at the same time it's trying to be some kind of thriller or mystery, all with a kind of supernatural edge lying just beneath the (watery?) surface. Fans of the cast may enjoy their participation enough to want to check this out, and for them the good news is technical merits are generally very strong.
1978
Warner Archive Collection
1981
2014
2018
2017
Communion / Holy Terror
1976
2016
1982
2015
2018
2010
Una libélula para cada muerto
1975
2020
2013
2016
4 mosche di velluto grigio
1971
2016
1958
2019
2018