The Big White Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.5
Audio		3.0
Extras		1.0
Overall		3.0

The Big White Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman April 18, 2020

The cover of this release offers a pull quote comparing the film to both Raising Arizona and The Big Lebowski, which is at least a little odd, since the obvious Coen Brothers offering that The Big White bears the strongest resemblance to in any number of ways is Fargo. Both The Big White and Fargo play out in frozen environments and both feature a kind of hapless shlub who is desperate for cash and who does something reckless to appropriate some much needed moolah. Both films also offer an ensemble cast portraying a bunch of eccentric characters whose individual stories interweave in equally eccentric ways. A lot of the film is genially agreeable, but the humor is forced at times, and there's virtually none of the style that the Coen Brothers tend to bring to their projects. Still, for those willing to experience a kind of B-movie version of a Coen Brothers outing, The Big White might provide a passing kick or two.

The behind the scenes featurette included on this disc as a supplement features the late, great Robin Williams, this film’s “William H. Macy” (so to speak), in a fur lined parks out on the tundra talking about the shoot in an ideolect that is ostensibly "Canadian" but which is nonetheless suspiciously close to the one used by Frances McDormand in Fargo , suggesting that subliminally at least Williams may have realized the most obvious Coen Brothers referent to The Big White (I should point out that Williams later goes into a supposed “Native American” or maybe Eskimo (?) patois, in his typical ADHD fashion). Williams portrays, yep, hapless shlub Paul Barnell, who owns a small travel agency in an outpost in Alaska. The film actually opens with Paul’s wife Margaret (Holly Hunter) running through a snow packed back road in her housecoat and slippers, which is a quick tip off that Margaret may be suffering from some emotional issues. It’s later revealed that Margaret at least thinks she has Tourette Syndrome, though that “diagnosis” is at least partially doubted by one character later in the film. The Big White tries to mine humor out of Margaret’s tendency toward non sequiturs and bouts of obscenities, but whether or not this really registers will probably be a matter of individual taste and “un-PC humor” tolerance levels.

Paul is desperate to get his wife some much needed help, but he’s strapped for cash. His brother Raymond (Woody Harrelson) has been missing and presumed dead for five years, but Raymond’s life insurance won’t be claimable until at least two more years (and possibly longer) since no body has ever been found. When Paul stumbles upon a corpse left in the dumpster outside of his business, fate seems to have intervened and provided him with a simple solution to all his problems. And you can probably guess a lot of what happens next, including the reemergence of the “real” Raymond, as evidenced by the fact that there’s an A-list Hollywood actor portraying him.

The “Frances McDormand” of this film is actually an insurance investigator named Ted Waters (Giovanni Ribisi), and another subplot involves his wife Tiffany (Allison Lohman), who makes a living as a call in psychic, offering emotional support to a couple of other characters in the film, which probably stretches and already fragile credulity past the breaking point. The film builds to a chaotic climax involving this quintet of characters, plus a couple of others just for good measure, tying things up in a predictable but still kind of bracing way.

A lot of The Big White has an undeniable Coen Brothers feel to it, and I think if the writing had been just a tad sharper, the film could have really had some distinctive impact. I actually rather enjoyed the film on its own merits, and it is of course bittersweet to see Robin Williams playing a husband dealing with a spouse with emotional issues. Hunter is a little odd in this part, but the part itself is kind of haphazardly written. Ribisi is archly funny in a couple of scenes.

The Big White Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Big White is presented on Blu-ray ostensibly courtesy of MVD Visual's MVD Marquee Collection imprint, though the film itself kind of interestingly actually bears the FilmRise masthead, with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. The Big White had a previous Blu-ray release way back in 2008 courtesy of Echo Bridge, and I'm assuming this was perhaps culled from the same master, as it often looks dated, especially with regard to palette and at times detail levels. The transfer seems slightly skewed toward blue a lot of the time, something that may add to the frigid ambience, but which can tend to push flesh tones toward purplish territory and which can even intermittently affect supposedly "pure" whites like all of the many snowbound scenes. Still, in close-ups especially, fine detail levels tend to be rather good and some of the outdoor location work offers good depth of field.

The Big White Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Unfortunately this release offers only lossy Dolby Digital tracks in either 5.1 or 2.0. The surround track does offer good immersion, with a wealth of ambient environmental sounds in the many outdoor scenes, but also with regard to Mark Mothersbaugh's nice score. Both of those elements would have no doubt sounded fuller in a lossless rendering, in my not so humble audiophile opinion. Dialogue is presented cleanly and clearly throughout this presentation. As has been a longstanding tradition with my personal reviews, part of my score above is based on my belief that Blu-rays should always have at least one lossless audio option.

The Big White Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Big White: An Adventure in Filmmaking (1080p; 15:18) has some fun candid footage and interviews.


• Photo Gallery (1080i) is authored without a timecode, but does advance automatically, so have the Pause button on your remote handy if you want to linger on any given image. I frankly didn't sit and watch for all of these, but based on chapter stops there appear to be well over 100 photos in this gallery.


• Theatrical Trailer (480i; 2:04)

The Big White Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Big White never quite delivers the goods the way that the best Coen Brothers efforts have, but it's often fun and darkly humorous. Fans of the cast may want to check this out, even if they'd best keep their expectations at a reasonable level. Technical merits are okay (video) to passable (lossy audio), for those considering a purchase.