5.7 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Story kicks off with the mysterious murder of a senator bearing the marks of a Soviet assassin, who was long thought to be dead. To hunt down the killer, a retired CIA operative, who spent his career going toe-to-toe with his Soviet nemesis, is teamed with a young FBI agent.
Starring: Richard Gere, Topher Grace, Martin Sheen, Stephen Moyer, Odette AnnableThriller | 100% |
Crime | 82% |
Drama | 45% |
Mystery | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 16-bit)
English SDH, Spanish
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (locked)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Viewers today are so accustomed to "twists", "reveals" and "spoilers" that everyone assumes it's supposed to be a Big Secret that the retired CIA man played by Richard Gere in The Double is really . . . a Soviet assassin. (Oops!) But the trailer discloses it, hints are dropped early in the film, and Gere's character confesses his identity less than half an hour in. And did I mention that the title of the film is The Double? As it happens, screenwriters Michael Brandt (who directed) and Derek Haas (who co-produced) always intended the audience to know the character's dual identity. Their script originally opened with the backstory now seen in flashbacks, and it wasn't until the editing stage that they decided the narrative would have more energy if they started in the present. Either way, the story isn't about who Gere's character is; it's about who's trying to flush him out and why. As with many espionage tales, things get even murkier and more disturbing once the original question has been answered. Brandt and Haas sold the script for The Double to MGM, then had to reclaim it when that studio filed for bankruptcy and was parceled out among various buyers. In the meantime, they achieved enough notoriety with their scripts for 3:10 to Yuma and Wanted to obtain funding to make The Double themselves, albeit without major studio backing for a wide release. During its three-week sojourn in just 45 theaters, the film barely registered. Most critics panned it; my colleague, Brian Orndorf, called it "ridiculously convoluted", and that was probably the nicest thing in his review. Few saw what I did, which is a diverting genre throwback about people for whom lying isn't just a technique but the essence of who they are. Now that Image Entertainment is releasing the film in an affordable, first-rate Blu-ray presentation, you can judge for yourself.
The Double was shot by top cinematographer Jeffrey Kimball, whose work extends from an impressive set of films for Tony Scott (Top Gun, True Romance and Beverly Hills Cop II) to a trio for John Woo (Mission Impossible 2, Windtalkers and Paycheck) to Stallone's The Expendables. On their commentary track, Brandt and Haas note that having Kimble as their DP allowed them to attract a first-rate crew, even though their film was low-budget, because everyone wants to work with Kimball. Brandt told Kimball that he wanted to "feel" the film, and he didn't care if that meant elements in the frame were out of focus or the frame was dark. Kimball gave Brandt what he wanted, but he and his crew were too professional not to deliver a glossy image at the same time. The Double "feels" like it was shot on film, in large part because Kimball knows how to shoot images with a sense of texture, e.g., by using smoke in the air to provide diffusion for the light. (The commentary talks about this in detail.) But he also knows how to deliver a detailed and fine-grained image with deep blacks, appropriate color delineation (corrected via a digital intermediate), and a palette that shifts easily between chilly blues for government facilities and warmer ambers and browns for life outside. All of this is well presented on Image's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray, with no signs of inappropriate digital tampering by way of high frequency filtering, artificial sharpening or compression artifacts.
The DTS lossless presentation of The Double's 5.1 track is extremely impressive. Listen, for example, to the scene where Martin Sheen's CIA chief and Richard Gere's retired operative enter CIA headquarters, walk through a corridor and enter a briefing room. The sounds of the environments they pass through envelop you and move with the briskly pacing pair. Throughout the film, small sounds appropriate to the scene are placed off-camera (a door closing, creaks, river flow, traffic, etc.) to create the sense of the larger world in which these operatives have to move and work. An elaborate car chase ("battle" would be more appropriate) in the latter part of the film is as kinetic sonically as it is visually. The score by John Debney (Iron Man 2, The Passion of the Christ) plays with appropriate range and intensity.
To return to my colleague's review, yes, The Double is "convoluted", but audiences expect that from their espionage stories, especially after 24 (for which The Double's plot line would have supplied material for maybe four episodes, at most) and slickly assembled potboilers like Salt or even a cerebrally classy one like Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. If ridiculous convolution were automatically a flaw, the cluttered alternate universes of Middle Earth, Hogwarts, Gotham City and, lest we forget, the Galactic Empire, wouldn't have the hordes of obsessively devoted fans populating site after site, filling up numerous threads, and buying multiple versions of the films. The Double isn't a perfect film, but it's an interesting one that, as I discovered while rewatching portions for this review, reveals additional layers on subsequent viewings, which isn't something I can say of everything I've reviewed here. The film is recommended, and the Blu-ray is highly recommended.
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