6.1 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 0.5 | |
Overall | 0.5 |
Five years after a young girl was murdered, her receives a phone call: "Mummy, it's me... come and get me". Helped by an ex-policeman and a reporter who specializes in the supernatural, she sets out on a desperate search that leads to a terrifying truth.
Starring: Emma Vilarasau, Karra Elejalde, Tristán Ulloa, Brendan Price, Jordi DauderHorror | 100% |
Foreign | 31% |
Mystery | 24% |
Thriller | Insignificant |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0
None
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 1.0 | |
Audio | 0.5 | |
Extras | 0.0 | |
Overall | 0.5 |
Writer-director Jaime Balagueró's The Nameless (Los sin nombre) won several festival prizes, but no one would mistake it for a masterpiece of supernatural or psychological suspense. Among other problems, it has too many characters, and its overly complicated plot requires so much exposition that no payoff can satisfy the anticipation. Still, the film should at least get a fair chance to cast whatever spell it can manage over viewers, but the Blu-ray presentation by Echo Bridge under the "Miramax" label sabotages it in every conceivable way: a lackluster image from a damaged source element; a poorly done English dub, without even the minimal effort needed to translate original intertitles or essential writings, such as newspaper headlines, that supply vital information; and a 2.0 soundtrack instead of the original 5.1, despite the obvious care that the sound team invested in creating an atmospheric and disturbing discrete surround mix. When you're not being distracted by the long vertical scratch that keeps appearing at the right side of the screen, you're wondering why the disembodied voices are so poorly matched to the actors' lip movements. Even bad kung fu movies were better synched. Balagueró directed the English-language Darkness (2002) for Mirmax's Dimension label, when the Weinstein Brothers controlled the company. Either as a favor to Balagueró or to capitalize on the modest success of Darkness, the Weinsteins released his 1999 Spanish-language chiller on U.S. DVD in 2005. That version, released under Disney's Buena Vista label, had the original Spanish track as Dolby Digital 2.0 with English subtitles, as well as the English dub in DD 5.1. For Blu-ray, Echo Bridge has provided the worst of both worlds by supplying only the English version in two channels. For anyone still interested at this point, I will do my best to provide a spoiler-free overview of the film. If you are at all intrigued, I recommend tracking down a copy of the Buena Vista DVD. Even at standard definition, it should provide a better experience than this pitiful excuse for a Blu-ray.
"We must find out who put that blue scratch behind you!"
The source material for Echo Bridge's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray is in terrible shape, far removed from anything resembling an interpositive or original camera negative. It does not appear to be even a print created for distribution in the film's original Spanish, as the occasional intertitle is in Catalan, which is a Romance language spoken in parts of Spain and France, with similarities to both Spanish and French. The image is littered with dirt, speckles, streaks and other damage, including a pronounced vertical scratch extending from top to bottom of the right side of the screen that comes and goes in the latter half of the film. It is inconceivable that a better source could not be found for a film first released in 1999. Looking past the damage, the transfer is merely adequate in its reproduction of Xavi Giménez's (Red Lights) cool, somewhat desatured palette that is occasionally offset by startling expanses of red. Detail is only fair, black levels are inconsistent, and the image has a flatness and lack of depth suggesting that high frequencies have been rolled off, with perhaps a touch of sharpening afterward. Some of the elaborate sets demands to be seen in detail (e.g., the abandoned clinic to which Claudia is directed by the first phone call from the voice claiming to be Angela), but this image doesn't make them easy to decipher.
The Blu-ray's DTS-HD MA 2.0 track is a textbook example of why lossless audio is not necessarily better audio. I would gladly trade this lossless dubbed 2.0 garbage for a lossy original Spanish-language 5.1 track in a heartbeat. As previously noted, the dubbing has been carelessly performed so that the voices rarely match lip movements, when the latter are visible. The voices thereby acquire a weirdly disembodied quality that is clearly not what the filmmakers intended. Played through a surround decoder, the 2.0 mix has just enough of a presence in the rear speakers to suggest the kind of effect that a discrete 5.1 mix might fully convey, with rustlings, creaks, wind, echoes and other faint noises heard in the distance during tense moments. The track has sufficient dynamic range to establish the necessary contrast between loud and soft moments in the quick cuts between disturbing "dream" footage and regular waking life, but a 5.1 mix that opened up the "dream" sounds would work even better. There is a generically effective horror score by Carles Cases, who also wrote the score for Darkness.
The disc contains no extras.
This was my first viewing of The Nameless, and I would like to see it again some day in a quality presentation with its original soundtrack, just to be able to experience Balagueró's vision as he intended. Otherwise, it's unclear to me whether the film has much rewatch value. I am one hundred percent certain, however, that this particular version on Blu-ray has no value at all. Avoid at all costs.
(Still not reliable for this title)
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