The Nines / Slipstream Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.5
Audio		3.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		2.5

The Nines / Slipstream Blu-ray Movie Review

Dress to the nines, but then slip into something more comfortable.

Reviewed by Martin Liebman May 21, 2013

The Nines
Score: 3.5/5.0

The best of all possible worlds.

Know anyone who has ever become so absorbed in something that it became reality, it pushed aside responsibilities, relationships, even their own mental and physical well-being? What happens when that false reality takes on a life of its own, expands, becomes something more than the artificial and, at least to the user, a very much tangible place, thing, time? Can hours, days, weeks, months, years, more evolve the fake to the physical, the imaginary to the believable, the believable to something not only inseparable, but eventually indistinguishable, from life? Can something made of other than flesh and blood not only take on the characteristics of flesh and blood, but replace flesh and blood? These are some of the questions explored in The Nines, a unique picture that subtly explores choices, realities, truths, lies, and everything in between. It's a movie that doesn't always make sense, but that's the beauty of it. It's a movie in which truth is false and falsehoods are true, where every line is blurred and nothing seems certain, but it's all played smartly and evenly, not force-fed for entertainment value. It's an odd journey but one that will enrich the mind and open up new avenues of thought and possibilities about the meaning of life, where it all comes from, and how it can be altered or destroyed in, literally, the blink of an eye.

The Nines' three-part structure begins with Ryan Reynolds portraying a has-been Action star named Gary. He's placed under house arrest following a night of binge drinking, drug abuse, and totaling his vehicle. He's not to leave the house or invite anyone over. He must answer the telephone when it rings or be hauled off to prison. He moves into a luxurious loaner house with the help of Margaret (Melissa McCarthy), a public relations guru who is determined to keep him in check. He settles in well enough, but he finds himself taken aback by the advances of his next door neighbor, Sarah (Hope Davis), a desperate housewife and mother of an infant child. Her interest in him may be more than neighbor friendly, leading to an ugly spat of sorts between Margaret and Sarah over Gary's well-being. Meanwhile, Gary develops a sense of unease in the house, bumps into the word "knowing" more and more frequently, and encounters the number "9" more often than the laws of statistics say he should.

Part two sees Reynolds playing Gavin, a Hollywood writer whose big television idea, a show he's called Knowing, is on the fast track to becoming the next big hit. He's also the subject of a personal documentary chronicling his journey towards Hollywood stardom. He's pegged Actress Melissa McCarthy for the lead role in his show. Focus groups generally like the show, but the one common complaint is McCarthy. Gavin doesn't want to get rid of her, but the network suits want to replace her. His producer, Susan (Hope Davis), encourages him to seek out another star, but there may be more going on behind the scenes than he knows, well beyond television politics, even. Finally, part three features Reynolds as Gabriel, a famous video game designer, husband to Mary (Melissa McCarthy), and father to their daughter, Noelle (Elle Fanning). When their car battery dies in the middle of nowhere, he runs to more open ground, hoping to find a cell signal to call for help. Along the way he meets Sierra (Hope Davis), a young woman who refuses to help him but reveals she's a fan of his work. She chooses to help him after all and, as they journey, she reveals the truth about who he really is.

The Nines enjoys a unique style, not so much visually and, in some ways, not so much even structurally or dramatically, but certainly in the way the movie carries itself. It doesn't necessarily hide the truth, it just portrays it as naturally obscure through the eyes of the Reynolds character(s). It doesn't change its characters through the three segments, it just rearranges their lives. It doesn't rely on cliché but it rather takes its own path towards novelty. The picture plays with varied feels, from the whimsical to the weird, playing on real ideas but presenting them -- and ultimately revealing them -- in a way that's anything but cookie-cutter. It's not so difficult to sort it out, after a time, but it's a movie best left explored on the screen rather than broken down into words. The reward comes in one's ability to sort it out, to try and piece it together, to absorb every little nuance, clue, syllable, sight, and sound and determine how they fit together and why, how the "same" people can be "different" and how and why they change. The beauty is in how the movie blends the simple with the complex, how everything feels full-circle complete but also separate, how the stories run parallel but also how they diverge at the same time. The performances are fantastic; it's clear the three leads have a firm grasp as to what's happening and why, what the movie is trying to do and the best way to get there. It's certainly one of the more uniquely thought-provoking films out there and one that's not to be missed.

S'more Blu-rays, please!

Slipstream
Score: 2.5/5.0

Here's today's challenge: make sense of Slipstream in one viewing. Whew. Tough assignment. Sir Anthony Hopkins' picture -- that he wrote, directed, and in which he stars -- will require of most more than one sitting to fully process, and kudos to anyone who has it all sorted out after two. It's a classic jumbled motion picture that's quite literally all over the place in terms of content and style, a film that never settles in, never settles down, and doesn't settle for anything less than the masterfully mysterious and mind-numbing. The picture doesn't seem to try to make sense of much of anything, at least not on its surface. It's sure to confound its audience, and the question following a screening may be: "which is more confused, the film or the audience watching it?" There's simply too much that comes too fast, built on a jumbled narrative that's difficult to discern, populated by characters who are difficult to identify beyond a face, and never mind how they slip from one reality to another as the film progresses. Slipstream certainly entangles the mind, sometimes in a good way, sometimes not, and for anyone up for a little hardcore, heavy, demanding cinema viewing, it definitely fits the bill.

Rather than attempt a traditional "movie summary" paragraph, here's how Hopkins himself described the movie to the Los Angeles Times:

"I'm fascinated by time. I've written a script about the nature of reality ... It's about reality and the illusion of life because life to me, as I get older, is so illusion-like, so dream-like, that I think it's all a dream. It's about a man, who's caught in a slipstream of time falling back on itself and he remembers his own future. My own interpretation is if there's a God, that God is actually time. I'm fascinated by the fact the older I get every moment just slips past. What is real? You grasp this moment and then it's gone. I was talking 10 minutes ago but that's all gone, it's all a dream. Maybe the puzzle of life is asking what it's all about. I've got a theory that at the moment of impact of death we'll wake up and say, 'Ah, that was it all along.' My life has been governed a lot by those thoughts and feelings."

To say that Slipstream is all over the place would be an understatement. To accept the movie as a finished product feels, often, difficult to swallow. It's littered with odd cuts, random flashes, low-frame-count images, jerks, repeats, frame flips, a car that changes color, and the movie even, at one point, suddenly cuts away to the crew making the movie in the movie. It's visual insanity and structural chaos. On the surface it looks like a random hodgepodge of stuff, and it's so difficult to penetrate that the requisite "look below" proves difficult, not even in totality but just in getting there, in peeling away the craziness and discovering even a sliver of what it is that makes Slipstream tick beyond the disarray. The more interesting element of Slipstream may not even lie in the movie; it would be an eye-opening experience to be sure if one were able to dig deep in Writer/Director/Actor Hopkins' mind -- beyond the comfy media quotes -- and see if there's anything more coherent in there.

The problem here isn't the editing, the structure, even the story, it's the film's full-on commitment to the obtuse. There's a fine line between artistic, novel, even experimental, and this. Slipstream moves way beyond the former pieces -- with which many successful films have been molded -- and settles onto an island of obscurity and oddity all its own. Credit Hopkins for putting it together, though, for finding just the right tweak, twitch, jump, whatever for every shot. At ninety-some minutes, the film must have been an editing nightmare, and no doubt Hopkins completed it to the exactness of his vision. The film does feature a stellar name cast, most of whom, like the movie, flail all over the place. On the other hand, some of the performances are solid enough that, no matter what's happening, there's a sense of understanding at least of the moment, where they are at least on the same page as the filmmaker. The picture does offer some interesting, absorbing moments -- the extended diner sequence is really quite good in something of a Tarantino influenced haze -- that show a promise that's not fulfilled on the first viewing but that might come more clearly into focus the more frequently the picture is absorbed.

The Nines / Slipstream Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Nines
Score: 3.0/5.0

The Nines' high definition presentation is nothing spectacular, but it holds its own and never falls into anything close to resembling total disrepair. The entire image takes on a fairly warm tint, particularly in the first segment. Colors are less pronounced in the second and a little colder in the third. The overall effect is lower-end acceptable in every one; no colors are particularly vibrant, though it may be said that there's more a lean towards the dull and dim end of the spectrum. Details are adequate, particularly in the bookend segments. General clarity and stability are fine, with only a few shots going excessively soft. Skin and clothing textures satisfy, but don't necessarily impress. Light grain remains. The middle segment sports a shiny, lower end HD video appearance. Details are rarely thrilling, thanks mostly to the obvious limitations of the photographic equipment. Flesh tones, for the most part, favor that warmer end in the first segment but settle down a little in the second and third. Black levels do appear a bit pale and purplish at times. There's not an excess of blocking, banding, or other negative visuals. This is by no means a great transfer, nor is it a bad one by any stretch of the imagination. It's acceptable for an ultra-budget release.

Slipstream
Score: 4.0/5.0

Slipstream's digital photography source translates very well to Blu-ray. Though it's not the slickest and most polished, it looks quite good given that the film wasn't a mega-dollar production and considering the budget nature of the release. Though it's a bit glossy looking at times, the transfer reveals very nice details both under the bright sun and inside the warmer, lower-light diner. It shows off some striking desert terrain textures, not to mention solid clothing and facial details. There's a general sharpness to the image, and though it lacks the organic nature of film, it never looks excessively smooth or unnatural. The color palette appears even and pleasing, again no matter the place or time or lighting condition or source. Nothing's too hot, nothing's too cold; it's all nicely put together from the top down. There is a hint of aliasing and a few jagged lines throughout; some background shots of the blinds at the diner in particular suffer through a minor case of the jaggies. Otherwise, black levels and flesh tones both are not overly problematic. It's not the finest in digital filmmaking on Blu-ray, but this transfer certainly impresses given its circumstances.

The Nines / Slipstream Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Nines
Score: 2.5/5.0

The Nines features a fairly dull DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack. Though music and effects do stretch off to the sides, the presentation nevertheless feels cramped, limited, not so natural. It lacks precision clarity, richness, and realism. That said, it's certainly not a disaster, but it's far from showing what a top-tier soundtrack can do. Chapter seven nicely replicates some necessarily mushy background music inside a bar/restaurant that does sound fairly realistic in context. Otherwise, the track doesn't do much in the way of really energizing its audience. There are no major sound effects, nothing that really pumps out the beats or works the subwoofer with any sort of aggression. Dialogue does play clearly and accurately from the middle. This is the very definition of a middling soundtrack that passes muster but isn't headed for the record books.

Slipstream
Score: 3.5/5.0

Slipstream, a chronologically fresh movie along the cinema timeline, earns a satisfying DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack. The presentation offers a fine general sense of depth and space. Sound placement is rather precise, and the desert exterior in particular finds a very nice realism in how the environment is recreated in sound. Basic soundtrack elements -- music, dialogue -- come through with commendable clarity and stage presence. Some fine roadway atmospherics, honking horns, and gentle background music contribute to the oftentimes lively but not excessive sound presentation. Gunshots come through adequately, with decent presence and potency, but not quite so realistic as what is normally found in the finest tracks. All told, it won't set the audio world ablaze, but there's certainly not much, if anything, to dislike about Mill Creek's sound presentation.

The Nines / Slipstream Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

No supplements are included.

The Nines / Slipstream Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Two intriguing movies, one very well done, the other...interesting. The Nines is an engaging and followable picture about a man seemingly existing in several timelines, while Slipstream sorta-kinda follows suit but never does make much sense. Technical specs are up to par for a budget real ease across both films. No extras are included. Recommended for The Nines, though Slipstream makes for a good thinking man's movie night, too.