Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		0.5
Overall		3.5

Unsane 4K Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman June 7, 2018

The moral of the story: "know what you're signing." In Director Steven Soderbergh's Unsane, a young woman is inadvertently locked away in a mental institution because the system let her down and her paranoia -- whether that paranoia be founded in some reality or wild, truly insane fantasy -- played into the notion of necessary intervention in a world where bureaucracy and "better safe than sorry" has replaced common sense and careful consideration of the facts. While the film ends on a fairly rote note, it does build with an appropriately haywire sense of uncertainty and panic as the fragile-psyche lead is unwittingly committed and meds are unwillingly shoved into her system. Soderbergh captures the film with a regular barrage of skewered perspective shots that put the viewer in a state of restless unease. The film is often cramped, uncomfortable, and effectively draws the audience into the lead's mind and the confines of the rather scary world around her. There's a boogeyman, too, but best to leave some of the movie's secrets alone.

Sawyer Valentini (Claire Foy) has gradually come to terms with the trauma that has reshaped her life. She's a very functional person, holding down a good job at which her performance is praised. She also keeps in touch with her mother, but she lives life on the edge. She's previously been the victim of a stalker, a man who made it his mission to shower her with a love she didn't want in her life. She has a restraining order against him but her life is still shaped by fear and an unwillingness to settle anywhere or do anything that might lead to his return. In essence, his specter keeps her from fully enjoying and engaging in life. But the weight of her new reality is taking a toll on her. When she seeks out some counseling -- just an ear to hear to what she has to say -- she's committed to an asylum for a period of 24 hours, which becomes a week. What is a misunderstanding becomes an inconvenience becomes a crisis when she realizes that there is perhaps another, much more nefarious, reason behind her facility imprisonment.

Unsane's weak point comes at what should be its high point: the third act and climax. While the film begins as a fascinating study of a battered and resultantly fragile psyche and evolves into a tense drama of imprisonment and questioning sanity -- as the audience, the hospital workers, Sawyer's fellow patients, even, perhaps, she herself, all doubt the validity of her claims -- it ends on a fairly routine sliding scale back towards nondescript Thriller territory, though the final scene does, at least, reinforce character, themes, and more abstract concepts and components constructed and explored throughout the film. Still, the film works extremely well and proves immensely effective as a dark and dangerous character piece that portrays Sawyer on the teetering edge of clarity and confidence in her reality and gradual sink into real madness where little, if any, previously existed. Whether all of her fears, both outside the hospital and inside, are with merit is up to the film to explore and the audience to decide, but Soderbergh certainly gives the viewer every opportunity to soak it all in with a uniquely crafted piece that's intimately and unsettlingly constructed, a perfect blend of visual and thematic disharmony that gets to the center of Sawyer's further unraveling of her already unraveled life.

Claire Foy is fantastic as Sawyer in a very difficult role that challenges her to toe that fine line between believably in command of her facilities and mildly off-kilter to, ultimately, in some doubt as to her true state and the very real potential for harm to her emotional and physical well-beings. Whether cautious of her life but sure of her new realities at film’s start, almost playfully going along with the registration process into the facility, angrily lashing out at her inability to gain her freedom, settling into her new (temporary, she hopes) reality, fighting through the effects of mind-altering medications, and coping with the perceived monster in her midst, it’s a very difficult role that requires regular large-scale adjustments and persistent micro-tuning of her physical and emotional self to sell the role, and the story, to the fullest. It’s an unenviable part that she handles with incredible command, and even with the good script (beyond the trite final act) and Soderbergh’s compellingly cockeyed composition, it’s she who shapes the movie with a precision and grace even through the most difficult balancing act scenes, which are essentially every one in which she appears.

Unsane 4K Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The included screenshots are sourced from a 1080p Blu-ray disc. Watch for 4K screenshots at a later date.

If the moral of the story is "know what you're signing," the moral of Unsane's technical presentation is "you too can make a movie!" (or not). The always experimental, cutting-edge Steven Soderbergh shot the film -- entirely -- on an iPhone 7 Plus, reportedly only with the aid of a Moment Lens. Obviously it wasn't captured entirely handheld and the footage underwent some level of post-production software tweaking, but it's essentially just a camera phone movie at its center. And watching the movie, it makes sense. With so many tight perspective shots and cockeyed angles where a bulkier camera might not fit, the comparatively diminutive iPhone can essentially be positioned just about anywhere to capture anything. With proper lighting and Soderbergh's keen eye for complimentary visual perspective, it works, and rather seamlessly at that.

And that would not seem to be an ideal candidate for a UHD release, even if the movie was, again reportedly, shot and finished at 4K. But it's immediately obvious, without comparing to the Blu-ray, that the film does benefit -- substantially in some ways -- from the UHD resolution and HDR-10 coloring. The HDR color grading makes the biggest, most immediately obvious impact. Take a look at an early movie scene in which Sawyer sits on a bench, eating her lunch while video chatting with her mother. The intensity of the blue sky and her blue business suit and the leafy greens behind her command the screen with a significant increase in saturation and vitality over the Blu-ray. The scene is absolutely transformed on the UHD format. And it's not just a one-off bit of visual trickery with a particularly well composed scene and opportunity for large swaths of color dynamics to pop. The entire film finds a new gear with the HDR grading, which includes black level depth, which is more refined and absorbing on the UHD, and without killing any shadow detail (though certainly some darker scenes are still limited by the iPhone's ability to handle some more challenging conditions, but look at the very beginning of chapter 11 for an example of the black level's upward trend).

There is a noticeable add to clarity and sharpness as well, though it's not quite as dramatic as the HDR grading. Skin textures are a bit more firm with increased depth. Clothes are more finely revealing and environments throughout the facility, whether the sleeping room, chairs and walls in the cafeteria, or the padded cell, all enjoy a firm uptick in clarity and textural efficiency. The grain structure, which was probably added in post, appears complimentary and nicely resolved. Macroblocking is still a pronounced artifact and is plainly visible in some scenes. Banding and aliasing are also minor concerns.

Unsane 4K Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Unsane features a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack (which is also the sole track included with the companion, day-and-date Blu-ray release as well). The film's sonic needs are met with this configuration, and it's doubtful that a more expanded -- rearward (7.1) and/or upward (Atmos, DTS:X) -- track would have made any discernible difference. The opening shot offers a satisfyingly wide dispersal of natural ambient activity, followed by the film's title sequence which delivers firm piano keystrokes, quickly intermixing some positive low end bass effects and additional musical cues. End credits music is also well versed in stage saturation and clarity, too. The track plays with bursts of intensity breaking up the more naturally cadenced dialogue scenes, such as when Claire is drugged on her first night in the asylum, the scene defined by screaming, piercing elements harmoniously poking and protruding all over the stage. Later in chapter 10, a more disorienting, scratchy, unkempt, but effectively wild burst of intensity accompanies another scene in which she is drugged. Light ambient effects, such as buzzing fluorescent lights, help various scenes to more casually, but critically, absorb the listener into the location by delivering balanced, effective, immersive little bits. There appears to be a very slight lip sync issue, at times, though with the movie's structure it's hard to say if it's intentional or accidental. Dialogue is otherwise fine. It's a little tinny during a key conversation inside a padded room in chapter 15 but it's otherwise well positioned and prioritized, clear with no other distortions of note.

Note that the DVS track found on the Blu-ray is not included on the UHD.

Unsane 4K Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Unsane contains one featurette on the UHD disc. Unsanity (2160p, SDR, 4:26) unconventionally explores the film in a brief behind-the-scenes piece. This is the same supplement as found on the bundled Blu-ray. A Movies Anywhere digital copy code is included with purchase.

Unsane 4K Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Unsane is a fairly unique experience, at least in sum. Never mind the manner by which it was shot, or the composition Soderbergh successfully employs to magnify the paranoia (real or imagined), but the film insightfully explores the toll that stress takes on the human condition, magnified when danger lurks in an inescapable place. It's a Horror film of a very unique variety, a Horror film in which the scares come not from physical violence but rather emotional toil and a truly inescapable boogeyman, or bogeymen, if one counts not only Sawyer's manifested fears but the hospital staff and regulations as well as her own degrading emotional state. The film lacks much surprise in its revelations and third act happenings, but it's otherwise an engrossing psychological study with an agreeable Soderbergh touch. For a movie that superficially didn't appear to be a strong candidate for a positive UHD upgrade, this one is actually quite the step forward from an otherwise solid Blu-ray. The 5.1 audio is quite strong as well. Only one extra is included; a more thorough supplemental package would have been a welcome addition. Highly recommended.