6 | / 10 |
Users | 3.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
Intense public fascination and life-changing personal crises ensue after a wealthy French lawyer and politician is charged with sexual assault by a hotel maid in the United States.
Starring: Jacqueline Bisset, Gérard Depardieu, Drena De Niro, Paul Calderon, Shanyn LeighDrama | 100% |
Crime | 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 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: LPCM 2.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH, Spanish
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 3.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
Writer/director Abel Ferrara's Welcome to New York is a tale of two controversies. The first is the infamous case of former IMF head Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who was charged in 2011 with sexually assaulting a New York City hotel maid. Although the charges were later dropped after doubt was cast on the maid's credibility, related allegations continued to surface about Strauss-Kahn, effectively ending his once-promising career in French politics. Ferrara, for whom the story's mix of sex, money and power must have been irresistible, set about scripting (with co-writer Chris Zois) a thinly disguised docudrama version of the Strauss-Kahn affair, with appropriate disclaimers vetted by attorneys. The second controversy came after Ferrara delivered his 125-minute director's cut to production company Wild Bunch. Apparently Ferrara did not have final cut, and Wild Bunch and distributor IFC Films had concerns about the film's commercial potential. When Ferrara refused to make changes, Wild Bunch proceeded to finalize a 108-minute, R-rated theatrical version, using an editor other than Anthony Redman, the film's credited editor. (It's an indication of how tangled this story is that no one has yet identified the editor who did the work.) To date, this R-rated theatrical cut is the only version to be released in the U.S. Charges, countercharges, angry interviews and threats of lawsuits have been exchanged, liberally spiced with bile and expletives on Ferrara's side. However, since no one other than the parties and their attorneys has seen the contracts, reporters have been unable to do anything but report the conflicting allegations. Meanwhile, Ferrara's director's cut played at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. It has also appeared on a Region B-locked Blu-ray in England, which we have previously reviewed here. MPI Media is releasing the R-rated theatrical version on Blu-ray. It would not surprise me if, at some future date, after both sides have finished huffing and puffing at each other, Ferrara's director's cut is also released. In the meantime, here's a look at what we have.
Specific information about the shooting format of Welcome to New York was unavailable, but the film was shot digitally by Ferrara's frequent collaborator, cinematographer Ken Kelsh. Post-production was completed on a digital intermediate, from which MPI Media's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray was presumably sourced by a direct digital path. The Blu-ray image is sharp and detailed with solid blacks and an absence of artifacts or noise. Saturated colors dominate in Devereaux's world of privilege, both in the earlier scenes of debauchery and when Simone arrives to take charge. A more naturalistic (and cooler) palette prevails whenever law enforcement dominates the picture. MPI has mastered the film with an average bitrate of 22.32 Mbps, and the compression appears to have been done with care.
Welcome to New York's original 5.1 soundtrack has been encoded in lossless DTS-HD MA. The sound design provides a quiet sense of ambiance for a wide variety of environments, ranging from Devereaux's Washington office to the city jail cells where he is initially remanded without bail. However, the focus remains on dialogue, which is spoken in a mixture of English and subtitled French and is clearly rendered (although Depardieu's accent remains as thick as ever). There is no underscoring, but several songs have been composed for the soundtrack, including "Every Lie's a Tear", written by Ferrara and performed by Amy Ferguson. As is typical of MPI's releases, an alternate PCM 2.0 track is included.
Other than a trailer (1080p; 1.78:1; 1:45), the disc has no extras. At startup, the disc plays trailers for 4:44 Last Day on Earth, Camp X-Ray, Match and The Riot Club, which can be skipped with the chapter forward button and are not otherwise available once the disc loads.
Although I have not seen Abel Ferrara's complete version of Welcome to New York, I have read a description of the major differences between the director's cut and the Wild Bunch theatrical release contained on this Blu-ray. Some of these differences appear to be meaningful, although the essential story has survived intact. The film is good enough, and the subject of sufficient importance, that I look forward to revisiting it whenever Ferrara's version becomes available here. For now, I can't quite recommend a purchase of this Wild Bunch version, but it is certainly worth renting for the experience of the two lead performances and the director's matter-of-fact presentation of debauchery that gets doused with a pail of cold-water reality. With any luck, we'll have the director's cut soon enough.
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