6.5 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 2.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
Hannah Lee Baker is a bright teen girl trapped in the dark Southern underworld of violence and guns, meth labs and vicious biker gangs, and whose only refuge is chess. She lives with Amber, her older sister; and her uncle Donny, an addict. All live in fear of Uncle Frank Stinson, who runs the illegal family business with an iron fist, aided by his psychotic younger brother Bobby. Things change for the worse when Amber falls in love with Wild Bill, a meth trafficker who finds himself at war with Frank. Hannah realizes the only way to save her family is by cleverly scheming to pit one pawn against another in a cunning chess game.
Starring: Alexa PenaVega, Abigail Breslin, Sean Bean, James Purefoy, Jake BuseyThriller | 100% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Action | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 MVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
English: Dolby Digital 5.1
English SDH
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 2.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 1.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
Well wrought metaphors can be sinuous, almost subliminal, experiences which suddenly erupt into consciousness with seemingly fully formed connections between what were previously thought of as disparate elements. Even well wrought metaphors can become heavy handed, though, especially when overused or made to be so overt that any connective surprise is mitigated. That’s one of the chief problems with Wicked Blood, a film that plays like a bizarre genre mash up of Breaking Bad: The Complete Series and Winter's Bone. Like the saga of Walter White, we get a tale of a basically decent person swept up into the drug trade, and like the film that helped establish Jennifer Lawrence as a major new star, we get a yarn of some Southern Fried folks whom you probably wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley (or even a well lit one). But Wicked Blood, the brainchild of Mark Young, who both wrote and directed it, comes out swinging with a chess metaphor that, while interesting enough, is overplayed to the point that many viewers will simply be saying, “Fine, checkmate”, after its fourth or fifth use. Wicked Blood details the story of young Louisiana girl Hannah (Abigail Breslin), a chess prodigy who is reeling from the recent death of her father. Saddled at home with an unsympathetic older sister named Amber (Alexa Pena-Vega) and drug addled uncle named Donny (Lew Temple), Hannah keeps to herself—and her chess board. Donny drowns his sorrows in what he calls “hillbilly crack”, but he was once an aspiring chess champion himself, and regularly attempts to engage Hannah in games. Amber can’t stand Donny and his drug problem, but it’s Hannah who takes things into her own hands when Federal agents show up at the family home one day and tell her that she’ll be shipped off to foster care if she doesn’t divulge where Donny is hiding out.
Wicked Blood is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Entertainment One with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. This digitally shot feature makes a virtually flawless transition to Blu-ray, with a sharp and well defined image that has a somewhat subdued palette but which offers impeccable clarity and, in some of the outdoor shots of the countryside which Young employs quite often, fantastic depth of field. Close-ups reveal exceptional fine detail. Contrast seems to have intentionally been dialed up quite a bit of the time, leading to slight blooming in the lighter color gradients, something that also leads to a marginal loss of detail and clarity at times. Despite the film's reliance on dimly lit interior scenes, noise and other artifacts are never a problem.
Wicked Blood's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 has consistent surround activity, but it's just a bit anemic at times, something that's a bit unexpected given effects like the massive explosion that starts the film (which turns out to be the ending of the story). That said, the film's dialogue is very cleanly and clearly presented, and midlevel low frequency effects like the roar of motorcycles sound very good. The film's rootsy score also sounds great.
Wicked Blood is too predictable for its own good, something that is further exacerbated by Young's arty direction (which only serves to point out how pedestrian the actual story is) and the ultimately ridiculous reliance on the chess analogy. Still, there are some good performances here, especially by Temple, who makes Donny the film's most memorable character. Fans of any of the actors may well want to check this out, for despite its flaws the technical merits of the Blu-ray are quite excellent.
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