An Invisible Sign (2010/MPI Blu-ray)/The 5th
Quarter/Monte Carlo/Terri (2011/Fox Blu-rays)
Picture:
B- Sound: B/B-/B/B- Extras: C- Films: C-
And now
for some feel-good films that did not make me feel good.
Marilyn
Argelo’s An Invisible Sign has the
always likable Jessica Alba as a young lady still scarred by the sudden health
issues of her father at a young age who feels she connects with him in numbers
and becomes a teacher, but these issues are about to catch up to her. Alba is good here as is the idea, but I
though the numbers angle was overdone, the classroom situation not bad (but
needed some more time to develop), Chris Messina unrealistically written as her
fellow teacher who becomes interested in her and a very unsatisfactory ending. Nice try, I guess, but it did not work no
matter how much I wanted to like it. A
trailer is the only extra.
Rick
Bieber’s The 5th Quarter
is a contrived tale of a nice family with two sons who face tragedy when the
younger son is killed and the older football player son intends to win his
games in honor of his loss. We have seen
this before, it never rings true, Aidan Quinn and Andie MacDowell are only so
convincing as the parents and it is cliché-ridden no matter how much it claims
to be “based” on a “true” story. They threw
too much of said story out. A making of
featurette is the only extra.
Thomas
Bezucha’s Monte
Carlo is an even sillier, more predictable waste of time that
has two sisters from one family and one gal from another forced to go to Paris by their newly
re-wed parents. I have never seen a film
make Paris look
so bad visually, but the script is formulaic and corny beyond belief and it is
fluff beyond fluff with Selena Gomez (can she act? Hard to tell, because it is not happening here.),
Leighton Meester, Katie Cassidy and (AGAIN?) Andie MacDowell co-star. Extras include six featurettes, a quiz and
unfunny Deleted Scenes.
Finally
we have would-be mumblecore comedy Terri
from Azazel Jacobs, about the isolated, depressed, heavy set, unpopular title
character (Jason Wysocki in a fair performance) trying to make his life better
and not getting anywhere. Part of the
problem is that the film does not know when to be serious, funny and is not too
successful at either. It is also a
run-on plot and John C. Reilly steals every scene he is in, which further makes
this one hard to buy. Extras include A Look Inside Terri featurette and
Deleted Scenes.
The 1080p
2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Sign and three AVC 1.85 X 1 digital High Definition transfers on
the remaining releases are all problematic with detail issues, softness, some
motion blur and color limits that all work against viewing them. Carlo
comes in with AVC @ 35.5 MBPS versus 19 MBPS on Terri and Quarter, yet it
is no better. The DTS-HD MA (Master
Audio) 5.1 lossless mixes on all four are dialogue-based, towards the front
speakers and usually work best when music kicks in if that. Carlo and Sign fare better throughout and
tend to be more engaged in the possibility of the surrounds, though not all the
time. They are warmer too.
- Nicholas Sheffo
