The
Blacklist: The Complete First Season
(2013 - 2014/Sony DVD Set)/Only
Lovers Left Alive
(2013/Sony DVD)/Quicksand
(1950/Film Chest DVD)
Picture:
C+/C+/C Sound: C+/B-/C Extras: C/C/D Main Programs:
C/C+/C+
Now
for three very different kinds of thrillers...
The
Blacklist (2013 - 2014)
has an all too familiar premise of a criminal mastermind (bald and
knowing it all these days) up to no good, but that the authorities
have to deal with to solve their case(s). In The
Silence Of The Lambs mode
(at least at first), the series coup is having James Spader (Mike
Nichols' Wolf)
as that villain, one Raymond Red
Reddington (deadly alliterations?) who turns himself in at the very
beginning of the pilot as he is so confident he has all kinds of
information that will help him negotiate against the crimes he is
wanted for.
From
there, I hoped the show would drop its derivative pretensions, but
instead, it wallows in them and cannot stop playing on them
throughout the 22 shows here. Spader easily out acts most of the
cast, though a few surprises are in store and offers brief hope the
show might pick up. It never does. Instead, it is silly, formulaic,
lightly cynical and does not know what to do with itself. Universal
(who did most of the Hannibal Lecter sequels) and Sony co-produced
the show and seems to think people forgot the materials it rips off,
but that material is still getting ripped off, so bad idea. It has
made it to a second season, so we'll see where that goes then.
Extras
include audio commentary on three episodes, 22 Beyond
The Blacklist shows and
The Insider behind the scenes of the show.
In
Jim Jarmusch films, people are at a dead end and his films ask what
do these people do there, where do they go from there when there is
nowhere to go. They either imagine they have space to themselves
(Ghost Dog),
are not aware it is already gone or taken from them (Dead
Man), might have a chance
to enjoy space they happen to have (Broken
Flowers) or are just
plain doomed (all of his other films). Only
Lovers Left Alive (2013)
takes on the undead, specifically vampires as the terrifically
matched Tilda Swinton and Tom Hiddleston are old vampire lovers still
hanging in there for more decades (centuries?) than they can
remember, coming together again. He is a Rock-N-Roller who still
loves his music and has some friends (including Anton Yelchin as a
clueless, hip contact) keeping his so-called-life going.
Mia
Waskowska is her with bad timing who disrupts there rekindled love,
but the film is about much more. There are silent moments that work
very well, including visually, while a motif of old vs. new
technology haunts the story. The mortals use the latest gadgets, but
the vampires are more than comfortable with the
if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it approach and this tends to suggest
their lives are more lived in, that they know more about who they are
and are happier as if Jarmusch is suggesting the living are now
operating more like the undead thanks to cell phones and the Net
these days. That does have some validity.
Hiddleston's
Adam even drives an older (but great) Jaguar XJ-S through the film
(he is doing a promotion campaign for the company now, though that
car is ironically also known as the car of Simon Templar (aka The
Saint) on the 1970s TV show Return
Of The Saint (reviewed
elsewhere on this site) with Ian Ogilvy, so the jokes add up) and he
uses an old analog TV to see at picture on a cell phone as if to
recreate an old prototype Picturephone. However, the storyline is
consistent, but cannot avoid all the overlap, repeating and even
predictability of the actual genre. I liked what worked here and
think this deserves a look by all interested, but it is not the home
run it was onto being. Some scenes and moments even reminded me of
the comedy Old Dracula
(1974, also reviewed on this site), but I could never tell if that
was referential or coy. John Hurt and Jeffrey Wright also star.
Extras
include Extended & Deleted Scenes, a Music Video and long
Traveling At Night With Jim Jarmusch making of featurette.
Finally
we have Mickey Rooney in a Film Noir. With his MGM contract finally
expired, he moved over to an independent production, Irving Pichel's
Quicksand
(1950) has Rooney as one of the workers at a local car garage who is
one of the boys. However, he starts to have money issues and starts
to make decisions he should not. Partly inspired by trying to get a
gal (Jeanne Cagney as a femme fatale of sorts) and just wanting to
get more ahead. This includes tangling with her old friend Nick
(Peter Lorre, who is not in the film enough) and robbing people in a
way he might not otherwise do.
Rooney's
Noir voice-overs are amusing and this is about as dark as he ever
got. The script cops out a bit at the end, but this has some amusing
moments and unintentionally funny ones as well. I like the look of
the film and Pichel had been an actor and voice over man in his
career getting his directing career going here. His next film would
be his most successful, Destination
Moon
later that year. This is an interesting curio worth seeing once and
the rest of the cast tries their best to make things work. Look
quickly for Jack Elam in a bar scene.
There
are no extras.
Blacklist
and Alive have been issued on Blu-ray and if you can play that
format, you might want to go to those versions of each program
instead, though the anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on
Blacklist and anamorphically enhanced 1.85 X 1 image on Alive
are not bad for the DVD format versions. However, they are still a
little soft and even strained at times. Both HD-shot, Blacklist
is competently shot by has no look to it that is distinctive, while
Alive is lensed by Director of Photography Yorick De Saux
(Arbitrage) and does have a consistent look that is somewhat
dark in line with vampire cinema. The 1.33 X 1 black and white image
on Quicksand is restored to some extent, but detail issues and
motion blur still plague the transfer. Director of Photography
Lionel Lindon, A.S.C. (Grand Prix, All Fall Down, the
original Manchurian Candidate) comes up with the most
distinctive look of all with plenty of dark shots worthy of Film
Noir.
In
the sound department, Blacklist and Alive feature lossy
Dolby Digital 5.1 mixes, but Alive comes out on top with more
activity and character than any of the episodes of the Blacklist
TV show, then Quicksand offers lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
that has been cleaned up a bit, but is dated and shows its age. More
restoration is needed.
-
Nicholas Sheffo
