Cruel Intentions (Blu-ray)
Picture:
B Sound: B Extras: D Film: D
Some
films are so bad, they are good, and then some are so bad that you watch in
shock they ever were made. Despite two
direct to video sequels, Roger Kumble’s Cruel
Intentions (1999) is a catastrophic teen-aimed gutting of Dangerous
Liaisons (if you are now thinking of the French title and/or trying to
correct me, save your energy) in which Ryan Phillippe and Sarah Michelle Gellar
intend to destroy Resse Witherspoon and anyone watching the film in an
increasingly laughable version of the classic tale.
No fan of
the original anyhow, this was a time at which Phillippe was being criticized as
being a bad actor (something Way Of The
Gun and Breach more than
disproved since) and Gellar proved that without her Buffy role, her performances are everything that is wrong with
female acting in film today. It is
Witherspoon (who married and recently divorced Phillippe) who is actually not
bad and is the only one to go on to critical acclaim all the way to Walk The Line. Unfortunately, Kumble’s screenplay even
sabotages her. Its 97 minutes seem much
longer and are all worth skipping.
The 1.85
X 1 image is from what looks like an older HD master with color, detail and
depth issues. It looks better than a
DVD, but not by that much. Good shots
are few and far between. A
dialogue-based film, The Dolby Digital 5.1 mix is nothing to write home about
and PCM 16/48 5.1 better, but also limited.
This will at least make fans happy.
Extras include two condescending Music Videos, Creative Intentions:
Finding a Visual Style featurette, making of featurette, filmmaker’s audio
commentary (ha!) and deleted scenes, all of which just drag things out all the
more.
- Nicholas Sheffo
