Noise
(2007/Anchor Bay DVD)
Picture:
C+ Sound: C+ Extras: C- Film: C-
The idea
of being too crowded, squeezed and gridded in is an interesting and
under-addressed one in our society. From
that, noise pollution is rarely addressed except as a side joke and annoyance
of everyday life, especially if you live in the city. Henry Bean’s Noise (2007) tries to make a comedy out of it with Tim Robbins as a
resident in New York City who cannot take it anymore, but this just slowly
collapses as it misses every opportunity.
Robbins
is good, though we have seen him give this kind of controlled, off-kilter
performance before, shutting down the alarms in the vehicles of other people
because waiting three-minutes for the alarm to end is just too long for him. Falling
Down has nothing to worry about.
He is so
annoyed that he becomes a secret vigilante out to stop all the racket, but the
real racket is this script by Bean, which is stale, has few points to make and
has no idea of where to go once it starts up.
Bridget Moynahan, William Baldwin and William Hurt also star, but they
can’t help this mess out either. You
just may shut your DVD player off in under three minutes.
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.85 X 1 is soft and not so memorable, though the color
is not bad, also expect motion blur. The
Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo has weak Pro Logic surrounds and dialogue and sound
effects are recorded well enough, but there is nothing special here
sonically. Extras include a
behind-the-scenes featurette, feature-length audio commentary by Bean and
cast/crew interviews.
- Nicholas Sheffo
