4k-UHD/Movie Review: Red Sparrow

 

Red Sparrow is a 2018 film adaptation of the first book in a trilogy of spy novels. The movie stars Jennifer Lawrence, Joel Edgerton, Charlotte Rampling, Jeremy Irons, Mary-Louise Parker, and Joely Richardson. It centers around a Russian ballerina named Dominika (played by Jennifer Lawrence), who, after suffering a career-ending injury, is forced into a spy training program called the Red Sparrows, which trains young Russian women in spycraft.

An easy comparison for the film would be "The Americans" TV series. However, while there are some character parallels between Keri Russell's character on the show and Lawrence's character in the movie since it is set entirely overseas, the better comparison would be to Atomic Blonde, with less over-the-top fight scenes. The movie is a spy thriller with a KGB vs. CIA kind of plotline, with the loyalties of almost every character called into question at some point. While it is set in the modern-day (there are cell phones and laptops), because the spycraft in the novels was deliberately kept old so that the author did not reveal any modern-day secrets, the movie has a very cold-war 1970s-1980s feel to it. As a result, some of the technology in the film is very old-school. Those old enough to remember 3.5" discs will find it hilarious that they are being used to copy files off a modern-day laptop computer. If any laptop had a 3.5" disc drive, they have not been around in a long time.

The 4K set is a two-disc set with a UHD disc and a regular Blu-Ray disc.  The UHD disc has just the movie and the director's commentary. The movie looks and sounds great in the ultra-high-definition format.  The regular Blu-Ray has all the other extras, including previews, deleted scenes, and over an hour's worth of making-of and behind-the-scenes featurettes. So, there is a decent amount of bonus material for those who like to watch the extras. Overall, the movie is very good. It is well-written and acted, and Lawrence takes on a different role than those she had played up to that point. The movie is very violent, and there is some nudity with a lot of sexual tones and themes. The movie is a bit different from the book it was adapted from, but it generally stays true to the story in the book.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: mother!

 

mother! is a very eclectic (to put it mildly) movie that was written and directed by Darren Aronofsky (who also directed films like Black Swan, Requiem for a Dream, and The Fountain), and stars Jennifer Lawrence as mother, who is the wife of and muse for a famous poet named Him (played by Javier Bardem) who has writer's block. It is hard to review the plot of the movie, first, because it is all over the place, and second because it is hard to do so without giving too much away. The best way to describe it is that it is a psychological thriller that is an allegory for biblical destruction with characters that clearly represent Adam and Eve, Cain and Able, etc. If you are not a fan of Aronofsky's movies, especially the more offbeat ones that have almost supernatural elements to them, then you will absolutely not like this movie. The movie kind of takes the craziest kind of stuff from Black Swan and Requiem for a Dream and combines that with the supernatural elements of The Fountain. 

The A/V quality of the UHD disc is outstanding. The movie looks and sounds great in the format, and the visuals really tie into the general weirdness of the movie. The UHD disc just has the movie itself, and then all of the other extras are on a second, regular, blu-ray disc. The extras include a 30-minute making-of featurette and a 7-minute featurette on the visual effects. There are also a handful of trailers that play as the disc loads.

The movie is good overall, but very strange. It is definitely not going to appeal to everyone, even people who generally like psychological thrillers. Lawrence and Bardem are very good in roles that are pretty different from what either of them has done (especially Lawrence). It also has a strong supporting cast including Ed Harris, Michelle Pfeiffer, Domhnall and Brian Gleeson, and Kristen Wiig. I would not say it is family-friendly because it can be a bit gory and does have some nudity and swearing. 

4k-UHD/Movie Review: Passengers (2016)

 

Passengers is a 2016 movie starring Chris Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence (not to be confused with the 2008 film of the same name starring Anne Hathaway). This movie is partly a sci-fi space drama, partly an action movie, partly a romantic drama, and partly an ethical thought experiment. Pratt stars as Jim Preston, a mechanical engineer aboard a spaceship called the Avalon, traveling from Earth to a new, habitable planet 60 light-years away from Earth. Technology has advanced to the point where the trip only takes 120 years, so the passengers aboard the ship are put in a state of suspended animation for most of the trip with different passengers being awakened in stages when the ship is within a couple of years of its destination. During the voyage, the ship is struck by a wayward asteroid, which damages the ship and causes Preston to be awakened 90 years too early. For the first portion of the movie, it is just Pratt and Michael Sheen (who plays the ship's computer/butler, Arthur). Then, over the course of the movie, Jennifer Lawrence's character, Aurora Lane is awakened, as is Laurence Fishburne's character, Gus, who is the ship's deck officer. The movie transitions from a lost at-sea castaway kind of movie, to a romance movie, to a disaster movie all within the span of nearly four hours. 

For those who get the 4K blu-ray set, there are three discs. The 4k-UHD disc just has the movie, a 3D-Blu-Ray disc that again just has the movie, and a regular blu-ray disc that has the movie and all of the extras. The extras include four different making-of featurettes that range in length from four minutes to just over eleven minutes. Then there are about ten minutes of deleted scenes, a series of fake commercials promoting travel on The Avalon, a gag reel, and trailers for other movies. So, a decent amount is there for people who like watching the extras. The A/V quality of the UHD disc is wonderful, and the movie has a ton of great CGI visuals.

Ultimately, the movie is long but does not really feel as long as it is. It is paced very well, and while the story is definitely a bit predictable in parts, it is entertaining. Given that Pratt has to carry the first portion of the movie on his own, with only a handful of scenes with Michael Sheen playing opposite him, he does a very good job portraying a guy who slowly starts to go crazy. Jennifer Lawrence does a good job with her character once she "comes to life" and the action portion of the movie is good as well. It is definitely worth the time to watch. 

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: American Hustle

 

American Hustle is a 2013 movie directed by David O Russell and starring Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Amy Adams, and Jeremy Renner. It is loosely based on a sting operation that the FBI executed back in the late 1970s to early 1980s to take down a bunch of corrupt politicians. Bale and Adams play a pair of scam artists who get caught by an FBI agent (played by Bradley Cooper) in a loan scam. He offers to let them off the hook if they help him take down bigger targets. Jennifer Lawrence plays Bale's erratic wife, who threatens to report him to the police if he leaves her. The movie is mostly a blend of drama and dark comedy that is kind of a heist/takedown movie with some romance (basically a love rectangle) mixed in.

The Blu-Ray's A/V quality is good, but the extras are pretty sparse. Those include about 25 minutes of deleted scenes and a 16-minute making-of featurette. There are also some previews for other Sony movies. What was included was okay, but it definitely did not get a ton of extras, especially for a movie with as much Oscar buzz as it did. Overall, I would say that the movie is good, but not as good as some make it out to be. It does have a great cast and Cooper, Adams, Bale, and Lawrence all nail their roles. Bale, who can get into about any shape that is needed for a role, is nearly unrecognizable as an overweight and balding slimeball. Adams does probably her best work (at least that I have seen) in this movie, and both she and Lawrence are extremely funny. Cooper is great as a crazy FBI agent. Where the movie loses me a bit is the pacing and the plot lines that kind of jump around. It is definitely a movie that you have to pay attention to constantly to follow what is going on.

Blu-Ray/Movie Review: Silver Linings Playbook

 

Silver Linings Playbook is a combination of a romantic comedy and a drama. It stars Bradley Cooper as Pat Solitano, a bipolar man who has spent eight months in a psychiatric hospital after beating up the man with whom his wife was having an affair. He moves back in with his parents (played wonderfully by Robert De Niro and Jacki Weaver) and makes it his mission (against the advice of everyone) to win his wife back. Pat is invited to dinner by his best friend Ronnie, played by John Ortiz, and meets Ronnie's widowed sister-in-law with mental issues of her own, Tiffany, played by Jennifer Lawrence. Tiffany agrees to help Pat win his ex-wife back on the condition that he enter a dance competition with her as her partner. From there, the typical will-they, won't-they get-together storyline plays out.

The Blu-Ray extras are okay, but not extensive. There are deleted scenes, a relatively short making-of-featurette, a Q&A session featuring the director and some of the cast members after a screening of the movie, and a couple of featurettes on the dance numbers.

Overall, the movie is very good. Cooper does a great job alternating between depressed and manic, basically acting like he is on speed. He has great chemistry with Lawrence (who is a large source of the film's humor, although De Niro and Copper have some very funny moments too) as well as with De Niro. De Niro himself is great as Pat's football-obsessed father who is trying to help his son but really does not know how to do so. The biggest scene-stealer of the movie is Chris Tucker (of Rush Hour fame). He is only in a handful of scenes as Danny, another patient at the hospital who is embroiled in a fight with the hospital about whether they can keep him committed. He keeps managing to get out only to be hauled back by the cops. It's a small role that is not integral to the rest of the movie, but funny nonetheless. Personally, I like that the comedy in the movie is a bit darker than it is in most romantic comedies. It is a movie that is very well-written and acted and is definitely worth checking out.