Blu-ray

DVDs I bought or received in the month of May

• 30 Days of Night (RA USA, Blu-ray)
• Enchanted (RA USA, Blu-ray)
• The Golden Compass (RA USA, Blu-ray)
• Mrs. Doubtfire (RA USA, Blu-ray)
• The Orphanage (RA USA, Blu-ray)
• Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (R0 UK, Blu-ray)
• Waking the Dead: Series 6 (R2 UK, DVD)

Definitely a very Blu month for me, which I have no complaints about whatsoever. I was going to post a bit about the various titles listed above, but for some reason I only managed to get an hour and a half of sleep last night, and as a result I’m absolutely knackered. Therefore, I’m off to get some serious shut-eye now, if I can. Laters.

30 gigabytes of joy

30 Days of Night is one of four Blu-ray releases I received or otherwise picked up over the course of the week, which I shall be rolling out gradually with the added bonus of a series of delectable images. This is a film with a quite understated visual style - muted colour palette, murky lighting and a fair amount of grain. It also looks very nice indeed in high definition, albeit not always in the way that you would associate with so-called “demo material”. Another solid release from Sony.

30 Days of Night
(Sony Pictures, USA, AVC, 30.7 GB)

Swoon

Three months after announcing their intentions to break into the Blu-ray market, Blue Underground have provided a tantalising glimpse at some of the titles we can expect to see from them. While no release dates have been announced, these titles alone should be enough to whet the appetite of any serious cult cinema fans:

- The Final Countdown
- The Bird with the Crystal Plumage
- The Stendhal Syndrome
- Maniac
- Vigilante
- Fire and Ice

The brief preview trailer, available on their site, also shows material from Two Evil Eyes, Dead and Buried and Uncle Sam. We’re being promised 50 GB dual layer discs, 7.1 Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio tracks, plenty of extras and (contain yourselves) D-Box Motion Code support.

Ringo Starr was in The Simpsons once…

Now that I have a Blu-ray drive in my main computer, I’ve been taking the opportunity to look through some of the discs I haven’t provided screen captures for yet. The Simpsons Movie is a title that immediately leapt out at me as a prime candidate for the PrintScreen button, mainly because it’s one of those discs that many reviewers have praised to the heavens, describing it as “perfect” and “flawless”, and other such hyperbolic nonsense. In actual fact, Fox’s encode of The Simpsons Movie features quite a lot of unsightly ringing, as a result of having been filtered.

(Lyris and myself, by the way, have all sorts of wacky names for the various artefacts that plague digital video. Ringo Starr, as you can probably imagine, refers to ringing. Stick around and you may get to meet Dusty Springfield, Billy Brickwall, Waxy O’Connor, and our old favourite, Mega Bloks.)

Why would anyone filter high definition content in the first place, especially material as basic-looking as Homer Simpson and his bland family? Well, I can’t say for sure, but it looks suspiciously like a technician left his or her software at the default settings and popped out for a leak, leaving the encoding software (or hardware) to wreak havoc. It’s not just that there’s ringing: for some reason, several shots show a bunch of errant hues showing up in the ringing, especially visible when you zoom in (Shot 3 is particularly affected by this).

The Simpsons Movie
(20th Century Fox, USA, AVC)

Popcorn strictly optional

Whimsy Cinemas™ is finally ready to open its doors! Yesterday evening, Lyris assembled his projection screen and attached it to the wall, ready for its first gala presentation. What will it be? Inside Man on HD DVD was the first title to be screened on our previous movie-watching solution, the crazy bed sheet of multiple creases, so it only makes sense that we follow it up with something that boasts equally stellar image quality. So far, we’ve taken a brief look at the Blu-ray releases of Ratatouille, Resident Evil: Extinction and Across the Universe, all of which looked suitably incredible, not to mention the most recent pass of La Femme Publique, which looked better than a standard definition DVD has any right to.

Finally, we have something that vaguely resembles being at the movies, only without the spotty-faced youths heckling (if any heckling’s to be done, we’ll do it, thank you very much) the movie and playing with their mobile phones. Sometimes, we even get the films before they’re released theatrically in this country, and in any event, in many cases, the Blu-ray discs we’re watching look somewhat better than the prints being trotted round the local cinemas.

Blu-ray review: Juno

For Juno, Fox have provided stellar audio-visual quality that ranks among the best they have produced for the Blu-ray format. While the bonus content is a little on the lightweight side, and the extra Digital Copy disc serves no discernible purpose, those who enjoyed the film can rest assured that they are getting a presentation of the highest standard and should have no qualms about picking up a copy.

For shizz! I cast my peepers over Juno, that wizard little sleeper hit about getting knocked up, given a totally boss Blu-ray release by 20th Century Fox. Okay, I’ll stop now.

Review at DVD Times.

Get your tools ready

The upgrade bug has bitten me again. Partially inspired by how cheaply Lyris was able to assemble his fancy new quad core system, I’ve begun to look into the possibility of once again purchasing a full-size system to replace my small form factor Shuttle PC.

Primarily, this is because I would like to purchase additional RAM and a DirectX 10-compliant video card, the better to enjoy some of the latest games. Unfortunately, my Shuttle only has room for two sticks of RAM and a single slot video card, and most of ATI’s more powerful DirectX 10 cards have whopping great fans on them that require more space than a single PCIe slot affords. On top of that, a more powerful video card would also almost certainly necessitate a heavier-duty power supply, one packing considerably more oomph than the paltry 250 watt affair that came with my Shuttle.

Finally, a superb bargain was recently pointed out to me: an LG GGC-H20L Blu-ray/HD DVD combo drive for a very reasonable £77.54, complete with the Blu-ray/HD DVD version of PowerDVD. Knowing that such a bargain wouldn’t be around for long, I snapped one up despite the fact that, as a SATA device, I wouldn’t be able to use is in my Shuttle system, which only has two SATA ports, both of which are being used by hard drives. It arrived today, and will have to sit on my shelf until I get my new system. Well, actually, I tell a lie. It’s currently sitting inside Lyris’ computer, so at least it’s being put to use for the time being.

As for the other components, I’m going to pick up an Auzen X-Fi Prelude 7.1 sound card (see my earlier post on the sound card issue for more information) and the best trade-off I can find between performance and price in terms of ATI’s current generation of video cards. My brother seems to be pretty happy with his ASUS P5K-E motherboard, so I suspect I’ll pick up one of those too. That only leaves memory (probably 4 GB, despite 32-bit operating systems only managing to access around 3.3 GB total), a processor (I’m still unsure as to whether to get a quad-core system, or simply go for the fastest dual-core I can get my hands on), a case and a power supply (I’ll probably end up getting the latter two together). If I play my cards right, this shouldn’t bankrupt me completely.

Paramount, Criterion go Blu

I’m sure everyone else has already reported on this by now, but Paramount have, not particularly unexpectedly, relaunched their support for Blu-ray with the announcement that Face/Off, Next and Bee Movie will be coming to the format on May 20th, followed by Cloverfield and There Will Be Blood on June 3rd. No word yet on Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, which was initially announced for HD DVD at around the same time as There Will Be Blood, but disappeared along with that and several other titles when Toshiba turned off the ailing format’s life support machine. Presumably it will materialise before too long - I hope so, because, out of all of these, it’s the one I’m most interested in seeing.

Paramount also plans to re-issue its entire back catalogue of Blu-ray titles, starting with eight titles on May 20th.

The real news, however, is that, after spending a considerable amount of time umming and erring from the sidelines, the mighty Criterion has finally announced its intention to get with the winning team and begin releasing in high definition. Announced via their most recent email newsletter, Criterion states that it will begin rolling titles out in October, with each released priced the same as its standard definition counterpart and porting over all the bonus content from the legacy release. Currently announced titles include:

- The Third Man
- Bottle Rocket
- Chungking Express
- The Man Who Fell to Earth
- The Last Emperor
- El Norte
- The 400 Blows
- Gimme Shelter
- The Complete Monterey Pop
- Contempt
- Walkabout
- For All Mankind
- The Wages of Fear

Now, here’s hoping they have the sense to do away with their nonsensical pictureboxing practice for their Blu-ray titles.

Turn that frown upside down

A couple of days ago, if you’d told me I’d enjoy Enchanted so much, I’d probably have laughed. I must admit that the idea of an intentionally saccharine Disney fairytale spilling over into the “real” (i.e. live action) world didn’t really sound like a bundle of laughs, but, all the same, reports of stellar image quality and some very nice hand-drawn animation piqued my curiosity, and I picked up the Blu-ray release.

I watched it on Friday night, and I honestly don’t think I’ve got so much pure enjoyment out of a film in a long time. If Disney fairytales aren’t your cup of tea, you’ll probably hate this, but in that case you, sir, are Scrooge McDuck and have a heart of stone. This film has its head lodged firmly in the clouds, and frankly I’m not complaining. A little bit of escapism now and then is a very good thing, especially when it’s executed with this degree of panache. I still haven’t decided whether Amy Adams is intensely charming or intensely irritating, but she and the rest of the cast have a level of enthusiasm that is incredibly infectious and lets me overlook the script’s shortcomings.

I found the live action material more appealing to look at than either the traditional animation or CGI elements, which is quite a feat indeed. Then again, given the bland (albeit slick) look of the hand-drawn elements and the overall shoddiness of the CGI (including the worst talking dragon this side of Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Graduation Day episode), perhaps that’s not entirely surprising. Anyway, I thought I’d do a bunch of screen captures to show just how far Disney managed to hit their Blu-ray release out of the park. Feast your eyes on these:

Enchanted
(Buena Vista, USA, AVC)

Animation:

Live action:

DVDs I bought or received in the month of April

• 101 Dalmatians: Platinum Edition (R1 USA, DVD)
• The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (R0 UK, Blu-ray)
• The Aristocats: Special Edition (R1 USA, DVD)
• The Black Dahlia (R2 UK, DVD)
• Bonnie and Clyde (R0 USA, Blu-ray)
• The Frightened Woman (R0 UK, DVD)
• Holby Blue: Series 1 (R2 UK, DVD)
• Juno (RA USA, Blu-ray)
• The Lady from Shanghai (R2 UK, DVD)
• The Maltese Falcon (R2 UK, DVD)
• Mother of Tears (R2 UK, DVD)
• The Postman Always Rings Twice (R2 UK, DVD)
• An Unsuitable Job for a Woman: Series 1 & 2 (R1 USA, DVD)
   

Blu-ray brattiness

Unfortunately, high definition doesn’t make Juno MacGuff any less moody and obnoxious than her standard definition counterpart, but she, her posse and their surroundings certainly look considerably more detailed and lifelike, courtesy of one of 20th Century Fox’s best transfers to date. “Grain!” I hear you say. “Good!” I say. Juno has a look not unlike that of Atonement (HD DVD screen captures here), but is considerably less eroded, resulting in a far more satisfying experience overall. The clots at DVD Town, IGN (“Only marginally better than the standard [definition DVD]” - pffffft!) and the like may have been pretty lukewarm in their reactions to this transfer, but rest assured that Captain Whiggles will be giving it a glowing appraisal come review-time.

Juno
(20th Century Fox, USA, AVC, 26.9 GB)

So many discs, so little time

The last few days have heralded a shed-load of DVD and Blu-ray releases pouring through my letterbox, most of which I’ve scarcely had time to give more than a cursory glance. Most of them were free review copies, and a good thing too as I recently had to pay off my Graduate Endowment, so my coffers are looking a little empty at the moment.

First up, and one that I did pay for, was Sony Pictures’ UK Blu-ray release of Terry Gilliam’s The Adventures of Baron Munchausen. It looks to feature a decent transfer for a catalogue title: detail is, on the whole, very good, but the tell-tale signs of grain reduction are consistently evident. At the moment, I’d peg it as being slightly better than the re-release of The Fifth Element, also from Sony, but more investigation will be needed.

Next up, on Saturday, Shameless Screen Entertainment’s UK DVD release of Piero Schivazappa’s trippy 60s shocker The Frightened Woman (a.k.a. Femina Ridens). As a nice surprise, they sent me a fully boxed copy rather than the “DVD in a paper wallet” affair that most of the UK studios favour, so I can savour the tacky artwork in all its, erm, glory.

Unfortunately, I can’t say anything particularly positive about the transfer. Yes, it looks considerably better than my old VHS dupe, but that’s not a fair or particularly realistic comparison. A more valid counterpoint would be Severin Films’ release of The Psychic, which had similarly poor image quality, with a lack of detail and what looked like a dodgy scaling job, manifesting itself in the form of jagged diagonal lines. I wonder what caused this. Perhaps both films were acquired from the same licensor, or perhaps both companies used the same (incorrectly set up) encoder? Either way, if I’d paid for a company to encode my film and it came back looking like this, I would have rejected it outright. In case anyone gets the wrong idea, this is nothing to do with the quality of the source materials, which, barring some tape-based inserts for scenes which wouldn’t be sourced from a print, appears to be in great shape. This issue here has nothing to do with that and everything to do with the way it has been treated at the authoring stage. Not impressed.

Also in the package was the 2-disc release of the first series of Holby Blue, from 2 Entertain (the BBC’s front for commercial exploitation via optical disc). This is interesting, because I recorded the entire series directly to my computer via my USB TV stick back when it first aired, so I had a point of comparison to refer to when examining the image quality. The results, which you can see by clicking the smaller images below, are quite surprising:

Example 1
(Left: Commercial DVD; Right: My recording from DTV)

Example 2
(Left: Commercial DVD; Right: My recording from DTV)

Example 3
(Left: Commercial DVD; Right: My recording from DTV)

That’s right: the DVD release is considerably more filtered than what was broadcast on BBC1. Obviously, there are considerably more compression artefacts in the captures taken from my off-air recordings - that’s not surprising, given the notoriously shoddy standard of BBC’s encoding (BBC1 has a fixed 6 Mbps bit rate to play around with, so there’s really no excuse). I am, however, surprised, by how much more detailed my recordings are. A further black mark against the DVD release is that 2 Entertain have unceremoniously lopped off the “Previously” and “Next week” segments at the start and end of each episode, sometimes incredibly badly: the music has noticeable jump cuts and generally reeks of shoddiness. Is it so unreasonable to expect a complete package when you shell out your hard-earned cash for a TV series that you already helped pay for with your robber baron tax? (Ignoring the fact that I got the DVD for free, and, not being a home-owner, don’t pay the robber baron tax.)

The final disc in this package of joy was Optimum’s UK release of Dario Argento’s Mother of Tears. Audio options are Dolby Digital 5.1 and 2.0 English, with no subtitles, while the only extra is the trailer. Image quality (and I’m aware of sounding increasingly like a broken record here) is not too bad, but not too great either. There’s plenty of evidence of ringing as a result of brick wall filtering, and also a massive amount of noise reduction which robs the image of its natural grain. A couple of people who got advance copies of this disc mentioned that the film looked as if it had been shot on digital video, and I see what they mean. I wonder if Medusa’s Italian release (which doesn’t have any English audio options) looks any better?

This morning, I received an order from DVD Pacific containing the US release of An Unsuitable Job for a Woman. This was an ITV adaptation of P.D. James’ novel of the same name (which I’m reading at the moment), starring Helen Baxendale and Annette Crosbie, and the DVD contains all four three-part episodes. My interest was piqued when I discovered that one of the three-parters was written by Barbara Machin, creator of Waking the Dead (the seventh series of which incidentally started tonight), so I decided to pick up this DVD set, fully aware that all four episodes feature standards converted transfers. This is, unfortunately, as far as I’m aware the only release of this programme on DVD, and beggars can’t be choosers. I won’t start watching till I’ve finished reading the book, though.

Finally - and this is where my luck with image quality finally changes - I also received a review copy of the US Blu-ray release of Juno. My good friend Peter M. Bracke opines that this is “a fairly good-looking presentation”, but as usual I beg to differ. This is definitely the best high definition transfer I’ve seen from 20th Century Fox so far, bearing in mind that I own fewer of their films than any of the other major studios. The source material is such that it won’t make you leap out of your seat, marvelling at all the detail on display, but even so it’s an excellent presentation of a fairly low-key, muted-looking film.

Expect full reviews of The Frightened Woman, Holby Blue, Mother of Tears and Juno at DVD Times before very much longer.

FYI: PS3 DTS-HD MA no longer MIA, OK?

Source: High-Def Digest

Proving once again what a versatile and admirably future-proof piece of hardware it is, the Playstation 3’s latest firmware update will add internal decoding for DTS-HD Master Audio to its Blu-ray playback capabilities. DTS-HD MA decoding is supported on some of the more recent high-end players, but given how cheap the PS3 is, this seems like a remarkable deal. Now if only I had an HDMI 1.3-compatible audio receiver to take full advantage of it…

The update, version 2.30, is due out tomorrow.

Happenings in Whedonsville

A couple of recent goings-on in tellyland for your attention, both concerning Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon. The first, and probably least interesting from my perspective, is that Firefly, his short-lived sci-fi western series, looks set to get a Blu-ray release at some point down the line. The release is still a considerable way off, given that it is described as only being in the “early development stages”, but it has been confirmed by a 20th Century Fox spokesperson, so this news will surely please its many devoted followers. Myself, I could never get into Firefly, which is odd, given how much I enjoyed its big screen follow-up, Serenity. In its defence, I didn’t try particularly hard to watch it, and had a lot of other things on the go when I rented the first disc of the DVD set, so perhaps I didn’t give it enough of a chance. I’d certainly be up for revisiting it in high definition to see if my view on it has changed.

Secondly, and in my eyes far more excitingly, is the news that Whedon has a new television series in the pipeline, which will be titled Dollhouse and will reteam him with Eliza Dushku (Faith in Buffy) and, erm, 20th Century Fox. Yes, the same 20th Century Fox whom he vowed never to work with again after they, in his eyes, screwed him over so royally with Firefly. Also, I must admit that, in light of the debacle that was Buffy’s sixth and seventh season, and its shark-jumping comic book continuation, my faith in the man to put together a half-decent show has waned somewhat, but there’s a little part of me that is nonetheless excited to hear that he’s returning to television, paired with the always-watchable Dushku no less. And come on, you’ve got to admit that the premise has promise:

Echo (Eliza Dushku) [is] a young woman who is literally everybody’s fantasy. She is one of a group of men and women who can be imprinted with personality packages, including memories, skills, language - even muscle memory - for different assignments. The assignments can be romantic, adventurous, outlandish, uplifting, sexual and/or very illegal. When not imprinted with a personality package, Echo and the others are basically mind-wiped, living like children in a futuristic dorm/lab dubbed the Dollhouse, with no memory of their assignments - or of much else. The show revolves around the childlike Echo’s burgeoning self-awareness, and her desire to know who she was before, a desire that begins to seep into her various imprinted personalities and puts her in danger both in the field and in the closely monitored confines of the Dollhouse.

The word is that former Angel (and Firefly, and Wonderfalls) executive producer Tim Minear will also be involved, so here’s hoping he’ll help steer this new show in the right direction.

DVD debacle

Tomorrow, my film noir crash course will begin in earnest, starting with a morning viewing of The Maltese Falcon, which I picked up today during my lunch break. I also snagged The Lady from Shanghai and The Postman Always Rings Twice, so a sincere word of thanks to everyone who suggested titles for me to look into.

I also decided to nab The Black Dahlia to give me a flavour for a more recent take on the noir framework. I’ve heard mixed reports about it, but I figure I might as well give it a whirl.

I got home to find a package from DVD Pacific waiting for me, containing the Blu-ray release of Bonnie and Clyde and the recent Platinum Edition DVD release of Disney’s 101 Dalmatians. I’ve always had a strange relationship with the latter, since it’s one of the few Disney features where I actually read the source material before reading the film, and, perhaps for that reason, the adaptation never really stood up for me. It’s a very enjoyable film, don’t get me wrong, and Cruella De Vil is one of the greatest screen villains ever created, but the book, for me, just paints a much richer and more appealing image in my head.

An interesting point about this release is that, whereas the recent re-releases of The Jungle Book, The Aristocats and Robin Hood (and the upcoming The Sword in the Stone) were all matted to an aspect ratio of 1.75:1, 101 Dalmatians retains the open matte 1.33:1 format favoured by every prior home video release, something which pleases me greatly considering how borked The Jungle Book looked when matted. The behind the scenes documentary for 101 Dalmatians, contained on the second disc, mattes the image to a widescreen ratio, with disastrous results, and watching it made me thankful that Disney have opted for a full-frame presentation for this release. I mean, take a look at the image below and try to imagine how you might matte it without completely destroying the composition:

Hopefully there will be a full review at DVD Times in the near future.

DVDs I bought or received in the month of March

• Across the Universe (R0 USA, Blu-ray)
• Atonement (R0 UK, HD DVD)
• Danny the Dog (R0 Japan, Blu-ray)
• Hidden (R2 UK, DVD)
• Lewis: Series One (R2 UK, DVD)
• The New York Ripper: Special Restored Edition (R2 Denmark, DVD)
• Sugar Rush: Series One & Two (R2 UK, DVD)
• Tragic Ceremony (R1 USA, DVD)
   

How Blu are you?

Concluding my Blu-ray Trilogy of Terror™ for today, I thought I’d take a look at upcoming releases that have been announced for the format and put together a list of titles I intend to pick up:

Out now:
- Enchanted (Buena Vista)

March 25th, 2008
- Bonnie and Clyde (Warner) (ORDERED)

April 8th, 2008
- The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (Sony Pictures)

April 14th, 2008
- A Tale of Two Sisters (Tartan)

April 15th, 2008
- Juno (Fox) (REVIEW COPY REQUESTED)

April 22nd, 2008
- The Orphanage (New Line)

April 29th, 2008
- The Golden Compass (New Line)

May 26th, 2008
- Lady Vengeance (Tartan)

July 1st, 2008
- Gangs of New York (Buena Vista)

October 7th, 2008
- Sleeping Beauty (Buena Vista)

Gangs of Blu York

Source: High-Def Digest

For some reason, I seem to have been waiting for a high definition release of Martin Scorsese’s Gangs of New York for longer than virtually every other title. Back in 2006, it was erroneously listed for a release in the UK on HD DVD at Play.com… until, that is, it was discovered that UK distribution Entertainment In Video weren’t actually going to be supporting HD DVD at all. A Blu-ray release eventually showed up after several delays, and looked like crap. In any event, it was coded for Region B only, which made it a no sale for me. Congratulations, EIV! A double strike!

However, Buena Vista have now announced their plan to bring it out on Blu-ray in the US on July 1st. No disc specifications have been revealed yet, but I do have slightly more faith in Buena Vista than in EIV, so here’s hoping this film will actually get its first passable-looking home video release.

Blu-ray goes Live!

Source: High-Def Digest

The Playstation 3 has just become the first Blu-ray player to support Profile 2.0 (also known as BD-Live) via its free v2.20 firmware update. In addition to promising a raft of new thrilling interactive features like ring-tones and shared playlists (which were boring HD DVD owners around the world over a year ago), the 2.20 patch also adds some features that might actually be of use to the average viewer:

- BD-Live (Profile v2.0) Upgrade
- “Resume play” will enable PS3 system to start playing a Blu-ray disc and DVD at the point it was stopped, even if the disc had been removed (BD-J format not supported)
- “Audio Output Device” will be a new Remote Play setting, enabling PSP to serve as a remote control for music played through PS3
- PS3 system’s Internet browser will be enhanced: Video files directly linked from a Web page will be able to be streamed, and the browser’s view speed will be improved
- DivX and WMV format videos larger than 2GB will be playable
- “Mosquito Noise Reduction” will be added as an AV setting in the control panel of the DVD/BD player for improved movie playback (BDMV format not supported)
 

Je ne regrette rien

This evening, I watched Olivier Dahan’s biopic of Édith Piaf, La Môme (La Vie en Rose outside its native France), and I have to confess I found the experience to be a bit like eating at one of those nouveau cuisine restaurants: the meal was impeccably designed and very artistically arranged on the plate, but it left me unsatisfied.

I know more or less who Édith Piaf was, but none of the specifics. After watching the film, I can’t say I know any more about her than I did before. Oh, I know she grew up in a brothel, that she was a heavy drinker, that she had an affair with boxer Marcel Cerdan… I can recite all manner of factoids about her life, but I can’t tell you anything about Édith Piaf the person, or what made her tick. Part of the problem, I think, is that this is less a sustained narrative and more a series of unconnected vignettes from various stages in her life. I suppose that is, to some extent, unavoidable when you’re making a biopic, particularly one which attempts to span the duration of the subject’s life, but I suspect more could have been done to give the various events depicted greater meaning. Why does it matter, for instance, that she spent her formative years in a brothel, or that she was briefly her father’s assistant at the circus, or that her first manager was murdered by mobsters and she herself was initially suspected of involvement? None of it gives the impression of adding to our understanding of the character, and, when the credits began to roll, I ultimately found myself wondering “So what?”

Would it all have made more sense if I had had a stronger knowledge of Édith Piaf before going into the film? Perhaps, but, in that case, I would still feel that the film had failed to convey the essence of the character. I’m a big believer in films having to hold up on their own merits rather than requiring any external baggage to be brought to the table. If having additional external knowledge about a person or an event enhances your appreciation for a film, so much the better, but if a lack of prior insight prevents the film from coming together as a cohesive whole, as I suspect is the case here, then I believe the filmmakers haven’t done their jobs properly. Olivier Dahan is undeniably skilled behind the camera, as the film is absolutely gorgeous from start to finish, and I feel that he and cinematographer Tetsuo Nagata were overlooked at the BAFTAs and Oscars (Nagata, did, however, bag himself a César), failing to garner even a nomination in that category. He also extorts fine performances from his cast, in particularly (and most obviously) Marion Cotillard in the role of Piaf, but I get the sense that, at a basic level, the script itself is the loose thread in this tapestry.

As a point of comparison, another film released in 2007 that I recently watched was Across the Universe. For those who don’t know, Across the Universe is a musical set at the time of the Vietnam war, its soundtrack comprised entirely of Beatles songs. Now, the thing is - and this is going to reveal just how pop culture unaware I am - I assumed they were original compositions for the film. I didn’t realise they were Beatles songs until they started singing All You Need is Love… and the only reason I knew that wasn’t an original composition was because I’d previously heard elements of it in Moulin Rouge! The point I’m trying to make with this little detour is that I completely missed the point of the film, and yet was still hugely entertained by it. It doesn’t matter whether you understand the context of the songs in Across the Universe or not: they’re enjoyable in their own right, and the plot and characters are engaging enough to captivate you from start to finish.

You don’t get that with La Môme. Instead, the impression I get is that we, the audience, are being fed a whole lot of moments from a person’s life and left to work out their significance (if indeed there is any significance to them - it is a biopic, after all, and as such is largely limited to portraying what really happened, and what really happened doesn’t necessarily mean anything) without any attention being paid to whether or not a layman will be able to make anything of them. Maybe I’m not the target audience, but I do tend to think you should be able to enjoy a film without having any prior knowledge of the subject matter.

So, in the end, what we have is a very nicely shot film, coupled with an extremely impressive (and deservedly award-winning) performance from Cotillard, who transforms herself in the truest sense of the word. (One of my co-workers told me he couldn’t believe it when he saw her arriving on stage to collect her Oscar, as, until that point, he had no idea of what she actually looked like.) It’s not just hair and make-up, though: it’s a truly brilliant piece of acting that doesn’t even feel like a performance. (I do think it’s a shame, though, that her singing was dubbed over with Piaf’s. It detracts from the realism, and apparently her own singing, briefly heard in various behind the scenes pieces, was pretty impressive in its own right.) La Môme is worth seeing for that reason alone, but as a whole, it’s an uneven and often frustrating piece of work.