In a Nutshell. Mini reviews of movies old and new. No fuss. No spoilers. And often no sleep.

Wednesday 26 October 2011

Don't Look Now (1973)

I'm not going to give a synopsis. It's better if I don't.
The first six minutes of Don't Look Now will stay with you forever; it's chilling and achingly unforgettable, containing some of the most masterful cross-cutting in the history of cinema. The remainder alienates a lot of people.
Nicolas Roeg crafts a puzzle that rests upon random chance and of corners that when turned lead to nowhere, and yet are familiar. The Venice setting echoes the same with its claustrophobic streets and characteristic canals. Stay for the duration and a number of recurring aesthetic and thematic triggers begin to emerge.
It's marred only by badly clipping audio that's painful to the ears at times.

4 unhelpful police inspectors out of 5

4 comments:

budarc said...

5 out of 5 for me. One of my favorites. That ending...

The bad audio may have been exclusive to the rip you watched.

Dr Faustus said...

It would have been a 5 for me if the sound was good. It's a commercial dvd. It's been like that for all the R2 versions and the vhs I had before that, I assumed it was in the master. Is your version okay?
If the bluray fixes it I'd buy it again, for the 3rd time. :)

cuckoo said...

I don't think North America has it on Blu-Ray yet. I know the DVD is notorious for having severe audio problems.

It seems to be on Blu-ray on in The Future....perhaps the reviews will clear that up.

Dr Faustus said...

It's locked to R2. That sucks (for everyone except me). Specs say it has LPCM 2.0. Found this. "...the audio treatment is outstanding. The English LPCM 2.0 has a terrific dynamic amplitude that effectively puts to shame the Dolby Digital Mono track from the R1 SDVD release of the film."