The Joneses Blu-ray delivers great video and solid audio, but overall it's a mediocre Blu-ray release
When the seemingly perfect all-American Jones family moves into a rich suburban neighborhood, the neighbors are filled with envy and admiration of their success, good looks and apparently endless stream of desirable possessions. But as the neighbors fall over themselves to keep up with the Joneses, none are prepared for the sinister truth behind this all-too perfect family.
As the saying goes, we spend money we don't have, to buy things we don't need, to impress people
we don't like. All in an attempt to keep up with the figurative Joneses. Well, they were
figurative, anyway. Inspired by the recent recession, first time writer, director, and producer Derrick
Borte has brought the catchphrase family to life, making them the next-door neighbors that
everyone envies and admires. You may say to yourself, "isn't that a bit obvious?" Well, yes, it is. You
may also ask, "Will the film wag its timely finger at the spend-first, pay-later practices of morally and
financially bankrupt American consumers?" Or, "Is it a satire on the keeping up with the
Joneses mentality of materialism and debt born from feelings of social inferiority?" Or just, "Is it
any good?" Good hypothetical questions, all, and I'll tackle them in order: Yes, yes, and it tries, it
really does, but ultimately, no, not really.
Picture perfect...
We first meet the Joneses as they move into a swank new house, a behemoth of a McMansion in
an upscale neighborhood where the average income is over 100k. Movers unload 18-wheelers full
of brand new Ethan Allen furniture and an Audi sports car is deposited carefully in the driveway.
Clearly, the Joneses are into some serious money. Steve and Kate (David Duchovny and Demi
Moore) are perfectly groomed and impossibly confident, and their teenaged kids, Jenn and Mick
(Amber Heard, Ben Hollingsworth), look to have been birthed from the pages of some designer
fashion line's summer catalog. By all appearances, the Joneses are a model family, fit to live in
their newly purchased model home. Ah yes, but appearances—as always—are deceiving, and once
they're inside, away from the neighbors' prying eyes, the Joneses' glossy veneer begins to show its
cracks. First, Kate sexually shuts Steve out of the bedroom, literally slamming the door on his face.
Then, we see svelte daughter Jenn sneak into the spare room where her father is sleeping, strip
naked, and slip beneath the sheets. What in tarnation is going on here, you ask? To even begin to
talk about The Joneses requires the slipping of a mild spoiler, one that's revealed about
fifteen minutes into the film, so don't hold it against me.
Be prepared to suspend your disbelief. As it turns out, the Joneses are not, in fact, a happy atomic
family—you know, the sort that comes inside the picture frame. They're not even related. They're
actually a "unit" of "stealth marketers" who work for a company called Life Image. Their mission?
To influence the buying habits of their well-to-do neighbors, subtly swaying taste and pushing
target products. Steve hits up the golf course to charm middle-aged men into buying a specific
brand of clubs. Kate schmoozes in the local beauty salon and holds cocktail parties where she slyly
hocks flash-frozen sushi that's available at the local grocery. And the kids are instantly popular at
school, where they secretly shill new clothes, video game systems, and rum coolers. You can
probably see where this is going, and if the film has one overriding fault, it's that it's utterly
predictable, to the point of being dull. Naturally, Steve and Kate's fake marriage gives way to real
feelings, complicating the business end of their relationship. Obviously, the kids are going to get
into some trouble of their own—nymphette Jenn falls for an older man, and Mick has trouble
balancing his sexual identity with his work expectations. And, of course, the next-door neighbors
(Gary Cole and Glenne Headly) fall under the Joneses' spell, spending themselves into financial
oblivion in a vain attempt to keep up. Vain, it should be said, in both senses of the word.
What starts as an overly obvious but mildly clever satire on the desire to accumulate material
wealth to fill some sort of social/emotional void, eventually gets mired down in been-there-before
suburban melodrama. There's plenty of intrigue early on, when we're not sure what's up with the
Joneses—the supposed family's sexual dynamics are compelling in a WTF kind of way—but once
their true identity is revealed, the film trudges half-heartedly toward the inevitable tragedies and
predestined resolutions. There's a reason why most satires are dark comedies and not just didactic
dramas—it helps not to be so self-serious when trying to make a point. Writer/director Derrick
Borte seems to earnestly believe that The Joneses' over-intoned message is somehow
deeply profound, but he never sells us on it. We're left with a general feeling of well, okay, yep,
we get it. What now? A film like this might have seemed slightly prophetic before the
implosion of the real estate market, but now it just feels like Johnny-come-lately finger pointing.
Although they aren't given much to work with, the cast does try valiantly to give the perfect-on-
the-outside, broken-on-the-inside performances that the script demands. Amber Heard is
surprisingly good (and sexy) as Jenn—look out for her upcoming, co-starring turn with Johnny
Depp in The Rum Diaries—and Gary Cole is perfect as the envious neighbor, desperate to
have it all. This is Duchovny and Demi's show, though, and they play their fake-turned-real
romance well, making a hard-to-believe premise a bit more believable. One final observation: Is it
just me, or is David Duchovny starting to look like a young Walter Matthau?
The Joneses take up residence on Blu-ray with a more-than-capable 1080p/AVC-encoded
transfer, framed in a 2.38:1 aspect ratio. I was actually quite impressed with the
image—it's rich, naturally filmic, and although the lighting veers at times toward the flat, lifeless,
overly bright look that you usually find in big budget comedies, there's plenty of depth and presence to
the picture. Color-wise, there's nothing here that screams HD eye candy, but the neutral tones of the
Joneses' house are warm and inviting, flesh tones are natural, and outdoor scenes have a realistic
saturation level. Solid black levels make for an image with rocksteady contrast, and darker nighttime
sequences offer better-than-expected shadow delineation. Sharpness wavers a bit, with a few scenes
toward the end of the film that look oddly soft, but in general, fine detail is resolved in close-ups, edges
are crisp—but not overly so—and facial texture is easily visible. Basically, this is a transfer that looks
like it hasn't been tinkered or tampered with much, and that's definitely a good thing. Grain is
untouched by DNR abuses, edge enhancement is nowhere to be seen, and I didn't spot any out-of-
control compression issues, even though the film has a relatively low bitrate and sits on a single-layer,
25 GB disc.
The film's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround track is a lazy Sunday stroll through the
suburbs, with little engagement from the rear speakers and only a few instances of overt "sound
design." You'll hear some cars pass through the surround channels, some water noises in the girl's
locker room, party chatter, and some low volume airy ambience outside, but that's really about it. The
only other thing that gets output from the rear speakers is Nick Urata's equally restrained score, which
never gets loud enough to have real presence, but sounds good, considering. The front-heavy mix
emphasizes dialogue, which is crisp, clean, and perfectly balanced throughout. There's really not a lot
to say here; the track is as quiet as a pre-dawn golf course, but there are no major audio hiccups.
English SDH and Spanish subtitles are available in easy-to-read white lettering.
Okay, we get it. What better time than an economic recession for a pointed film about materialism and
consumer culture. Only, The Joneses is too on-the-nose, too obvious. I mean, it's called
The Joneses. It's also dull, patently unbelievable, and can't seem to decide if it wants to be a
cynical, black comic satire or an emotion-laden drama. The film looks and sounds great on Blu-ray, but
unless you're a diehard Duchovny or Demi Moore fan, there's really not much of a reason to give
The Joneses anything more than a rental.
Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment has announced The Joneses for release on Blu-ray on August 10. This comedy starring David Duchovny and Demi Moore only got a limited theatrical release in April and, despite overall positive reviews, grossed under $1.5 million ...
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