Unfaithful Blu-ray delivers great video and audio in this fan-pleasing Blu-ray release
Edward and Connie Sumner are a wonderfully maintained middle-aged couple living the
American dream. Together with their eight year-old son, a dog and a housekeeper, they share
an enviable life in the suburbs of New York City. But no life goes unchallenged: This happy
marriage, dampened by the routines of affluence, falls prey to an outsider when Connie has a
fateful collision with a stranger on a Soho street. It's an encounter which assaults her with
mystery, spontaneity, charm and risk. It will pull Connie into an affair which will become her
obsession. When Edward innocently learns that his wife has lied to him, suspicion propels him
to to uncover the devastating details of her infidelity. Tormented by the knowledge, he
confronts her lover, only to discover a level of rage within himself that he could never have
imagined.
For more about Unfaithful and the Unfaithful Blu-ray release, see the Unfaithful Blu-ray Review published by Kenneth Brown on January 29, 2009 where this Blu-ray release scored 3.5 out of 5.
Few directors have found critical acclaim and cult followings with their contributions to an oft-derided genre like the erotic thriller, but Adrian Lyne has spent his career doing just that. With 9½ Weeks, he encountered a hungry audience who didn't care about the poor reviews it received. With Fatal Attraction, he was rewarded with six Oscar nominations, including nods for Best Picture and Best Director. With Indecent Proposal, he proved he wasn't a one-hit wonder by duplicating the box office success of Fatal Attraction, drumming up controversy, and earning Paramount a fortune. So it was that when Lyne decided to return to suburban obsession with Unfaithful, expectations were high and studio pressure was even higher.
Oliver Martinez and Diane Lane bear all for Adrian Lyne's tale of seduction and infedlity
Happily married suburbanites Ed and Connie Sumner (Richard Gere and Diane Lane) are living the life with their eight year-old son (Malcolm in the Middle's Erik Per Sullivan) in a lovely house outside of New York City. Aside from their dwindling middle-aged passion for each other, everything about their lives seems perfect. However, when a Manhattan windstorm and a scraped knee leaves Connie trembling in the arms of an alluring stranger (an inexcusably bland Oliver Martinez), she becomes embroiled in a reckless love affair that threatens to undermine everything she and her husband have accomplished. At first, she gets away with her increasingly frequent trips to the city but, before long, her lies begin to rouse Ed's suspicions. And when he hires a private detective (Dominic Chianese) to follow her, he quickly discovers his worst fears are true.
Before I attempt to pull back the curtain on Lyne's 2002 erotic thriller and rant about its shortcomings, allow me to shine a light on what makes Unfaithful worth watching: Diane Lane and Richard Gere's outstanding performances. While I didn't buy into the story itself for a second or believe that Connie's eyes would wander from her devoted husband after little more than a contrived chance encounter with a strapping young Frenchman, I was at the mercy of Gere's quiet rage and Lane's vulnerability (for which she earned a nomination for Best Actress at the Academy Awards). Both actors bring a much-needed dose of reality to the film, giving their on-screen marriage enough unspoken credibility to offset the script's lack of proper character development and plot cohesion. Their passing exchanges, shifting expressions, and suspicious glances perfectly convey their characters' individual loss, and their cloaked accusations are far more compelling than those Lyne trots out in the third act. Even when the inevitable climax collapses and a vague conclusion emerges in its place, Gere and Lane keep their wits about them and make the Sumners feel more real than they deserve to be.
Sadly, the rest of the film doesn't measure up. Plagued by studio interference, casual threats, and outright demands to alter his characters, tone, and ending, Lyne lost control of the production and subsequently created something far less satisfying than he initially set out to make. Marital conflicts, darker subplots, and even the film's original setting were scrapped in favor of Hollywood's favorite fallbacks: predetermined morality, predictable cause and effect scenarios, and cliche developments in the story. Don't get me wrong, without Lyne the entire film would have probably been an absolute mess. However, the director's inability to hold onto what made his vision (and Claude Chabrol's La Femme infidèle, the French film on which Unfaithful was based) so intriguing allowed his adaptation to become as unfulfilling as the Sumners' relationship.
I suspect if Lyne had managed to retain full creative control of his film, I would be describing Unfaithful as the evolutionary successor to Fatal Attraction. Instead, I have no other choice but to shrug my shoulders and imagine what could have been.
Unfaithful arrives on Blu-ray with a remarkably filmic 1080p/AVC-encoded transfer that effortlessly renders the director's every intention (sometimes to a fault). Lyne's palette -- warm and inviting one moment, cold and detached the next -- is brimming with attractive primaries, realistic skintones, and enveloping blacks. Contrast is spot on as well, injecting reliable depth and dimensionality into the image regardless of any particular scene's lighting source and intensity. More importantly, the BD doesn't struggle with saturation issues, compression limitations, and image cleanliness like the standard DVD. While it doesn't appear that Fox used any post-processing nonsense (like DNR), grain is less intrusive and more stable, source noise doesn't plague the darkest shots, and artifacting has all but been eliminated. Best of all, detail has been drastically improved. Textures are refined, on-screen text is crisp and legible, and objects are well defined. If anything, some minor edge enhancement threatens to interfere with the otherwise impressive picture.
A handful of scenes do look softer than the rest of the film, but it's largely the result of Lyne's decision to pump smoke into many of his sets. Still, even though the lingering haze reduces clarity and obscures fine detail a bit at times, the effect rarely lasts long and doesn't detract from the overall quality too much. It may not turn as many heads as the latest and greatest high-def masterpieces, but Unfaithful still looks great. The BD easily and completely outclasses its DVD counterpart, renders the original print in exacting detail, and emerges as the version for fans of the film to own.
The Blu-ray edition of Unfaithful also includes a convincing DTS HD Master Audio 5.1 surround track that weaves the film's hushed conversations, sorrowful score, and intense encounters into an immersive whole. Regardless of how quiet the soundscape sometimes becomes, dialogue remains sharp and evenly distributed across the front channels, pans flawlessly transition from speaker to speaker, and directionality is remarkably precise and believable. Aggressive low-end pulses are relegated to a few intense scenes in the second act, but subtle LFE support is present throughout the film -- foreground and background voices have genuine weight, moving objects exhibit natural heft, and passing cars are often paired with the slightest of rumbles. Even so, it's the rear speakers that are tasked with the most work and are responsible for the track's overall impact. Crisp ambience enhances the soundfield, interior acoustics have been perfectly replicated, and city streets sound suitably crowded. I certainly wouldn't go so far as to say the mix is a sonic powerhouse, but it's clear that its designers have gone to great lengths to faithfully represent every effect, beat, and word in the film's subdued soundscape.
While it will come as no surprise to anyone who already owns the standard DVD, Unfaithful includes an unexpectedly extensive supplemental package. Granted, the individual features are fairly hit-or-miss, but it's nice to see a film of this nature earn more than a barebones disc.
Full-Length Audio Commentary: Director Adrian Lyne candidly discusses the genesis of the project, casting, the difficulties and challenges his actors faced on set, Unfaithful's themes and characters (and the ways in which they continue explorations he began with other films in his canon), and his encounters with studio interference during the shoot and his subsequent editing. It's all quite interesting and informative, but it starts to grow old after the one-hour mark. Still, Lyne fans will appreciate his detailed account of the production.
Scene Specific Actors' Commentary: Running for just over an hour, this unrevealing commentary track finds Diane Lane and Oliver Martinez talking about their craft, commitment, and characters. Martinez doesn't say much, but it doesn't matter -- the actors' behind-the-scenes chemistry is far duller than their on-the-screen romance might suggest.
Deleted Scenes w/ Optional Director's Commentary (HD, 17 minutes): Eleven smart cuts and a meandering alternate ending may provide fans of the film with extra character tidbits here and there, but there isn't anything of note to experience here.
An Affair to Remember (SD, 16 minutes): A typical EPK in which all of the key cast and crew members discuss Lyne, the on-set atmosphere, and the many things that supposedly makes the film so "unique" and "special." It's a solid behind-the-scenes featurette, but it doesn't dig into the studio's interference or the troubles faced by the production.
Cast Interviews (SD, 20 minutes): A collection of promotional interviews in which Lane, Gere, and Martinez discuss the film and their contributions to it. It's nice to hear from each actor, but they don't offer much that hasn't already been covered elsewhere on the disc.
The Charlie Rose Show Interview (SD, 19 minutes): I've never been a big fan of Rose's dry chats, but, under his watchful eye and careful questions, Lyne, Lane, and Gere offer some engaging anecdotes and thoughts on the film.
Anne Coats on Editing (SD, 9 minutes): Just what it says it is... a featurette about editing and its influence on the tone and pacing of a film.
Unfaithful may boast a pair of fantastic performances from Diane Lane and Richard Gere, but its story fails to feel as authentic and powerful as its director clearly intended. While most will chalk it up to studio interference (I do), it doesn't change the fact that the film could have been more relevant, resonant, and rewarding. Thankfully, the Blu-ray edition is easy to recommend. It features an excellent video transfer, a subdued but impressive DTS HD Master Audio track, and a generous collection of supplements. Newcomers should take the time to watch the film before committing to a purchase, but fans will be more than pleased with this BD release.
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