Great Gatsby (1949/Paramount/Via Vision/Imprint Import Region Free Blu-ray)/Radiance (2017*)/A Radiant Girl (2021*)/Rain Man 4K (1988/MGM/UA/MVD 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray w/Blu-ray)/Still The Water (2014/*all Film Movement DVDs)

4K Ultra HD Picture: B Picture: B-/C/C/B-/C Sound: B-/C+/C/B & B-/C+ Extras: B/C-/B-/B/C- Films: B-/C+/C+/B+/C+

PLEASE NOTE: The Great Gatsby Import Region Free Blu-ray is now only available from our friends at Via Vision in Australia, can play on all 4K and Blu-ray players and can be ordered from the link below.

Now for a solid new group of dramas to know about...

Elliott Nugent's The Great Gatsby (1949) is the first sound film adaption of the legendary F. Scott Fitzgerald classic novel (an earlier silent version is, unacceptably, a lost film; hopefully for now, though a trailer survives!) with Alan Ladd in the bootlegging lead and as compared to the post-modern wackiness and mess of the Leonardo DiCaprio version and beautiful-but-off version with Robert Redford scripted by Francis Coppola with an awkwardly cast Mia Farrow (obviously growing much worse over the years) and mixed results, this film is the best version so far of the book.

Even if it is not perfect, the screenplay by Cyril Hume and Richard Maibaum has more going or it than I think even many who liked the film might miss, though it has to sacrifice parts of the book to do what it does. In that, Paramount did not enthusiastically back the production, but it has only grown in value and held up as well as its rivals.

Besides being shot well and having some money in it, the supporting cast is amazing and includes no less than Barry Sullivan, Howard Da Silva, Betty Field, MacDonald Carey, Ruth Hussey, Shelley Winters, Henry Hull, Ed Begley and Elisha Cook, Jr. The result is a feel that seems more naturalistic than expected and this just flows the best of the three versions that exist. Especially if you have not seen this version and may have liked one or both of the later ones, this is ambitious and one of the last gasps of the look and class Paramount was known for like no other studio starting in the silent era. I was glad to see it and it is definitely worth your time.

Extras are listed at the link and include a great feature-length audio commentary and some great new featurettes.

Naomi Kawase's Radiance (2017) is the first of two films from the director, this one has a young woman (Ayame Misaki) as a woman who writes up versions of films for the visually impaired when she happens to meet an older photographer (Masatoshi Nagase) who just happens to he losing his eyesight!

The high concept might be a stretch for some, but Kawase runs with it the best she can and does get some good moments in. However, it is not enough in 102 minutes to really work for me, but it is still ambitious and a serious attempt is made to make it all work. I just think it could have gone further in the time it had.

The only extras are trailers.

Sandrine Kiberlain's A Radiant Girl (2021) is one of those rare films I liked and thought had things going for it, but wanted to like more because of how it was going, yet comes up short. The title young lady (Rebecca Mauder) who has high hopes for her future. Unfortunately, it is 1942 and she is Jewish, about to be among many targeted by the Nazis in France!

Mauder is great and even amazing here, but the film does not always play like and feel like its time, though no flaws that would ruin its authenticity. Instead, there is just something a little off here and the end is just about effective and I get it, yet I think it has an open-endedness that might not totally work. I like the cast and directing enough, but the other issue is that the transfer of image and sound got in the way of me being able to get into the film, so I will want to see it and experience it again in HD and a higher format when possible. It is worth a look, but I just wish it looked better.

Extras include trailers, a excellent French Alliance Institute Francaise after-screening Q&A with the director & star by the always-great Annette Insdorf and the short film Fine, directed by Maya Yadlin.

Barry Levinson's Rain Man 4K (1988) adds to the small-but-growing list of Best Picture Academy Award Winners finally making it onto 4K Blu-ray. We reviewed the basic Blu-ray a while ago at this link:

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/10846/Rain+Man+(1988/MGM+Blu-ray)+++Yi+Yi+(aka

Looking at it again, it holds up well, is now a time capsule of the period it was made in ways we might not have expected, has two of the best performances in the long careers of the two leads and how it gave the public an awareness of autism remains nothing short of remarkable. I was also reminded that, along with films like Avalon and the highly imitated Diner, Levinson was one of the most important filmmakers of his time and how much I miss that.

Seeing it again after so many years, I can see new strategies in how they made it, approaches that led to some remarkable impact and how high a level everyone was working at when this was made. Sadly, Hollywood and many other outlets for that matter, cannot seem to make films like this by human beings, about human being that have so much to say. However, up there with Scorsese's Raging Bull, Ridley Scott's Blade Runner, Terry Gilliam's Brazil and Spike Lee's Do The Right Thing, Rain Man is on a sadly very short list of the best films of the 1980s, a decade inferior to the 1970s in too many ways to go into here.

It also remains a triumph for Dustin Hoffman, a still-active method actor who shows why the oddly, increasingly derided approach to acting he has employed so well over the many decades of his career works. There is not one false note in all of his work here, 100% on top of what he is doing and pulling off a performance for the ages that actually changed lives for the better. A true triumph, he is ultimately the soul of Rain Man and despite minor spots for me that do not always work, it will remain an all-time classic and that it was a huge blockbuster hit is just icing on the cake. Nice to have it in 4K!

Extras are the same as the previous Blu-ray only edition, including three audio commentary tracks.

Naomi Kawase's Still The Water (2014) is her second film here, issued three years earlier, has a young man (Nijiro Murakami) discovers a woman's body floating dead in the sea nearby. Only 16-years-old, he turns to his girlfriend (Jun Yoshinaga) to help, so they try to solve the mystery. However, they start to also discover more about themselves as they are forced to come of age in some ways. Good thing they have each other.

This is not a murder/mystery film, yet partly a coming of age film, but comes close at times to trivializing the dead. Likely very unintended, this also has some good moments, but also more than a few that drag, when that time could have been used better. This runs just over two hours and it feels like we also get more missed opportunities. At least this looks good at times.

The only extras are trailers.

Now for playback performance. The 2160p HEVC/H.265, 1.85 X 1, Dolby Vision/HDR (10; Ultra HD Premium)-enhanced Ultra High Definition image on Rain Man 4K has some issues in some shots with more grain than I remembered, but it is the best I have seen the film since my several 35mm screenings during its original theatrical run with some great detail, Video Red, Video White and depth in particular, especially as compared to the Blu-ray's 1080p 1.85 X 1 digital High Definition image that repeats the older Blu-ray and looks older than ever.

Both films feature DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless mixes, with the regular Blu-ray repeating the older mix form the older Blu-ray, but the 4K edition has some more detail, depth and even warmth, making it the best I have ever heard the film. Originally issued in Dolby's then-newer SR (Spectral Recording) noise reduction system, it is one of those films that did that at the last minute as the format had only been introduced the year before on Verhoeven's Robocop, so the clearer mix shows the variation in quality from the on-set recording. That shows the film's age, but the score always sounds solid and consistent. The 4K edition is now the only way to see the film outside of a mint condition 35mm print.

The 1080p 1.33 X 1 black & white digital High Definition image transfer on Gatsby can show the age of the materials used, but this is superior enough to all transfers of the film issued before despite the dust and flaws throughout, though other segments look fine and are in great condition. Video Black and Video White are also pretty consistent, while the original theatrical monophonic sound is here in a decent PCM 2.0 Mono mix that is the best I have ever heard the film and only needs a few minor fixes.

The anamorphically enhanced 2.35 X 1 image on all three DVDs come from recent HD shoots and though Film Movement has turned out some solid transfers in the older format, these are sadly three releases where the image is just much softer throughout than I would have liked. This especially bothered me on Radiant Girl. As for sound, all discs offer lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 and lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo mixes (in various languages) except Radiant Girl, which also drove me up the wall because it has the poorest sound here when it deserves better. Oh well.

To order The Great Gatsby Umbrella Region Free import Blu-ray, go to this link for it and other hard to find releases at:

https://viavision.com.au/shop/the-great-gatsby-1949-imprint-collection-220/

- Nicholas Sheffo