HTF BLU-RAY REVIEW: The Da Vinci Code Extended Cut

Re: HTF BLU-RAY REVIEW: The Da Vinci Code Extended Cut

Southpaw, I hear you, but I have to partly agree with Ray on this.

There's certainly a lot of material here to look at, but once I peeled back the layers, it came out a little thin. Ron Howard's commentary is fine as far as the selected scenes go, but I would have preferred a full commentary for the edition. The way it is now, you either have to start and stop about 10 times, or watch the movie in a bizarrely truncated format. I didn't have as much of an issue with the interactive guide, but I agree that it's a bit tricky trying to pick up on everything going on, and you wind up spending much of the time rewinding back and forth. As for the featurettes, there's some good stuff in there, but there's also a lot of repetition. There were several times when I saw the same comments by Ron Howard and Dan Brown on different featurettes.

None of this is to say that the special features were bad. On the contrary, I gave them a favorable review. But to get me to 5/5, you'd have to get to the level of the 5-Disc Blade Runner...

Re: HTF BLU-RAY REVIEW: The Da Vinci Code Extended Cut

Neil, THANK YOU. I agonize over the PQ because of the effect of DNR on the larger monitors. When this economy gets a little better, I'm going to upgrade, but I'm taking my time to get there.

Bryan, I hear you. But I believe in having high standards, possibly a bit too high, but still high enough that I'm not singing excess praise where it isn't merited. I try to be honest here. If I gave 5/5 repeatedly, it would lose its value. I believe I've done it from time to time - perhaps on my review of the Dreamgirls Blu-ray 2 years ago. I remember we also had a discussion going at one point here about too many people putting "Highly Recommended" on too many reviews, and the message stuck with me.

TonyD, I'm interested to see if this longer cut worked better for you than what you saw before. When I said it's his second best film, I meant in terms of the cleanliness of the storytelling and the clarity of the action. (For example, many hit films today are so frenetic in the action sequences with the "shaky cam" effect, or do so much in quick-cut closeups that I can't figure out what is going on or who has the gun. With this film, I always knew where everyone was and could follow the story.) That said, I agree with you that the NT movies are more fun. But I didn't take this seriously - I saw it as a romp and appreciated it on that level. Now, as for Ron Howard's best film, that was another story, but that one certainly didn't take itself seriously either.