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- The City of Lost Children, ...
4K Ultra HD – Edition FR – Studiochannel – 112 min – 29 March 2023
Video format
• Intermediate Master: 4K
• Standard HDR: Dolby Vision
• Ratio: 1.85
Soundtrack
• French DTS-HD MA 5.1
• English DTS-HD MA 2.0
Subtitles
• French
• English
It is brought to the attention of our dear readers as well as the viewing equipment specified and used by each tester of the MaG team, the rendering may differ from one installation to another, whether or not it is calibrated, as well as personal preferences and expectations may influence the rating. Moreover, the images in the article are not representative of the edition tested.
WORK – The dream thief
Krank, a strange character, lives surrounded by an army of clones on a platform at sea lost in the fog. To try to find the secret of happiness, they capture children to steal their dreams. One of the children captured is One's little brother, a friendly colossus, who decides to do everything possible to find him, with the help of Miette, a young orphan.
Populated with extraordinary troubles (Ron Perlman, Dominique Pinon, Jean-Claude Dreyfus, etc.) that camp fantasy characters, this strange dream tale (for disillusioned adults) invites chimeral travels and stimulates the imagination with its stunning retrofuturistic universe with memorable blafarde polychromy. Unique of its kind, this work is as wonderful as a nightmare that sucks love for the freaks, whose gifted ones communicate it.
IMAGE – Open your eyes wide!
From a 4K scan of the original 35 mm negative, this UHD transfer whose calibration HDR Dolby Vision was controlled by Young and Caro (with the studio L-Immagine Ritrovata) represents a breakthrough in all fields compared to the previous Blu-ray released in 2016 by the same publisher.
The more or less thick grain (depending on whether or not CGI is present in the frame) is no more noisy (or so little) and emerges in all its organic splendour, the definition that is much more solid carefully restores the complex textures of nebulous decorations (the rusty metal) and the finest details (the close-ups on the faces, worn clothes), of fantastic sharpness, emerge from the shadow without digital DIY. The depth of field is greater than in the past and everything has been perfectly cleaned of all dust, hair and other petals.
The intentionally attenuated light sources (inner lights) shine with a new shine (reflections on the water, the final explosion), the still variable contrast ratio (some blacks persist to be dark grey) gets deeper and the colorimetric palette, where most of the colors continue to be tastefully desaturated (Miette's red dress, Santa's costumes), stimulates the unhealthy green shade of the photograph (as well as the fact that « dream » which surveys the city and the product injected by the learned chip) signed Darius Khondji.
SOUND – Little Dad Christmas 🎶
Atmospheric (a port acoustic design filled with drops of water, clapotis of waves and steams churning) but little enveloping (a mainly frontal mixing), this multichannel soundtrack without loss that does not suffer from any damage sharing dialogues of a beautiful authenticity, shows a real weight when the narration demands it (the LFE channel rumbles as it should during the detonations of the shotgun or during the marine accident on the docks) and generously dispenses the superb onirico-carnavalesque partition dAngelo Badalamenti (Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive, Long engagement Sunday).
CONCLUSION – Once upon a time...
While adulthood comes after the escape from childhood, this uchrony steampunk in which the brilliance of life is tarnished by the hardness of life only demands to make us dream with this superb edition mediabook 4K Ultra HD (happiness performances A/V) made with the utmost attention for its 30th anniversary!
Nyctalope like Riddick and with a very good hearing, I am ready to jump on physical editions and SVOD platforms. But if the quality isn't on the rendezvous, stop at the bite! #WeLovePhysicalMedia
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Finally a test of the 4K version, and apparently it benefits from the support and its benefits. A light dissipation of the outer sheath of the cardboard box with a thinness and a fragility that pushes the upper and lower sides to bend (by chance mine is only down).....When Delicatessen or Amélie or the Long Sunday engagement,and even T.S.S.Spivet?
Delicatessen is coming in the coming months! 😉
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