Source United States | Publisher : Kino Lorber | Release date : 20 June 2023
Video format
2160p24 – Ratio 2.39
Dolby Vision / BT.2020 – HEVC encoding
Master intermediate 4K
Soundtrack
English DTS-HD MA 5.1
English DTS-HD MA 2.0
Subtitles
English
Rated 4.5 out of 5
Artistic : 8 | Video : 9.5 | Audio : 9
It is brought to the attention of our dear readers that, in addition to the specified and used viewing equipment, the rendering may differ from one installation to another, whether or not it is calibrated, as well as personal preferences and expectations may influence notation. Moreover, the images in the article are not representative of the edition tested.
Test equipment and condition (Config. HP: 5.1.4)
Video broadcaster : Sony Bravia XR-65A80J (Dolby Vision Luminous)
Sources : Oppo UDP-203 Audiocom Reference | Zappiti Reference
Pregnant : Sennheiser Ambeo Soundbar (DTS Neural:X), SVS SB-4000
WORK - The briefcase merchant
Five men and a woman who do not know each other meet in a warehouse in the Paris suburbs. These shadow men are former Cold War soldiers who survive by secretly renting their services to anonymous sponsors. The young Irish woman who brought them together lacks experience. Their mission is to tear up a precious briefcase from which they ignore the contents of an enemy team that is firmly armed...
Behind the elliptical scenario of this abstract spying polar is a pure action film where silent characters (Robert De Niro, Jean Reno, Sean Bean, Stellan Skarsgård, Jonathan Pryce) short behind a MacGuffin (the famous briefcase) in our beautiful France. A pretext to offer spectators chase races (inspired by Bullit and English Connection) became models of the genre (and realized without rigging by the veteran) John Frankenheimer) in a neo-black atmosphere at the Melville (The Samurai never far away). Successful mission!
IMAGE - On Hexagon roads
Far behind the mirror, the old Blu-ray encoded in MPEG-2 (published in April 2008 by us via MGM) is not equipped to achieve the same speed as the present UHD Dolby Vision transfer (the perfection of which is hampered by a stealthy vertical line) resulting from a new 4K scan of the original 35 mm negative (in Super 35 format). For your information, the HD disk included in the edition will embed the enhanced transfer.
Particularly robust thanks to an exemplary encoding, the image delivers a silver patina of beautiful finesse and details of fantastic precision (pores of the skin, weaving of clothes, paved streets). With great clarity and profiting from a leap of definition far from being annoyed, it delimits in fact the least corners of the wide frame (cf. the sharpness of the background) with an obvious superiority vis-à-vis its counterpart 1080p, whose softness of the pique is more than a distant memory.
Avoiding primary (more luxuriant when they appear) as much as possible, the almost monochromatic colorimetric palette balances the steel shades of the signed photograph Robert Fraisse and deepens the darkest tones, supported for this by more assertive contrasts giving blacks a completely different density and whites an exalted radiance. It is not for nothing that the light sources (reflections on the bodies, the sun, lightnings at the exit of the guns) shine as never before.
Everybody wants to go to the party.
While the music ofElia Cmíral is reduced to its strict minimum, the dynamic power of this multi-channel soundtrack starts by simmering alongside a spatialisation of the city giving to heart joy in road traffic (we keep the steering wheel !).
The explosions fully exploit the LFE channel, the shots and other collisions are not lacking in scope, the dialogues are exuded efficiently by the power station and the beaches « silent » sound distribution (effects such as atmospheres invest the rears not without regularity) as realistic as that of passages where pyrotechnics predominate.
CONCLUSION - The taste of work well done
With first-rate A/V performances, the 4K Ultra HD chandelier with the utmost care one of De Niro's latest great films, a modern classic unloved with memorable motorized sequences, so that it can withstand the test of time longer... The Peugeot 406 and the BMW M5 of the final definitely deserve it!
[...] Mbps seems to better reflect the vision of the director and his chief operator Robert Fraisse (Ronin) than his aging counterpart 1080p. And if he does not seek to fill us with his sight, [...]