4K Ultra HD – Edit DE – Capelight Pictures – 100 min – 15 April 2022
Video format
• Intermediate Master: 4K
• Standard HDR: HDR10+
• Ratio: 2.00
Soundtrack
• Mandarin DTS-HD MA 5.1
• German DTS-HD MA 5.1
Subtitles
• Mandarin
• 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 – Welcome to the crazy!
After a year of fighting a pandemic with relatively mild symptoms, a frustrated nation eventually lowered its guard. It is then that the virus mutates spontaneously, giving rise to a scourge that alters the mind. The streets are unleashed in violence and depravity, with infected people being forced to commit the most cruel and horrible acts they can think of.
Ultra-bloody and mean to wish, this film of completely alienated (and particularly fun) horror that denounces the traverses of modern society (such as the toxic masculinity and the totalitarian political climate) by putting its reflection on the (disastrophic) management of the pandemic crisis, is executed like a deglined cartoon (with certain virtuosity) where cruelty and brutality serve as an outlet for an suffering people. Sensitive souls abstain!
IMAGE – More and more!
Descending from an 8K capture, this UHD HDR10+ transfer from an intermediate 4K master removes extremely sharp images with much more subtle details (make-up, decors), closes a colorimetric palette « Half » generously saturated with brighter hues (red blood), prodigal contrasts ostensibly more measured to the raised blacks (the shadows are less thick) and to the whites less for free brilliant (the skys are no longer overexposed), and brittler light sources (cf. the ceiling lights of the subway and the hospital).
However, even if much less pronounced than on the Blu-ray, the digital noise present in places can surprise even though the rendering of the photograph is « Clinical » the rest of the time.
SOUND – Follow your true nature...
Less sustained than the incessant flow of blood from the screen, this soundtrack « pain » a little bit of a budget that is easy to guess as being tight.
For if the dynamics get angry when the infection invades (rapidly) the streets, it never reaches its full capacity; This remark also concerns the surround scene, certainly present but rather restrained and rather unbalanced, just like the LFE channel, active it is true but unwilling to go down to the bottom of the spectrum.
While he is therefore deprived of the great sound show which he nevertheless tends to achieve, this highly charged mix before uses favorably continuously intelligible dialogues and a resolutely bleak musical frame.
CONCLUSION – What if VOCID-19 was just the beginning?
Hyper contagious, this very transgressive virus that would certainly « tasted » the Marquis de Sade (a clue to understand as it should be the title of this joyfully sadistic trip) may stir your guts in 4K Ultra HD!
Artistic note
7.5
Video quality
9
Audio quality
7.5
0
Maybe it's because I've seen too many bad and often extreme movies, but I only hung on to the first 50 minutes of The Sadness. The next 50 are unfortunately ultra classic and far below. However, this remains a nice entertainment
You are not wrong because the last part is less notable (wiser in short) without demeriting. 😉
[...] The film will only have little connection with Saltburn, but it proves if it is necessary to affix the term "trash" to Fennell's film as a result of pure and hard deception. Note that The Sadness might as well have left its place in feature films at least as unbridled as the recent Wolf Hunting Project or the oldest Ebola Syndrome, all three are (or will soon be) available on Shadowz! But The Sadness is also available in physical format whose test is to be read here... [...]