WEIRDLAND: Donnie Darko, Blu-ray Director’s Cut (2001)

Monday, March 09, 2009

Donnie Darko, Blu-ray Director’s Cut (2001)

"Jake Gyllenhaal just inhabits the role of the possibly schizophrenic young man, with his hunched shoulders, odd smiles, everything. Mary McDonnell as his concerned mother is also a standout, and casting of Patrick Swayze as the motivational leader was perfect.

The story begins with Donnie as a sometimes delusional high school student who talks to a person named Frank with a demonic-looking rabbit head. Frank predicts the end of the world in 30 days after drawing Donnie outdoors at night - just prior to a jet engine mysteriously falling out of the sky into Donnie’s room where it would have killed him. Then things begin to really get confusing. Frank urges Donnie to break a water main at the school, flooding it, and later to torch the home of pushy motivational speaker Swayze. Donnie has found a book on time travel by a strange old local lady and tries to explore its meanings, but writer-director Kelly said he just brought in time travel at a comic book level, and intended it more as a deus ex machina than anything that could be analyzed (as a couple web sites do). According to the time travel framework, most of Donnie’s 30 days take place in a tangent universe rather than the present one.There are complaints that the quality of this Blu-ray release is no better than the previous standard DVD. The problem seems to be that the director used a special high speed Kodak film stock for the entire film because he liked its look. However, it is not as sharp as slower films, is more toned-down in color - and what I found most disconcerting - doesn’t have low enough black level. However, the Blu-ray version is definitely higher resolution and the soundtrack is cleaner and more immersive".
Source: www.audaud.com

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