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Lots of stuff is still broken, but at least reviews can now be looked up and read.
Paterson (Blu-ray) (2016)

Paterson (Blu-ray) (2016)

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Released 19-Apr-2017

Cover Art

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Details At A Glance

General Extras
Category Comedy / Drama Featurette-Q & A with Adam Driver (19:48)
Theatrical Trailer
Trailer-Jim Jarmusch film's trailers x 6 (13:32)
Rating Rated M
Year Of Production 2016
Running Time 117:58
RSDL / Flipper Dual Layered Cast & Crew
Start Up Menu
Region Coding 2,4 Directed By Jim Jarmusch
Studio
Distributor

Madman Entertainment
Starring Adam Driver
Golshifteh Farahani
Barry Shabaka Henley
Chasten Harmon
William Jackson Harper
Masatoshi Nagase


Case Standard Blu-ray
RPI ? Music Squrl
Jim Jarmusch
Carter Logan


Video Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame None English DTS HD Master Audio 5.1
English DTS HD Master Audio 2.0
English Descriptive Audio Dolby Digital 2.0
Widescreen Aspect Ratio 1.85:1
16x9 Enhancement
16x9 Enhanced
Video Format 1080p
Original Aspect Ratio 1.85:1 Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures No
Subtitles English for the Hearing Impaired Smoking No
Annoying Product Placement No
Action In or After Credits No

NOTE: The Profanity Filter is ON. Turn it off here.

Plot Synopsis

"Sometime empty page
present most possibilities"

     Paterson, the film, is one week in the life of a man named Paterson (Adam Driver), a bus driver in Paterson, a city in New Jersey, and his wife Laura (Golshifteh Farahani). Paterson’s routine each day is unchanging: wake up, cereal for breakfast, walk to work with his lunchbox, drive the bus, walk home. After catching up with Laura, he takes her English Bulldog Melvin for a walk and drops in at the bar run by Doc (Barry Shabaka Henley) for one beer before returning home.

     Paterson is content with his mundane life although he is also a poet, writing poems before his shift starts in a notebook which he keeps with him. However Laura, with whom he is very much in love, is more ambitious for Paterson and wants him to publish his poems to give them to the world, or at least to take a copy of his notebook in case it and all his poems are destroyed. Laura also wants to start a bakery business making cupcakes and / or to be a country singer and she purchases a black and white guitar to get started although Paterson knows they cannot really afford it. Laura is into black and white: she paints parts of the house, the drapes and the cushions black and white, she dresses in black and white, makes black and white cupcakes and when they go to see a movie, it is an old black and white film!

     Paterson is a gem of a film by the wonderful independent writer / director Jim Jarmusch, whose films are always individual and very idiosyncratic; I confess to a bias here: Dead Man (1995) and Ghost Dog (1999) are among my favourite films. Paterson is Jarmusch in fine form, a beautiful, gentle, poetic film about life, dreams, relationships and poetry. The film focusses on one week, each section starting with a caption showing the day; we learn nothing of Paterson’s background although there are hints in the pictures in his house. The film is fragmentary, featuring conversations, or parts of conversations, which occur in the bus or the bar. Most are not particularly significant, although some are, and generally Paterson is not the centre or the focus; he is peripheral, absorbing words and experiences, a bit player, for example, in the relationship troubles played out in the bar between Marie (Chasten Harmon) and Everett (William Jackson Harper). Jarmusch also includes in Paterson recurring motifs, such as twins, running water or words themselves. Although not a lot happens, there is a lot to ponder in this film and the ending, involving a Japanese man (Masatoshi Nagase - who provides the dialogue at the top of this review) visiting Paterson (the city), is superb, precisely wrapping up what has gone before.

     Paterson is dominated by the performance of Adam Driver who is in every scene. I am in the minority I know, but I did not like him much in Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) but here he gives a wonderfully nuanced, captivating performance; his interrelationships with Iranian born actress Golshifteh Farahani (who has also appeared in big budget films including a couple for Ridley Scott, Body of Lies (2008) and Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014)) are delightful.

     Paterson was among the nominations for the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 2016 but lost out to the Ken Loach film I, Daniel Blake. I have not seen that film so cannot comment but I can say that Paterson is a perceptive, gentle and beautiful film, well made and well-acted, with wry humour. This mostly involves the bulldog but it was, for example, great fun finding out just why Paterson’s mailbox is on a lean each day he gets home from work.

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Transfer Quality

Video

     Paterson is presented in the original aspect ratio of 1.85:1, in 1080p using the MPEG-4 AVC code.

     Paterson looks beautiful. Shot using Arri Alexa cameras, detail is sharp. Colours are natural and unmanipulated providing a pleasing appearance of the city streets, the older buildings or the waterfall and park. Blacks and shadow detail are fine, brightness and contrast consistent, skin tones good.

     I did not notice any artefacts or marks.

     English subtitles for the hearing impaired are provided in a clear white font.

Video Ratings Summary
Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

     English DTS-HD MA 5.1, English DTS-HD MA 2.0 or English Descriptive Audio using a male voice (Dolby Digital 2.0) are the audio choices.

     This is a quiet film that does not require anything dramatic by way of audio. Dialogue is clear and the surrounds and rears are mostly used for ambient sound, such the wind, the waterfall or the click of pool balls or background music in the bar. The mostly low key electronic ethereal score by Squrl, with additional music by Jim Jarmusch and Carter Logan, was effective. I cannot say that I noticed any use of the subwoofer, but it was not needed.

     There are no lip synchronisation issues.

Audio Ratings Summary
Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Extras

Q & A with Adam Driver (19:48)

     Adam Driver sits down after a screening of Paterson and answers questions from moderator Tim Robey and the audience. He is a candid, pleasant and entertaining speaker and talks about learning to drive a bus for the film, his character, why he does not like to watch his own films and director Jim Jarmusch.

Theatrical Trailer (1:53)

    

Also Available by Jim Jarmusch (13:32)

     A fascinating set of Jarmusch trailers: Stranger Than Paradise, Down By Law, Mystery Train, Night on Earth, Dead Man and Only Lovers Left Alive.

R4 vs R1

NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.

    The US Region A Blu-ray of Paterson has no extras and so misses out on the Q&A. Our Region B release is identical to the Region B UK version: indeed, when the Blu-ray loads the first screen is a choice between UK/Ireland and Australia.

Summary

     Fans of Jarmusch will be happy. With delightful performances by Adam Driver and Golshifteh Farahani, Paterson is a gem of a film, a beautiful, gentle, poetic, life affirming film that is about nothing . . . and everything. Repeated viewings are necessary!

     The video and audio are fine; the extras although limited are worthwhile.

Ratings (out of 5)

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

© Ray Nyland (the bio is the thing)
Friday, April 28, 2017
Review Equipment
DVDSony BDP-S580, using HDMI output
DisplayLG 55inch HD LCD. This display device has not been calibrated. This display device is 16x9 capable. This display device has a maximum native resolution of 1080p.
Audio DecoderNAD T737. This audio decoder/receiver has not been calibrated.
AmplificationNAD T737
SpeakersStudio Acoustics 5.1

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