Breaking Up (1996)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Romantic Comedy	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1996
Running Time	85:37
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Robert Greenwald
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	Russell Crowe Salma Hayek Abraham Alvarez
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$14.95	Music	Mark Mothersbaugh

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English English for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    The inaptly nicknamed Dud List that records the DVDs that the site has on hand that no one has stuck their hand up to review every so often turns up an undiscovered gem. When such an event occurs, the reviewer usually ends up having a very easy review session: the film is engaging, and as a result the words tend to flow a little easier for the writing. Sometimes that list turns up known gems that for whatever reason, but mainly due to the allocated reviewer being overloaded or absent on holiday, suddenly become available for review. When that sort of event occurs then again the reviewer has a happier time of the review session as they know they have not got a piece of fetid rat's entrails to deal with. But mostly the Dud List turns up those self same fetid rat's entrails.

    Breaking Up definitely falls into the latter category, despite the presence of Russell Crowe and Salma Hayek. Whilst Salma Hayek has never been known for the stunning quality of the productions with which she has been associated (at least not until Frida perhaps), Russell Crowe certainly has, as one of the films that he made immediately prior to this was L.A. Confidential. Why he chose to do this piece of pretentious crap I guess only he alone can answer.

    So, aside from providing evidence that maybe actors are not the best decision makers in the world, what else do we learn from Breaking Up? Well, the fact that winning a Pulitzer Prize in no way means that a person is automatically a great writer all the time - as evidenced by the fact that the screenwriter here was Michael Cristofer, a Pulitzer Prize winner. The only prize this fetid piece of garbage would be able to win would be the hokiest dialogue award. I mean, where on earth did he get the idea that people actually talk like this?

    Steve (Russell Crowe) and Monica (Salma Hayek) have this relationship that sort of falls into the good and bad category. That they love each other is beyond any doubt, but does that mean that they can stand each other? Not on your life. So the good news is that the sex is very good, the bad news is that they fight, break up, make up, fight, break up and make up ad nauseum. Believe it or not, that is the entire film. Starting with the post final break up analysis, we are taken through the various stages of their devolving relationship until they finally break up for good - by which time we have probably all stopped even bothering about where this was going.

    Quite what was intended with this project I guess will remain a mystery locked away in the mind of director Robert Greenwald. What we actually get is an at times dispassionate meandering through some extraordinarily bad, and completely unbelievable, dialogue whilst never really understanding where the hell this is actually going. It jumps around, like the cinematography at times, as if the screenwriter had burning matches shoved under his toenails. Character development is non-existent and as a result we really are not sympathetic, nor are we given any reason to be sympathetic, to either of the characters, which does not in any way actually aid the film at all. By the middle of the film, the interest level has even gone beyond the fact that Salma Hayek/Russell Crowe look pretty d*** good (depending upon your preference in this regard). At times it almost looks like either or both of them have also lost the direction the director was intending to take and simply resort to reciting memorised lines rather than actually trying to act.

    Whilst we should I suppose applaud any initiative that sees a move towards budget price DVDs, I really don't think this achieves anything positive. It might be cheap but then again the film is pretty nasty. If you really want to see Russell Crowe in a film pre-Gladiator then check out the aforementioned L.A. Confidential. If you want to see Salma Hayek strutting her stuff then check out Fools Rush In of the same era - it at least makes more sense and is a heck of a lot more enjoyable than this pretentious tripe.

Video

   Given that we are talking about a release in the new Warner Home Video budget price range, you can guess that not only are we talking about a crap movie but that the general quality of the transfer may possibly not be up to comparison with the best around. Well, the transfer is probably best described as serviceable, although some of the source material has been shot in such a way that anything better would have been impossible. It would appear that some portions of the film were shot on handheld video camcorders.

    There seems to be a general softness to the transfer that just takes the edge off the detail of the film. This is more pronounced in the portions shot on video (which are very fuzzy looking at times) and in black and white (intentionally so I am guessing to give it a handheld, amateur look) but even allowing for these intentional choices, you really wish that everything was a bit sharper and a bit more detailed. There is a consistent presence of generally light grain throughout the transfer, although at times it does become just a little more than that. Shadow detail is fine, mainly as it never really becomes an issue.

    The colours tend towards the slightly muted, which I am guessing is the result of the film used and the intent of the director as there are certainly places where you could have imagined something richer in tone that would have added enormously to the visuality of the film. The lack of vibrancy is no doubt intended, even if not necessarily something that I would agree with. There are no problems with oversaturation or colour bleed. Blacks could certainly have done with being a bit deeper, but overall the colour matches the serviceable nature of the entire transfer.

    There did not appear to be any significant MPEG artefacts in the transfer. Film-to-video artefacting is generally absent from the transfer although there are the odd instances of aliasing that do become a little more obvious here and there (Venetian blinds for instance or in the shirt at 31:55). There are plenty of film artefacts floating around, thankfully mainly of the small black speck variety. There is at times what appears to be film dirt over the image.

    This is a single layered, single sided DVD, so there is no layer change.

    There are two subtitle options on the DVD, both of which are English - one being for hearing impaired viewers. They appear to be accurate and complete, with the only issue being that once or twice they seemed to get ahead of the actual dialogue.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There is just the one soundtrack on the DVD, being an English Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack.

    The dialogue comes up reasonably well in the transfer but there are times when it is a little difficult to hear and understand. There did not appear to be any audio sync issues in the transfer.

    The original music comes from Mark Mothersbaugh. I cannot say that it is really that wonderful but then again how do you really score a film that just lurches from one bust up to the next? He tries his best but really it ends up being rather trite stuff that we have heard a hundred times before.

    The film probably needed a better recording than what we have here, that whilst very serviceable simply does not add enough dynamic to the proceedings at all. It sounds as if there might be some surround encoding used but mainly in the fronts to fill out the sound - but without giving it more space to work in. The result is a little congested at times when the film really needed a bright open sound to it.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Menu

    Listed for completeness sake only.

    The Region 1 release suffers in the comparison test however by not being 16x9 enhanced and by being NTSC - I don't think that format would really aid the visual look of the DVD all that much. However that is offset by an audio commentary from the director that by the sole account found is very good, with further extras in the form of deleted scenes, biographies and the theatrical trailer. Clearly if you have to have this film, then Region 1 is by far and away the best choice on all grounds barring video (not 16x9 enhanced), packaging (snapper case) and price.

    All things considered, even hard core fans of the two cast members would have little reason to be checking this one out. A story that seems to wander endlessly without aim, characters that simply fail to garner any sympathy, some of the most ludicrous dialogue that you are ever going to hear in a film and transfers that are nothing more than serviceable. It is by no means the worst film that I have ever seen but even as a Salma Hayek fan I wish that I had given this one the big miss. Eminently, and advisedly, avoidable.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall