A Business Affair (1994)

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General		Extras
Category	Romantic Comedy	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1994
Running Time	97:42 (Case: 90)
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Charlotte Brandstom
Studio Distributor	Capella Buena Vista Australia	Starring	Christopher Walken Carole Bouquet Jonathan Pryce
Case	Amaray Variant
RPI	$19.95	Music	Didier Vasseur

    A Business Affair is a painfully slow romantic drama, on a very ordinary DVD.

    Although the DVD cover describes this movie as being a 'romantic comedy', there are very, very few comic moments. The story is set in London, where the selfish, domineering and obsessive Alec (Jonathan Pryce) is considered to be a very talented author. He is married to the beautiful Kate (Carole Bouquet), who works as a model, but dreams of being an author herself. They have a troubled relationship, as Alec will not allow Kate any real independence. Alec also generally exhibits a lack of respect toward Kate. Their relationship hits a snag when Kate meets Alec's US publisher, the passionate, possessive and greedy Vanni (Christopher Walken). Vanni is immediately besotted by Kate, and seeks to posses her for himself. Kate meanwhile, is still seeking her own identity and independence.

    The story appears plausible enough, and certainly offers a lot of dramatic potential, but sadly it doesn't deliver. While the movie is a little over 90 minutes in length, it feels much, much longer. The story is poorly executed, and the decent acting by the three leads is wasted, as the story fumbles and plods forward ever so slowly.

Video

    The transfer provides an image that is better than a VHS tape, but this is no demo disc.

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.33:1, pan and scan.

    The image is a little soft throughout. The black level is acceptable, but the shadow detail is generally very poor. For example the scene in the darkened street at 9:46 exhibits very poor shadow detail.

    The colour is a little muted at times, but acceptable overall. The flesh-tones are fairly accurate.

    There are a few MPEG artefacts appearing throughout. The image displayed pixelization on occasion, such as at 36:54. Some faces exhibited slight posterization, such as at 25:33. There was also some macro-blocking, for example on the background wall at 38:49.

    Film-to-video artefacts also raise their ugly head. Aliasing appears throughout in the form of a mild shimmer on certain objects. There is also telecine wobble on occasion, such as at 31:55. A variety of film artefacts pop up throughout the movie. An example is the smattering that appear at 17:46. While edge enhancement is never a problem, slight halos did appear on occasion, such as at 93:56.

    There are no subtitles on this DVD and this is a single-layered disc.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There is only one audio track on this DVD, English Dolby Digital 2.0.

    The dialogue quality and audio sync are okay, but some of French actress Carole Bouquet's dialogue appeared dubbed.

    The musical score mainly consists of subtle orchestral music, and is credited to Didier Vasseur. It is competent but not memorable.

    The audio track is not surround encoded, so there is no surround presence or activity, and the subwoofer was never called upon.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    There are no extras.

Menu

    A very simple menu, presented in an aspect ratio of 1.33:1. It is static and silent.

    A Business Affair has been released on video in Region 1, but not on DVD.

    A Business Affair promises a lot, but delivers very little.

    The video quality is adequate.

    The audio quality is also adequate.

    There are no extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall