Something to Talk About (1995)

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General		Extras
Category	Romantic Comedy	Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	1995
Running Time	100:48
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (65:33)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Lasse Hallstrom
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	Julia Roberts Robert Duvall Gena Rowlands Kyra Sedgwick Dennis Quaid
Case	Amaray-Transparent
RPI	$34.95	Music	Hans Zimmer

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	Unknown	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English French Italian Dutch Arabic Spanish Portuguese German Romanian Bulgarian English for the Hearing Impaired Italian for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Something To Talk About concerns itself with the age-old problem of a man cheating on a woman, and one of two possible ways to resolve the problem - either call it quits, or try and somehow save the relationship. In this story, Eddie (played by the likable Dennis Quad) is caught meeting another woman at lunch by his wife Grace (Julia Roberts), who then finds that this is not the first of his infidelities. Given that they have a daughter and what used to be a strong love for each other, by the end of the movie they are back together, nice and neat and with very little difficulty.

    To try and offer something more, there is a subplot involving the whole family led by Robert Duvall who breeds champion horses. Through the course of the film, it is revealed that he also has been unfaithful to his wife. So now it's a family problem, though again it all works out for the best in the end. Isn't Hollywood just dreamy, and totally out of touch with the real world? Oh, yes.

    I personally didn't find this movie nearly compelling enough; the characters are shallow, with almost no development, and they struggle with what is at times very forced dialogue. Julia Roberts seemed to be just going through the motions, and Robert Duvall confirmed to me that he is nothing more than an average, though over-rated, character actor. The movie as a whole just didn't gel, and I don't expect that I will return to it soon. Perhaps the only redemption was Dennis Quaid, who manages to salvage the plot with his refreshingly effortless acting.

Video

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 and is 16x9 enhanced.

    Whilst having a typical Warner film-like look and feel to the transfer, this is indeed a very sharp and pleasing picture most of the time, and sharper than much of their work. There is plenty of fine detail in close shots, though long shots often do not look quite as finely rendered with some edge enhancement noticed. Grain is ever so subtly present in some shots, and absent in others, especially day time scenes which are as clean as a whistle. There is no low level noise in the transfer.

    Colours are slightly understated due to what appears to be a slight luminance over-saturation of the image, evident in the opening credits and some day shots. Regardless, skin tones are natural enough looking and the primary colours come through unscathed with no chroma noise evident.

    Spread across two layers and with no extras, the transfer clearly benefits with no MPEG artefacting of any kind due to compression. Film-to-video artefacts are minor, consisting of slight luminance oversaturation and occasional minor weave. I noticed only a handful of very minor film artefacts throughout.

    The disc is RSDL formatted, with the layer change occurring during Chapter 21 at 64:33 minutes. It was not disruptive, however it was noticeable.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There are three 384Kb/sec Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtracks; English, French and Italian.

    Dialogue was almost always very odd-sounding, with poor fidelity and almost no integration into the soundfield or environment. Whilst what was being said was always understandable, the poor vocal quality did at times become fatiguing, especially when voices were raised. There were no sync problems.

    The soundtrack is unremarkable, though recorded well enough. Indeed, at times it was a godsend to just listen to music instead of badly done vocals.

    Surround channel usage was minimal, and indeed the only time they were used was to pull the soundtrack back a bit from the front. A reference modern soundtrack this is not.

    The subwoofer had very little to do, though when it was called upon it was used well.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Theatrical Trailer

    Presented in 16x9 and in Dolby Digital 2.0 surround, the trailer is above normal in terms of transfer quality, though only average in content.

    The Region 4 release misses out on:

• Full-screen version

    The Region 1 release misses out on:

• Italian Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack

    There is no compelling reason to choose a full-screen version of this movie. Indeed, given that both versions are squeezed on the single disc on the R1 version, I dare say we will have a better quality transfer, but that is only conjecture.

    Something To Talk About is an average movie with a rather vacuous Hollywood look on life which I found tedious. The video is extremely good, almost reference quality. The audio is rather unfortunate due to very poor dialogue. I would certainly rent first.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall