Black and White: Collector's Edition (1999)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	Dolby Digital Trailer-City Theatrical Trailer-1.85:1, 16x9, Dolby Digital 5.1 (2:13) Audio Commentary-James Toback (Director) Featurette-Keeping It Reel (4:53) Deleted Scenes-2 Music Video-It's Not A Game-American Cream Team featuring Raekwon Music Video-Year 2000-Xzibit featuring Jonathan Davis Biographies-Cast & Crew Isolated Musical Score
Rating
Year Of Production	1999
Running Time	95:10
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (55:42)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	James Toback
Studio Distributor	Sony Pictures Home Entertain	Starring	Robert Downey, Jr. Gaby Hoffmann Jared Leto Joe Pantoliano Power Raekwon Claudia Schiffer William Lee Scott Brooke Shields Ben Stiller Mike Tyson Elijah Wood
Case	Soft Brackley-Transp
RPI	$36.95	Music	Power and American Cream Team

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Isolated Music Score Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.40:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English French German Dutch Arabic Bulgarian Czech Danish Finnish Greek Hebrew Hindi Hungarian Icelandic Norwegian Polish Swedish Turkish French Audio Commentary German Audio Commentary Dutch Audio Commentary	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	Yes
		Action In or After Credits	Yes, during credits

    In the broadest sense, there is no real plot here at all. What this film is attempting to do is present the interesting dichotomy of American urban cities where the African-American youths are trying to escape their situation, yet white middle class youths are desperately embracing the whole hip-hop culture thing as some sort of 1990s rebellion against good sense. Broadly the film follows one Rich Bower (Power), a young black man trying to move away from his criminal past and become a recording star, and his childhood friend Dean Carter (Allan Houston) who rejected the lure of the 'hood years ago and became a basketball star, and their extended group of associates both black and white. Their life in the 'hood is broadly chronicled through the camera of documentary maker Sam Donager (Brooke Shields) and her gay husband Terry (Robert Downey Jr), as they attempt to document the ironic phenomena of white wanting to be black and black wanting to be something more respected. Along the way we get to see little cameos of performances from the like of Mike Tyson (playing himself) and Brett Ratner (also playing himself).

   This is an exceedingly improvisational film to the extent that director James Toback (who also makes an appearance in the film, as well as writing the screenplay) basically let the actors improvise most of the dialogue to the film. The result is an eclectic little effort that the arthouse film lover will probably rave over but the rest of us should cheerfully avoid. None of the performances are exactly stellar and in many respects this shows how much Robert Downey Jr has destroyed himself with his lifestyle choice- although it has to be said that he had some balls to do the come-on scene with Mike Tyson! Some of the cast are virtual novices here and no one ever accused Brooke Shields of being an actress anyway. The standouts are Ben Stiller in a slightly (black) comedic turn as the New York detective who provides the catalyst for the main junction in the film, and Claudia Schiffer who is surprisingly effective in the smallish role of his ex-girlfriend and current girlfriend of Dean Carter. The overall performances certainly accentuate the improvisational nature of the film. Adding to the style of the film is some fairly unusual editing as well as some slightly unnatural choices in colourisation. This apparently drew some attention on the festival circuit, but at the end of the day I feel the word hype might have had something to do with it. Certainly voters at the Internet Movie Database give this a fairly average rating.

   If you are into arthouse films, then this is an obvious choice to pick up but if you want entertainment in your films, I would suggest that you look elsewhere. Very average stuff indeed in my view.

Video

    The film is presented in an aspect ratio of 2.35:1 which is very close to the theatrical aspect ratio of 2.40:1. It is 16x9 enhanced.

    On the presumption that the slightly out-of-focus shots at times are intended, and allowing for the intermixing of real film and film gimmicked up to look like it was shot on a camcorder, this is a really sharp and detailed transfer. Perhaps there was just a little too much sharpness here and the eagle-eyed will probably note just a little edge enhancement here and there. Given that certain shots were obviously shot to minimize the shadow detail, the overall effort is very good indeed. Again, apart from the intended grainier parts of the film, this is a very clear transfer that really does not contain anything much in the way of a grain problem nor a low level noise problem.

    If you are looking for natural colours here, you will be disappointed. The opening scene in Central Park, that unfortunately runs into what is really a gratuitous bit of unnecessary T & A, has a decidedly autumnish feel to it with a heavy emphasis on the golden tones even in the sky, and this was repeated several times throughout the film. At other times the colours are really heavily saturated but lacking in any emphasis of colour variety and depth so that a broadly darkish feel is give to the transfer. All of this is obviously intended, but it does mean that bright colours are missing here. The overall feel is nonetheless quite vibrant within this stylized colourscape. Unfortunately there are a couple of instances where oversaturation breaks out, usually involving a heavy red area, notably the red jumper around the 5:00 mark and the red cap around the 8:10 mark. There did not seem to be any problem with colour bleed.

    There did not appear to be any significant MPEG artefacts in the transfer, with just one pan shot showing some loss of resolution (at 29:35). However, there were times where I felt that perhaps some blockiness was just threatening to become an issue, although I hasten to add that it certainly did not barely get any notice from me. There is however a fairly heavy dose of what appears to be the Gibbs Effect during the credits, with some rather distracting colouring breaking up the white credits. Unfortunately the transfer is also blessed with some consistent albeit generally minor problem with shimmer, which at times becomes just a little too obvious to ignore (the edge of the pool table for instance in a number of shots). You can also add into the mix some rather obvious cross colouration in the fence around the 72:53 mark. There were a few film artefacts floating around the transfer which really were not a great concern.

    Despite the wording on the packaging suggesting this is a single layer DVD, it is in fact an RSDL formatted disc with the layer change coming far too obviously at 55:42. Considering the length and style of the film, I would have thought that a far better layer change point could have been found as this really is far too obvious and slightly disruptive to whatever flow the film was trying to garner at the time.

    Altogether this is not one of the best transfers to come from this source, although no doubt the style of the film has a lot to do with this.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    The dialogue here is about as easy to understand as you would expect from a bunch of hip-hop African-Americans and a bunch of white wannabes. Be aware that there is some variance in the dynamics of the dialogue so sometimes it does get a little difficult to understand. The only real issue is that Bijou Phillips' efforts just invoke in me the urge to throw something large and heavy at the screen. Very grating indeed. There did not appear to be any significant audio sync problems in the transfer, but then again given the heavy doses of mumbling, one cannot be too sure.

    The original music comes from Power and American Cream Team. Whilst my views on hip-hop/(c)rap are fairly well documented, within the context of the fairly low artistic merits of the genre(s) this is not too bad an effort. Certainly if you are a fan of this sort of music, the Isolated Music Score will have you perhaps not quite in raptures but certainly entertained. Obviously with the film being so street-based, take the music out of the film and you have no film.

    This is not too bad a soundtrack, although it has to be said that it is not a stellar example of Dolby Digital 5.1 sound. The main issue here is that the surround channels do not seem to get a whole heap of work, with the rear channels being noticeably absent for significant portions of time. To say the least this is a tad odd when the film is so much based on a street theme that should be alive with surround channel ambience - street sounds, background dialogue, background music and so on. The bass channel kicks in some support at times but again I felt it to be just a little lacking when really needed. There does appear to be some variance in the sound levels throughout the film and whether this reflects transfer problems or source material choices I do not know. Overall, I felt that this just lacked a little in the way of dynamics and I never found it a soundscape that drew me into the action. The Isolated Music Score is very good from what I sampled of it.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Trailer - Dolby Digital City

Menu

Audio Commentary - James Toback (Director)

Featurette - Keeping It Real (4:53)

Deleted Scene (1) (6:50)

Alternate Take (1) (2:44)

Music Video - It's Not The Game American Cream Team featuring Raekwon  (4:59)

Music Video - Year 2000 Xzibit featuring Jonathan Davis (4:26)

Biographies - Cast and Crew

Isolated Music Score

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall