Rain Man
BUY AT:
See more details, packaging, or compare
Synopsis
WINNER OF 4 ACADEMY AWARDS® INCLUDING BEST PICTURE!
After a selfish L.A. yuppie (Tom Cruise) learns his estranged father left a fortune to an autistic-savant brother (Dustin Hoffman) in Ohio that he didn't know existed, he absconds with his brother and sets out across the country, hoping to gain a larger inheritance.
*1988, Best Actor
Picture 8/10
MVD Entertainment presents Barry Levinson’s Rain Man on 4K UHD in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1 on a triple-layer disc. According to notes on the back of the package, the 2160p/24hz ultra high-definition presentation is sourced from a new 4K restoration overseen by Levinson and scanned from the 35mm original camera negative. The release also includes a standard dual-layer Blu-ray featuring a 1080p presentation of the film alongside all video features.
As Barry Levinson alludes in his included commentary, the film isn’t what one would call visually inventive, yet the 4K presentation as it is presented here still looks quite good. Fine-object detail is impressive, and the film looks incredibly sharp and crisp. The color palette can be a bit drab, but they look to be rendered well, with Dolby Vision and HDR further helping. Black levels and shadow details are also quite strong, with the darkened Vegas scenes probably providing the real stand-outs, the wider contrast aiding in rendering the city’s bright lights. Some smokier interiors, including a diner early in the film (where Bonnie Hunt appears as a waitress), also look incredible.
Grain can be a bit problematic in places. It can have a buzzier look to it during the opening credits and periodically throughout, most noticeable against a bright sky. This even holds true with Dolby Vision turned on. It still comes out looking clean a majority of the time, and the picture always has a film-like quality to it, but I honestly thought the Blu-ray managed to handle grain better overall. Highlights look decent, particularly when it comes to the chrome finishes on that Buick, but I can’t say anything else really stood out. Overall, it’s a really nice looking 4K presentation, the best I’ve seen the film, but it’s probably still not as impressive as it could be.
Audio 8/10
MVD includes a DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround mix. I’m reasonably sure the film was initially released with a 2.0 surround soundtrack, though I felt that was pretty much what this is. I can’t say I noticed any direction in the rears as certain sounds (music, ambient effects, the bustle of Vegas) were directed back there, but it’s still mixed effectively. Voices sound very clean and sharp, while the wide dynamic range helps Hans Zimmer’s score swell and fall appropriately.
Extras 6/10
MVD ports all of the material from MGM’s previous special edition, adding nothing new. That means you find the same so-so video features (all located on the included standard Blu-ray), The Journey of “Rain Man” and Lifting the Fog: A Look at the Mysteries of Autism. The latter is well-meaning though it ultimately feels hollow. Gathering together various medical experts and those with different forms of autism for interviews, the 20-minute piece attempts to explore autism as it is presented in the film while also explaining how the film has helped bring awareness to the broader audience, dispelling some myths. The problem is that it ultimately doesn’t add much to what is already presented in the film. It might have been interesting if it addressed some of the criticisms lobbed at the movie through the years with defenses, but there’s no such thing here.
The 22-minute making-of is about the same as most other MGM-produced features of the time, the featurette gathering together members of the crew from Barry Levinson on, though sadly neither Tom Cruise nor Dustin Hoffman appear (Valeria Golino does, though). It gets a bit into the production’s backstory but does rush through it. To get more details into the production, though, one may find more value in the three(!) audio commentaries that are also found here (playing with the film on both the 4K and standard Blu-ray discs), each one featuring a different individual: director Barry Levinson and writers Barry Morrow and Ronald Bass.
While I enjoyed Bass’ contribution, I was otherwise rather frustrated with these tracks. Bass proves interesting because he came in to touch up the script at various stages. It’s mentioned throughout all of the commentaries, and the included documentary how the original script and film passed through many hands (Martin Brest, Steven Spielberg, and Sydney Pollack) before it landed with Levinson. Still, Bass was there just about every step of the way, and he goes through the many incarnations of the script that he had a hand in before the writer’s strike hit, and he had to stop. His track, in particular, gets into how the character of Raymond changed and how contributions from members of the cast and crew led to the finished film, which was completely different from the original script (interestingly, it sounds like Pollack is the one that turned it into a road movie).
The other two tracks don’t prove as interesting. Morrow talks about his original script and the alterations while also commenting on the film and its performances, but I can’t say I found it particularly interesting. Levinson’s proves very frustrating because it’s loaded with a lot of dead space. And I mean a lot. What’s even worse is that when he does speak up, he ends up being enjoyable, explaining his decisions around framing and blocking scenes and how he could make the film as visually attractive as possible. He also talks about how the writer’s strike impacted the production and the improvisations that occurred due to it (the film was primarily shot in sequence, allowing them to “explore” each scene and situation as they went), touching on how the story morphed. It’s all well and good, but his comments are ultimately few and far between.
That, paired with repetitive information throughout all three tracks (the strike, changes to the story, the casting), can make it incredibly trying to wade through what is ultimately just shy of seven hours’ worth of material. I would rather MGM (or even MVD if they could) had edited the three tracks together, with Bass possibly receiving the bulk of the runtime. As it is, there is some okay material to be found in all three, and it’s fascinating to hear how different (and significantly worse off) the movie could have been, but I can’t say it’s ultimately worth working through all of them.
The Blu-ray then closes with a 2-minute deleted scene (finding Raymond wandering into a general store) and the film’s original trailer, which also ends up being the only high-definition feature on the disc. The rest are all standard-definition upscales.
Some updated material about the film and how it has aged would have been very welcome, but that’s sadly not to be. As it is, despite some interesting comments scattered about, the features prove underwhelming.
Closing
Thirty-five years later, the film is prime for updated analysis, which this release's dated features fall short of fulfilling, but the 4K presentation still looks solid.
BUY AT:
