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| HVe and The American Cinematheque's DVD of Cure is an admirable job with an enhanced image that gives us a rich picture to contemplate. The good encoding is not super-sharp, but with Kurosawa's clean images we hardly notice. The music score starts with a couple of engaging melodies and stays an active part of the soundscape even after boiling down to some sparse tones and presences.
The disc comes with an interview with the director (in subtitled Japanese) in which he talks about Japanese 'V-movies', the equivalent of our straight-to-video shows and the details of his career (he loves to shoot in dilapidated buildings). He derived his formative notion for Cure from the idea that our personal identities are neither rigid nor unchanging, that we're influenced by whom we live with and love. His 'villain' may use hypnosis, brainwashing, or possession to impose his warped psychosis on others, but for all practical purposes the process seen here is simply one's identity being influenced by the personality of another. Kurosawa stresses that an individual, personal identity isn't a traditional Japanese concept, which gives the movie an interesting cultural context. He also identifies his generation as 'in between' the older WW2 generation with its set ideas, and the new younger one that seems to believe in their hobbies and interests as ends in themselves. He's an interesting guy.
On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor, Cure rates:
Video: Very Good
Sound: Excellent
Supplements: Trailer, Director interview
Packaging: Keep case |
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| Video: Cure makes its Region 1 DVD debut courtesy of Home Vision Entertainment. The film has been letterboxed at 1.85:1 and the transfer is enhanced for 16 x 9 TVs. The transfer is sharp, and for the most part, clear, although there is some noticeable grain at times. The image has a slightly washed out and dark look, but the colors are fine and the image is never so dark that the action isn't discernible. There is some evidence of edge enhancement, but artifacting and video noise are kept to a minimum. The transfer isn't perfect, but considering the fact that many Asian films look awful on DVD, it is above average.
Audio: The DVD carries a 2.0 stereo audio track. This track provides clear dialogue and sound effects, with only a slight hint of hissing. The stereo effects are quite good, and there is some decent bass from the front channels. The English subtitles are white and very easy to read.
Extras: The Cure DVD contains a handful of extras. We start with a 20-minute interview with director Kiyoshi Kurosawa, which was conducted in Toronto in 2003. Kurosawa talks briefly about the origin of the idea of Cure, and then spends the rest of the interview chatting about his personal philosophies on the nature of man and film, and then comments on some of his colleagues. Given the ambiguous nature of Cure, I was hoping that Kurosawa would at least address some of the questions raised by the movie in this interview, but he does not. (This interview is presented in a 16 x 9 format.) The DVD also contains a trailer for Cure, which has been letterboxed at 1.78:1, but is not anamorphic. A filmography for Kurosawa is also included. Finally, the DVD sleeve contains liner notes which give an overview of Kurosawa's career and raise some theories about Cure. |
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