The Show - Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

The Show

Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score: ​

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Movie
Hmmmm, what is it about death that fascinates us? If you notice, action, blood, gore, losing ones life. It’s all a staple of film since the beginning of the medium. Hey, it’s not just a film thing though. It’s a human thing. Books have been dealing with it for centuries, and does anyone remember the days of the gladiators where it was a game to watch people battle it out to the death? We’ve become “civilized”, and most of the real life death has been phased out of the entertainment business (outside of accidents, which people still will sit and rubberneck at and revel in the shock and awe), and our combat has become MMA, extreme sports, and other forms of high risk competition that usually doesn’t involve human sacrifice. But that entertainment feature has shifted over into movies, where we look at the facsimile of death as part of a daily (or weekly depending on your schedule) grind. When I heard about Giancarlo Esposito making a sophomore attempt at directing a film I was intrigued (most people know of Giancarlo as “Gus” from Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul), especially when I heard it was going to be a satire on reality TV (one of my most hated genres of Television) and our fascination with the macabre. While the premise is ludicrous (the nature of good satire), the execution is ham fisted, with almost no emotional connection with the premise until the very very end, and a predictable crawl that you can count the beats of until the finale.

Adam Rogers (Josh Duhamel, who can’t seem to get much work outside of Transformers) is a game show host on one of those “Marry a Millionaire” series, where a tragedy goes horribly wrong. One of the two finalists for the show (the rejected one naturally) snaps on set and somehow gets hold of a gun and murders the “millionaire” and blows her own brains out on camera. Shocked at the apathy of the studio and the loss of life, Adam decides to quit the business and move on. Unfortunately, his boss Ilana Katz (Famke Janssen) has other plans for the game show host. In this version of reality assisted suicide is not a crime anymore, but even further, neither is just willful suicide for any reason. Thus a whole new opportunity has reared its head. Ilana ropes Adam into becoming the host for ANOTHER show, this one about the horrors of death. People come up on stage with sob stories, and end their life on camera as part of a “game show”. Adam initially refuses, but soon decides that if he’s going to be a part of it, he wants it done HIS way. Thus he sets the show up as a celebration of life (sarcasm) by having the proceeds for donations go to their loved ones as the contestants are all people who feel they have no way out.

As the show adapts and changes, so does Adam. Soon the little stories that he wanted to lionize aren’t enough. Ratings need to go higher, and with that comes more bizarre deaths, and Adam himself soon becomes the very monster that he was trying to escape when he initially was going to leave the business. His sister Karina (Sarah Wayne Callies) is a recovering pill head nurse who is having a rough time of it, and as she watches her brother spiral out of control she soon begins slipping back into her old depressed habits (hint hint, we can all see where this is going). Then there is Mason Washington (Director Giancarlo Esposito), a struggling family man who is desperately trying to make ends meet for his wife and two kids. He’s working two jobs and looking for a third, as he and his wife can’t seem to make it on his salary as a janitor after losing his high paying sales job. No matter WHAT he does, the world seems determined at taking everything from him, as every job that he tries to go for ends up kicking him in the teeth. Even the two jobs that he has right now get taken from him in a single life. His wife even threatens leaving him if he can’t keep the house (for some reason she refuses to let her family downsize as “we’ve worked too hard to get where we are today to go back”) leaving Mason with a feeling of helplessness and despair (again, it’s kind of blatantly obvious where this is leading).

The Show is intentionally meant to be a satire, and with that in mind the crazy setting of suicide being legal and film able is understandable. It’s meant to serve a point about the dangers and voracious appetites of reality TV and our fascination with death. However, the movie itself is so hamfistedly done that you can’t help but chuckle. What is meant to be an emotional ride is completely devoid of said feeling, except for a few minutes at the very end. The characters are caricatures (which isn’t a bad thing in satire), but the writing is neither witty enough to be satire, or emotional enough to be a full blown drama. Instead it just kind of plods along with a very predictable story line as Giancarlo Esposito tries to get the audience to see the evils of society in this Machiavellian tale. It also suffers from a lack of “nastiness”, so to speak. The entire premise is to make you sick to your stomach at whats happening, and part of that is visual stimulation through the gruesomeness of the deaths. Something that could have been used as a visual aide to help push some emotion across. Strangely the R-rated film’s deaths are very neutered, showing very little of the actual suicides, and in a very tame manner. Effectively killing any sense of horror or disgust at what’s being show. As such, the film itself feels held back drastically from what it COULD have been.




Rating:

Rated R for disturbing and violent content involving suicides, language throughout and brief drug use




Video:

The Show comes to Blu-ray with a fairly standard looking 1080p encode in 1.85:1 that is a BIT flat and dull, but still competent enough to look pleasing in most lights. I can’t seem to find ANY information online about what cameras were used, and the resulting DI, but overall it looks like your standard digital production. Colors are a bit muted, but ambulance lights and a few other bright spots gives some solid saturation levels here and there. Fine detail is good, but never great, and the black levels are healthy and maintain a strong detail level, despite some mild washing out of the blacks in a few scenes. There’s a sort of golden, gray mix that is going on, and while it doesn’t “pop” that much, the detail levels, and lack of major banding make it a well done Blu-ray without going above and beyond the call of duty.






Audio:

The 5.1 DTS-HD MA track is about as competent as the video encode is, and follows the same pattern. Everything is well done, with no major flaws to speak of, but it doesn’t really go above and beyond either. The film is a mostly a talky affair, with well placed vocals in the center of the front sound stage, and some mild ambiance in the mains. There’s a few moments where the surround kick up with the audience cheers, but mostly this is a very front heavy mix. The brooding score fills out the back end a bit, and there are two major parts in the movie where some DEEEEEEEEP impactful bass hits drop, but other that those couple of moments, the bass response is just used as a slight enhancement to the score.





Extras:

• Making The Show
• Cast and Crew Interviews
• Trailer Gallery

Final Score: ​

The Show is a plodding piece of cinematography that just can’t seem to decided if it wants to be a heartfelt drama, or a disturbing piece of satire. Giancarlo obviously gives the film his all (his performance is by far the best one in the film), but his hand at directing is sloppy at best, and lacks the finesses to draw out the creativity and nuances of a true satire. The film just ends up being a fairly boring film that is OK for a one time watch, but so overly predictable as to become painful at times. The Lionsgate Blu-ray is well done in the video and audio presentations, as usual, but the film’s minimal extras and weak story have me recommending skipping this one, or using it as a low priority rental..




Technical Specifications:

Starring: Josh Duhamel, Giancarlo Esposito, Famke Janssen
Directed by: Giancarlo Esposito
Written by: Noah Pink, Kenny Yakkel
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 AVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1
Studio: Lionsgate
Rated: R
Runtime: 104 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: November 7th, 2017

Image

• Michael Scott
• May 11, 2017

Recommendation: Low Low Rental

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. I will skip this one.