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Midnight in the Switchgrass
R2 - United Kingdom - Lionsgate Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Rick Curzon (1st August 2021). |
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The Film
 Bruce Willis (Die Hard franchise) and Megan Fox (Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen) lead a powerful cast including Emile Hirsch (Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood), Lukas Haas (Inception), and Colson Baker (Bird Box) in this gritty and intense crime-thriller. While in Florida on another case, FBI agents Helter (Willis) and Lombardo (Fox) cross paths with state cop Crawford (Hirsch), who’s investigating a string of female murders that appear to be related. Lombardo and Crawford team up for an undercover sting, but it goes horribly wrong, plunging Lombardo into grave danger and pitting Crawford against a serial killer in a twisted game of cat and mouse.
Video
Run of the mill serial killer thriller doesn't do anything remarkable in terms of it's story, plot, characters etc. It's all very competent but unremarkable. Performances are decent but overall nothing special. Technically, this is a digitally lensed film although I can't confirm this via online sources in any way bar my gut instinct. The image is clean and free from any damage or major artefacts. It's a downscale most like from a 2K source and looks perfectly fine. I could see no evidence of compression such as noise. The colour palette is low-key and naturalistic with largely muted flesh tones. Some interiors have a golden cast. I could see no signs of bleed. Black levels are strong with no unintended crush and contrast is supportive with decent whites. Obviously, an HD rendering will improve in areas like compression and detail. Detail is present but is obviously compromised via being in standard definition and grain is nonexistent. Fans of the stars will almost certainly be importing the US BD release or similar but for a DVD rendering this gets the job done; encoding is good. PAL / MPEG-2 / DVD5 / 2.39:1 / 94:41
Audio
English Dolby Digital 5.1 Subtitles: English HoH A pretty active track with fair use of the surrounds. Dialogue is always clear and the separation is very good; rears are generally used for score and ambiance but when the action kicks in things get lively and the LFE is healthy. Not a top notch track but one wouldn't expect Bond / Marvel / DC levels of welly. Decent hard of hearing subtitles are provided.
Extras
Audio commentary with director Randall Emmett (2021) Decent yaktrak from the director who takes us through the production in some detail. Typically of tracks done close to production there's little or no distance and so reflectivity is very on message. Startup Trailers: - Spiral: From the Book of Saw (2:11) - Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard (2:20) Promos for forthcoming releases presented in 2.39:1 with Dolby
Packaging
The usual, black DVD Keepcase.
Overall
An adequate programmer gets a solid standard definition rendering from Lionsgate with decent technical specifications for the format and a nice commentary from the director. Collectors and fans will obviously want a BD But this is a competitively priced disc, looks decent and even has a good commentary; definitely recommended.
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