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Le Havre: The Criterion Collection
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray A - America - Criterion Collection Review written by and copyright: Noor Razzak (1st January 2013). |
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The Film
 What I love the most about The Criterion Collection is that you get to explore a lot of films that you would not have heard of previously or have access to. "Le Havre" is exactly one of those films, prior to receiving this film for review, I had not heard of it nor it's filmmaker. I had never seen anything from Finnish filmmaker Aki Kaurismäki and was surprised to discover from his IMDB profile that he's been around for some time making his directorial debut in documentary films in 1981, having directed 31 films in his career and his latest feature film "Le Havre" has not only won the filmmaker some acclaim but a prestigious Criterion Collection treatment. "Le Havre" tells the story of Idrissa (Blondin Miguel), an African boy who arrives into the small port town of Le Havre on a cargo ship, Idrissa is bound for the United Kingdom to be reunited with his relatives when the container is inspected by the authorities, he and the other smuggled travelers are caught but Idrissa makes a run for it and manages to escape police custody. While hiding under the docks, Idrissa comes across Marcel (André Wilms), a kindly bohemian shoe shiner that takes pity on the boy and brings him to this home and helps the boy dodge officials and deportation. France has had a turbulent and checkered history with immigration, violence in the ghettos has brought an outcry over racism, tensions occasionally flare and have led to countless demonstrations, riots, etc. These tensions have been the subject of many films, most notably Mathieu Kassovitz's tension-filled "La Haine" (1995), films like "La Haine" deal with the subject matter in a dark and tense manner, "Le Havre" takes a whole different approach, it's a lighthearted and romanticized jab at contemporary French politics and making a stand against officials while demonstrating the importance of standing for the basic rights of human beings and also on how these challenges brings out the best in people within a tight-knit community. "Le Havre" is essentially a fairy tale, a how-it-should-be scenario rather than focusing on the actual realities of it. The film's plot is concise and to the point, as a result the film tends to feel rather flat, with characters that all appear as caricatures of your typical small-town French people. The major problem is you end up with a lot of characters that lack depth. This may have been Kaurismäki's intention to instead focus on the story and it's themes rather than the characters themselves. But this poses a problem in that if the characters aren't well defined and feature little depth then it's difficult to engage in the story. What the film does have is loads of charm, dry wit and beautifully simple. Marcel is your typical working-class hero, making little shinning shoes, spending his money on drinks at the local bar and living with his long suffering wife Arletty (Kati Outinen). Marcel is not entirely considerate and his wife pretty much does everything for him, Idrissa's prescience changes things, Marcel becomes more proactive, his fatherly instincts start to kick in particularly in a time of distress which sees his wife hospitalized. In many ways Marcel is not only doing the "right" thing (in his mind) by helping Idrissa, but it also aids him taking his mind of off his wife's condition, almost to his detriment. "Le Havre" is at times drawn out, there's a scene that involves a fund raising concert featuring crooner Little Bob (Roberto "Little Bob" Piazza) that's over-long and felt like the concert was shot and edited in real time, the film's themes can sometimes feel trivialize because of the tone and the fairy tale aspect of the film, but in end it's worth checking out simply because of the film's charms which can win over viewers.
Video
This transfer comes to Blu-ray approved by the film's director, presented in the film's original theatrical ratio of 1.85:1 and mastered in AVC MPEG-4 compression at 1080p 24/fps. Being a film that was only released in 2011 what we have here is a modern transfer, so unlike a lot of other Criterion titles the film wouldn't have required intensive restoration and remastering. The image is clear, crisp and sharp. The film's color palette leans towards the grey/green spectrum and the image represents those colors accurately. The film's depth and detail also look impressive. The image is clear and free from any flaws, I couldn't spot any specks, dirt, and edge-enhancement is non-existent. Overall it's a terrific image.
Audio
The film is presented with its original audio in French DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround mixed at 48kHz/24-bit. "Le Havre" is a film that jump between two sound platforms, the quiet dialogue driven scenes and the loud and punchy music sequences (usually involving the musician Little Bob). The quiet moments are well mixed, audio is clear and distortion free, however in these sequences the audio tends to be very front heavy with little surround activity, the concert sequence really pops, the audio is vibrant and features a decent amount of depth. Overall the track does feel balanced and the transitions from the more subtle scenes to ones with a lot of activity also feels natural. Optional subtitles are included in English only.
Extras
The Criterion Collection has released "Le Havre" with a set of quality supplements that include some original concert footage, two featurettes, two interviews, the film's original theatrical trailer and a liner notes booklet. Below is a closer look at these supplements. First up us the "Little Bob in Concert" performance footage (1080p) which runs for 8 minutes 15 seconds, the film features a scene in which Marcel puts together a benefit concert which features the singer Little Bob, this clip features what is essentially an extended performance from that concert and includes the songs "Libero" and "Sheila 'n' Willey", if you like his music then his is something worth exploring, if you thought the concert scene in the film was long and drawn out (like I did) then it's pretty much skippable. Next up is the "Le Havre at Cannes" featurettes (1080i) which make up two clips: – "Press Conference" runs for 45 minutes 12 seconds, this fantastic clip features the director, producers and cast as they field questions from the press pit at the Cannes Film Festival, definitely worth checking out. – "Cannes Interview" with local newscasters which runs for 11 minutes 25 seconds, produced for television this clip features short interviews with the film's director Aki Kaurismäki, actress Kati Outinen, and actors Jean-Pierre Darroussin and André Wilms. The disc also features an interview with actor André Wilms (1080p) which runs for 13 minutes 8 seconds, recorded exclusively for The Criterion Collection the actor discusses his collaboration with the film's director and also comments on his character. Next up is another interview with actress Kati Outinen (1080i) which runs for 48 minutes 9 seconds, this is a segment taken from a Finnish television show entitled "Mansikkapaikka" which originally aired in April 2009. This feature mostly covers her career and also her working relationship with the film's director. This is a terrific and in-depth interview. The film's original theatrical trailer (1080p) rounds out the video extras and runs for 2 minutes 19 seconds. The final supplement is the liner notes booklet which features the essay "Always Be A Human" by writer/critic Michael Sicinski and an interview with director Aki Kaurismäki conducted by film historian Peter von Bagh.
Overall
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