Nathalie... Blu-ray - Emmanuelle Béart

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S E A R C H D V D B e a v e r

Directed by Anne Fontaine
France / Spain 2003

Nathalie (Emmanuelle Béart) is the name a Parisian prostitute assumes for a special mission or "private investigation." She is engaged for this unusual, and secretive task by a professional, upper middle class wife (Fanny Ardant) who fears her husband (Gérard Depardieu) is unfaithful to her. Nathalie has to seduce the clueless husband and regularly report all details of her relationship with him, including his most intimate sexual preferences in bed. Nathalie is stunning, charming and cunning. Can Nathalie and her reports to the mistrustful wife be trusted? Is the middle aged husband indeed unfaithful?

***

Fanny Ardant, Emmanuelle Béart, and Gérard Depardieu star in this story of an unusual love triangle. When Catherine’s husband is unfaithful, she doesn’t want revenge - she’s curious. She wants to share the experience, but in secret, so hires an elite prostitute to seduce her husband and report back to Catherine. Her desire to remain in control of the situation is soon tested by other desires.

***

Paris doctor Catherine starts to think her husband, Bernard, is having an affair when she hears an unfamiliar woman's message on his voice mail. Hoping to learn more about his extramarital activities, Catherine heads to a strip club, where she hires call girl Nathalie to have a fling with Gerard. As the affair progresses, Nathalie gives Catherine regular status reports, and the relationship between the women evolves from business to personal..

Posters

Theatrical Release: September 11th, 2003 (Toronto International Film Festival)

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Comparison:

Koch Lorber Films - Region 1 - NTSC vs. Cohen - Region 'A' - Blu-ray

Box Cover		Bonus Captures:
Distribution	Koch Lorber Films - Region 1 - NTSC	Cohen - Region 'A' - Blu-ray
Runtime	1:40:51 (4% PAL Speed-up)	1:45:47.125
Video	2.35:1 Aspect Ratio Average Bitrate: 5.99 mb/s NTSC 720x480 29.97 f/s	2.35:1 1080P Single-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 24,000,526,063 bytes Feature: 22,571,572,800 bytes Video Bitrate: 23.52 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video
	NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.
Bitrate DVD:
Bitrate Blu-ray:
Audio	French (Dolby Digital 5.1)	DTS-HD Master Audio French 1628 kbps 5.1 / 48 kHz / 1628 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz / 1509 kbps / 16-bit) DTS-HD Master Audio French 1562 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1562 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1509 kbps / 16-bit)
Subtitles	English, None	English (burned-in)
Features	Release Information: Studio: Koch Lorber Films Aspect Ratio: Original Aspect Ratio 2.35:1 Edition Details: • 'Making of...' Featurette (28:24) • Studio Canal trailer DVD Release Date: May 2nd, 2006 Keep Case Chapters: 20	Release Information: Studio: Cohen 2.35:1 1080P Single-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 24,000,526,063 bytes Feature: 22,571,572,800 bytes Video Bitrate: 23.52 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video Edition Details: • Trailer (1:46) Blu-ray Release Date: July 19th, 2022 Standard Blu-ray Case Chapters 9

Comments:

NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were taken directly from the Blu-ray disc.

ADDITION: Cohen Blu-ray (August 2022): Cohen have transferred Anne Fontaine's Nathalie... to Blu-ray. Unfortunately both the 2006 DVD and this 2022 Blu-ray have deficiencies. The SD transfer is a direct port of the Region 2 PAL Studio Canal DVD available HERE (which DOES have English subtitles). Koch Lorber have not bothered to convert to NTSC first and hence there are fine 'combing' and 'ghosting' instances that are visible in-motion, depending on your system. The Cohen Blu-ray, while looking a notch superior in the 1080P resolution, strangely has burned-in subtitles - when was the last time we saw that? Because of the unconverted PAL speed-up DVD, the Cohen is a better image, show more detail and is a bit tighter - but it is on a single- layered disc with a middling bitrate. To be fair, I didn't have any issues with the HD presentation (a few untoward, funky, compressions) but would love to see this film in a 4K-restoration, or, dare I say 4K UHD.

NOTE: We have added 46 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Cohen give the option of DTS-HD Master tracks (16-bit) in 5.1 surround or 2.0 channel stereo the original French language. Nathalie... has no aggressive moments, nor adroit separations, but another beautiful score by Michael Nyman (The Piano, Gattaca, Man with a Movie Camera, Keep It Up Downstairs, Peter Greenaway's A Zed & Two Noughts etc.) - there is also a mixture of other music - at parties, coffee-shops etc. including Georges Delerue (Day For Night), Giuseppe Verdi, Amon Tobin, Leonard Cohen, Sarah McLachlan, Joy Division etc. sounding clean with consistent dialogue in the lossless transfers. As mentioned, Cohen have burned-in (?) English subtitles on their Region 'A' Blu-ray.

The Cohen Blu-ray offers only a trailer as a supplement. There is a 4-page leaflet advertising their other releases. The DVD has the 'Making of...' featurette but it is NOT subtitled in English (language is French) and the menus are in French. I am led to believe Koch/Seville did absolutely nothing to this DVD - and it is a NTSC standard direct port.

Anne Fontaine's Nathalie... was the basis for Atom Egoyan's 2009 Chloe. Another film I really enjoyed - I recognized many cafes and landmarks of city of Toronto. It had Julianne Moore in the Fanny Ardant role of Catherine, Amanda Seyfried in the 'up-market prostitute' Emmanuelle Béart role and a terrific Liam Neeson playing the part of the husband - by Gérard Depardieu in Nathalie... It's an erotic French drama with Egoyan's film adding a layer of suspense. Director / co-writer Fontaine has stated that she enjoyed Egoyan's take but was also not happy with Nathalie... because the two lead actresses of the film objected to her original intention for a lesbian relationship to evolve between their characters. It has the bonus of the pre-plastic surgery Emmanuelle Béart - one of the hottest women on the planet at the time (imo) and excellent acting from all three. I preferred the ending of Chloe and would recommend that Blu-ray for its films and supplements, ahead of this bare-bones Cohen Blu-ray but did I say this has Emmanuelle Béart?