Review by Gary Tooze

Production:

Disc:

Video:

Audio:

The US disc is DTS-HD Master Audio English 2478 kbps 5.1

Subtitles:

US has 2 HD Trailers and is BD-LIVE enabled

Bitrate:

 

Description: After the failure of his career, his marriage, and his suicide attempt, world-class grouch Boris Yellnikoff, spends his days insulting the small children unfortunate enough to study chess with him and irritating his still-loyal friends with his never-ending tirades about the worthlessness of absolutely everything. A former Columbia Professor and self-proclaimed genius who came close to winning a Nobel Prize for Quantum Mechanics, Boris fancies himself the only one who fully comprehends the meaningless of all human aspirations, and the pitch-black chaos of the universe. As he readily admits, Boris is not a "feel-good person".

 

 

The Film:

Excerpt from Roger Ebert at the Chicago Sun-Times located HERE

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

I've considered writing much of this is information in an article. Canadian manufacturers Alliance, TVA and Maple (whose name is on the spine of one of these disc packages) are the worst producers of Blu-rays in the entire world. There are multiple examples I can give for their interlacing, incorrect aspect ratios and sloppy transfers that are disrespectful to the films they are releasing. This was true in DVD and it is now true in high-definition. I'm only thankful that their output is minimal.

The US edition of Whatever Works in hi-def is different from the Canadian edition - released one week later - in a few ways. Firstly, the Canuck Blu-ray is interlaced - where the American one is progressive. This makes the US Sony edition better in the image department although there is little difference in the image captures that do not exhibit the combing artifact - so I won't be including in direct comparisons. This is most notable, though, in motion. Otherwise both editions are fairly unremarkable in regards to image quality - both are single-layered and decent detail is exhibited with a fine sheen of nominal grain. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Being a solely dialogue driven film the audio differences are negligible - both being lossless - but the US sporting a 5.1 track (with minimal separation anyway) and the Canadian being 3.0 - Allen often favoring these less-used 3 channel track choices. What is unusual is that the Sony release is region FREE and the Canadian one is Region 'A'-locked - as verified by my Momitsu.

 

 

Extras :

Nothing on the US disc but two HD trailers and it is BD-LIVE enabled. Nothing at all on the Canadian. That's all folks. Menus on both disc are similar but not exactly the same.

 

 

BOTTOM LINE:
I suppose there is some legal reason that these different editions exist. But both being accessible via the apposing country's Amazons - I'd like to encourage Canadians to support the American transfer which is superior and offers a moderately better package - including a more reasonable price! Yes, the Maple edition has the gall to charge more for their inferior Blu-ray! It's a run-in-the-mill Allen effort - which makes it better than most new comedies that come out. So, while we like the film notably performances by Larry David, Evan Rachel Wood and Patricia Clarkson - even the Sony package seems vacant and priced a shade exorbitantly for what it is offering. 

Gary Tooze

October 29th, 2009