Widows 4K Blu-ray Review

Now THIS is how you do an all-female heist movie

by Casimir Harlow
MSRP: £24.99

Widows Film Review

Oscar-winning indie filmmaker Steve McQueen's most commercial project is a superior remake of the 80s Lynda La Plante TV series.

Widows is almost outright excellent. We've seen the Ocean's franchise reborn with an all-female cast - to reasonably enjoyable effect - but this is really how to put an all-female crew on the map. It may not be a Heat contender, but it's not far off Affleck's The Town; a gritty, well-developed heist picture with a group of interesting characters set against a palpable urban landscape that's almost a character of its very own. At times Widows feels like the Chicago sister to The Town's Boston brother.

McQueen kick-starts with a brutal opening sequence, jarring you awake from a tender moment to a blistering heist-gone-wrong chase, before settling into a period of loss, followed by fear. Viola Davis is unsurprisingly formidable in the driving seat, ably supported by Michelle Rodriguez - who, between Fast and Furious sequels, has rarely been given this kind of choice role - and Elizabeth Debicki, who was great in The Night Manager (and underrated in the underrated The Man from Uncle) and also needs more material like this. And whilst the likes of Colin Farrell and Liam Neeson thrum around in the background, Robert Duvall powerhouses his way through some great lines, and Atlanta's Brian Tyres Henry and Get Out's Daniel Kaluuya vie for the most threatening bully on the block, it's Cynthia Erivo who comes out of nowhere to steal the entire show out from under the feet of both the boys and the girls. Erivo was the standout in the eclectic ensemble piece Bad Times at the El Royale, and is superb here too, tough as nails but still with that hint of vulnerability around the edges.

Widows feels like the Chicago sister to The Town's Boston brother

Novelist Gillian Flynn deserves credit for turning the story around too, having written Gone Girl, and the less well-received Dark Places, as well as the HBO series Sharp Objects, she works wonders with La Plante's distinctly 80s, distinctly TV tale, fashioning it into a proper contender of a heist movie; a film which is arguably only let down by the very TV feel that still creeps in around the edges, badly informing character's motivations, or delivering arguably unnecessary curve-balls when actually there was more than enough backbone to carry the piece through without clever but contrived twists and turns.

It's a familiar cops-and-robbers Heat-style formula, just dressed up in a different outfit - with not only a change-up in terms of sex, but also in terms of the cop pursuit, substituting the threat from law enforcement for a backdrop of slimy politicians and vicious gangsters. This different colour, however, is more than enough to set it apart, affording Widows a fresh take on the formula, and giving McQueen's all-girl crew a great platform upon which to shine.

With keen direction - those familiar with McQueen's Shame will recognise his fondness for reflections out onto the cityscape, and his off-camera shot of the verbal beat-down in the limo is superb (and possibly the biggest "least-fanfare" celebration of female power in the entire movie) - and a great score that cleverly doesn't even come into play until a good halfway through the suitably 'crime epic' runtime, McQueen really lets these players shine, turning a glorified 80s crime-flavoured TV soap into something tense, brutal and satisfying. And something - in a rare and welcome first from the filmmaker - bloody entertaining too.

Widows 4K Picture

Widows
Widows comes to UK Ultra HD Blu-ray courtesy of 20th Century Fox, who offers up what appears to be the exact same impressive 4K package that the US release was afforded, and the gritty crime story, shot on film and delivered with a 4K Digital Intermediate, looks as good as you could possibly hope for.

The disc presents a native 3840 x 2160p resolution image utilising the film's original theatrical aspect ratio of widescreen 2.40:1. It uses 10-bit video depth, a Wide Colour Gamut (WCG) and High Dynamic Range (HDR), as well as HDR10+, and is encoded using the HEVC (H.265) codec.

We reviewed the UK Ultra HD Blu-ray release of Widows on an LG 55B7 Dolby Vision 4K Ultra HD OLED TV with an LG UP970 Dolby Vision 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray player.

Looks as good as you could possibly hope for

Detail is excellent throughout, and there's a fine uptick afforded to this 4K rendition, which enjoys the full fat 'bandwidth' of the 4K digital intermediate, lapping up skin textures, lines, clothing weaves and background nuances. Shot in an intentional gritty style, the presentation doesn't hold back on the grain front, but it lends the production a suitable filmic texture and suits the crime genre and mood of the piece. It's also exactly how the film looked in the cinema.

Of course, whatever positives the sheer resolution can provide, the real difference is made in terms of the usage of WCG and HDR, which render night lights, gunfire, explosions and myriad other bursts of vibrance with energy and depth, set against a strong backdrop of solid blacks juxtaposed with bright whites. McQueen's style favours a slight blue-green-teal tone, but that doesn't prevent green grass for looking vibrant, and skin tones healthy, with the end result unlikely demo material that, as aforementioned, perfectly represents how the film was supposed to look.

Widows 4K Sound

Widows
The 4K disc's accompanying Dolby Atmos track is also a powerful offering, and much more conventionally demo in nature, rendering opening sequence bombast with aplomb, rumbling your living room with LFE undercurrent and allowing the impressive capabilities of the 3D object-based high definition immersive audio track to come to the fore, as bullets - and cars - whiz around the screen.

The Dolby Atmos track is also a powerful offering

Dialogue remains firmly prioritised, delivering the vocals - even when whispered or muttered - with a certain level of clarity and coherence, dominating the frontal array for the duration, whilst the score remains largely subdued for the first half of the movie, picking up as the tension is cranked up in the latter half of the film. Effects are, as aforementioned, superbly captured, relying on bombast mostly during the bookends of the movie, whilst the natural atmospherics are finely observed in the interim, affording the feature a keen immersive nature and leaving it clear demo and reference material.

Widows 4K Extras

Widows
A solid package

Fox's UK 4K Blu-ray release of Widows matches up to its US counterpart in the extras department too, and similarly doesn't bother porting any of them over to the 4K disc proper, instead leaving you to switch out the disc for the accompanying Blu-ray, which sports a multi-part feature-length Featurette which clocks in at just under an hour and has plenty of background into the production and interview snippets from the cast and crew. It's a solid package, rounded out by a Gallery and some Trailers.

Conclusion

Widows 4K Blu-ray Review

Widows
McQueen lets these players shine, turning a glorified 80s crime-flavoured TV soap into something tense, brutal and satisfying

Fox's UK 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray release of Steve McQueen's Widows delivers excellent video and audio as well as a solid selection of extra features, leaving it a recommended purchase for fans. Considering it's McQueen's most commercial effort so far, it's nice to see that the impressive filmmaker has kept his integrity and style whilst also making allowances for the more conventional nature of the production, resulting in arguably his most entertaining feature to date.

Scores

Movie

.
.
8

Picture Quality

.
9

Sound Quality

.
9

Extras

.
.
.
.
6

Overall

.
.
8
8
AVForumsSCORE
OUT OF
10

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