Music Box Films
Price: Currently $32.96 on Amazon (click pic above to order.)
Discs:
50 GB Blu-ray Disc
2 Disc Set
Video:
1080p
MPEG-4 AVC
1:78:1
Audio:
French: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
Subtitles:
English
Region: A
Les Revenants marks the first time that we've ever watched a French Language TV Show. French movies? We've seen more than our share of those, because they are plentiful, and easily accessible to foreigners like us. There aren't many French TV Shows that we've even heard of though, which is why we were so happy to have found this atmospheric little gem.
The Returned is the story of a small French town that is shaken to its core when a small group of people believed to be dead, show up one day as if nothing has happened; they don't know that they are dead, and their loved ones can't begin to understand how they can be alive. For some, it has been decades since they died, for others, only a few years, but all of their re-appearances send shock-waves throughout the small mountain community,, in different ways... and that's all we're going to say. It's plot points are really better left to be discovered by you, in as much of a natural manner as possible.
"Jean Luc Pierre Remy Francois? But how is thees possible!" |
The Returned has atmosphere and mood to spare. It's quiet and ethereal in its mechanics, and almost dreamlike in parts. Haunting, even. It's sharp and gorgeous to behold (the locations are fantastic), and its characters are as compelling as is the mystery that surrounds them. How are these once-dead people alive and "well" again? What does this mean for everyone in the town? What is with that creepy church in the reservoir? Why is that little kid so damned creepy!?!
This creepy little creep gave us nightmares, both waking and while asleep. |
There's a lot of ambiguity in this show, and it frustrated us at times for different reasons, but its just so solid in most of its other aspects, that we didn't dwell on its shortcomings for too long.
"I've got a message for you, mon ami, and you're not going to like it." |
I'd run. |
Knives being stabbed into bellies sounded particularly crisp in this one. |
The packaging for this set is and over-sized, tri-fold cardboard type of deal, so if you aren't a fan of Digibook-style packaging, it might drive you a little bit nuts. *For the record, we tend to prefer normal amray casing for our Blu-rays, mainly because we're a bit OCD about uniformity. We couldn't help but buy this set though, because it was just something we needed to own. Going against our organizational OCD in that way is saying a lot for the quality of this Blu-ray set, believe me.
Q: Which one of these two are dead? A: It's a trick question! |
The Returned easily fits in with the True Detectives and Hannibals of the TV world, both in quality and creative vision.
For those of you hesitant to blind buy something without sampling what it's like first, it's streaming on Netflix right now. Whichever way you decide to go, just give it a chance. You won't be disappointed.
A+
*It's an A+ not because it's a perfect show, but because the experience that it offers is about as close to perfect as it gets. We just wanted to make that distinction, lest you thought we were hyping this one up a bit too much. It's just really, really good.
Whether playing it creepy or just being plain old lovely, the women of The Returned definitely did their acting Coaches/Teachers proud with their work in this one.
Totally agree with everything you've said here, just love this show, can't wait to see where it goes.
ReplyDeleteReally looking forward to watching this. I saw the film this is based on in a theater years ago and still rmemeber it fondly: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_Came_Back
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