Blu-ray Review – Bound – Olive Signature

Bound

Director: the Wachowskis 
Screenplay: the Wachowskis
Minutes: 108
Year: 1996
Score: 7.73
Release: Olive Signature

Bound is the perfect example of how a movie lover is able to transform themselves from an amateur film lover into a full-blown pure cinemaphile. When I first watched Bound, in the late 1990s it was for the exact reason that old gross executive produces demanded. T & A. Watching it now with thousands of hours of experience it is a total different movie.

From OliveFilms.com:

A groundbreaking work of LGBTQ cinema, Bound stars Gina Gershon (Showgirls) as Corky, a tough-as-nails ex-con, and Jennifer Tilly (Bullets Over Broadway) as her lover Violet. A chance encounter in an elevator ignites a torrid affair between the two women, who soon plot to steal $2 million in laundered mob money and pin the blame on Violet’s mafioso boyfriend, Ceasar (Joe Pantoliano, The Sopranos). A stylish neo-noir, fusing classic tropes with hyper-stylized camera work and color design, Bound is a crackling retro-thriller that never strays too far from its noir roots and would become the first in a line of visually dazzling films from The Wachowskis, the writing and directing team behind the Matrix trilogy.

Bound features a stellar supporting cast that includes Christopher Meloni (TV’s Law & Order: SVU), Richard C. Sarafian (director of the cult film Vanishing Point) and John P. Ryan (Runaway Train) with exquisite photography by Bill Pope (Baby Driver) and razor-sharp editing by Academy Award winner® Zach Staenberg (Best Film Editing, The Matrix, 2000).

I am going to save you a little time and tell you to not sleep on this release. Olive Films Signature Line lives on under the guise of a limited release so there will only ever be 3,500 copies of this release in existence. The picture quality and audio are absolutely top notch.

With that aside, I watched Bound during a time before the Internet had dirty videos so 90s me sought out a VHS copy of this movie for obvious teenagers reasons, a sex scene with two beautiful women. At the time I hadn’t heard the word noir, let alone neo-noir, the concept of LGBTQ was foreign too, needless to say that midwest me didn’t have very progressive opinions. But then there was Bound. There were 100 other minutes that didn’t matter much to me and I thought the movie was barely okay. I am not that person anymore, and the love scene, now, is the least interesting moment in the film.

From the opening shot I realized that I had little memory of the actual film and I became hypnotized from the start straight on through to the closing credits. With a few days between that screening, I think it is safe to say that some of the shots feel overly staged for the shot rather than the scene. (Yes, I know, that’s how movies work, but in this case they appear to be a bit forced.) Watching Joe Pantoliano moving around in the white paint was was a perfect backdrop for what was happening at the moment so I am certainly not intending disrespect. Without Bound we would likely not have The Matrix, and if there was ever a reason to celebrate a film, beyond it’s own merits, this is certainly one of those time.

This release shares many of the same special features with the Arrow Films region B release from 2014 save for the “Part and Parcel” and “The Difference Between You and Me” interviews, which are exclusive to this release. I want to visit the commentary at some point to hear from the Wachowskis, but the other interviews are quite interesting.

Special Features:

• New High-Definition digital restoration
• Audio commentary with writers/directors The Wachowskis; actors Joe Pantoliano, Jennifer Tilly and Gina Gershon; film editor Zach Staenberg; and technical consultant Susie Bright
• “Part and Parcel” – with titles designer Patti Podesta
• “The Difference Between You and Me” – with B. Ruby Rich and Jen Moorman
• “Here’s Johnny!” – with Christopher Meloni
• “Hail Ceasar” – with Joe Pantoliano
• “Femme Fatales” – with Gina Gershon and Jennifer Tilly
• “Modern Noir: The Sights & Sounds of Bound” – with cinematographer Bill Pope, editor Zach Staenberg, and composer Don Davis
• Theatrical Trailer
• Essay by Guinevere Turner

Director: 10 – Cinematography: 10 – Edit: 5 – Parity: 8 – Main performance: 8 – Else performance: 6 – Score: 6 – Sound: 7 – Story: 6 – Script: 8 – Effects: 9 – Design: 6 – Costumes: 8 – Keeps interest: 9 – Lasting: 10