The film is almost entirely based around a country lounge singer Donna de Angelo (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio) her daughter Noelle (Vanessa Martinez), and her new found boyfriend Joe (David Strathairn) Donna seems to be known for her lack of stability in her relationships and after a quite publicly announced break up with one of her band members, she starts seeing Joe Gastineau. Joe has a reputation around town as a handy do anything kind of guy. An ex fisherman he hasn’t fished for many years after two of his crewmembers drowned.

Unbeknownst to both Joe and Donna; Noelle too has a crush on Joe and is distraught when she finds out that he is seeing her mother. Noelle seems to be the quiet shy type who has an obvious talent and passion for writing. She also has some hidden suicidal tendencies, which start to raise their head pretty early on in the movie with some minor body cutting.

Without spoiling the crux of the movie I will tell you that all comes to a head when Joe’s brother returns to town after a long stint away in Alaska. He asks for Joes help with what appears to be a business matter. The whole group end up being tied into it and it is a much bigger task then just a business meeting. The main focus of the film revolves around the relationship that is built from here between the Joe, Donna and Noelle.

This is certainly a superior addition to anyone’s collection. The acting on all accounts is absolutely superb, and the general plot and character portrayal is also fantastic.

So How Does This Transfer Hold Up?

VIDEO
This is one of the very few reference quality transfers I have seen in region 4, and is nothing short of remarkable. This transfer is presented at a ratio of 1.85:1 and is Anamorphic Widescreen. I could leave it at that and say that there are no faults but I should probably go through everything and give it a bit more praise. The image is exceptionally sharp and the images are always of the greatest clarity. There are some very minor not even worth mentioning instances of a tiny bit of grain and some virtually unnoticeable ailiasing. Shadow detail is perfect and at no time is there any loss of clarity due to shadows.

I was continually impressed with the rendering of colours. Skin Tones were beautiful and the fabulous Alaskan scenery was portrayed wonderfully. In such a cold climate you would expect blues and greys, but the scenery shots showed no element of hostile or cold colours but at the same time were not warm and cosy. This is remarkably good photography.

There are no mpeg artefacts and only some very very minor film artefacts.
The layer change at 72.48 is completely unnoticeable and very well placed.
As a general comment this is one of the best transfers I have seen on DVD.

AUDIO
The Dolby 5.1 audio is on par with the video transfer. There was little use of the base channel but that is to be expected with this type of film. The surrounds were used to great effect. Not a lot of surround noise, but the sound we get seems to have a great impact on the effectiveness of the audio.

Dialogue was clear at all times and very easy to understand even with the mumbling voice of Kris Kristofferson. I could not find any sync problems.

The soundtrack from Mason Daring is also highly effective. Aside from the live songs from Mary the ambient music is warm and enveloping. The bulk of the soundtrack is however live songs from the band which are all sung live by Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio who could have easily had a career as a country lounge singer.

EXTRAS
This is where I lose a little praise. I would have expected that a collector’s edition DVD would have a lot more to offer in the way of extras.
I don’t really consider this picture disc to be that much of an exciting extra as it is only a monochrome image anyway and is not overly exciting.
The menu is quite nicely done but could use some enhancement with a little music.
The theatrical trailer was representative of the film and certainly shows it’s quality.
The audio commentary was also very informative. I’m not generally an advocate for audio commentaries as I have a low attention span with things that don’t completely hold my attention. This was however a good commentary which I managed to listen to entirely. The section I was most interested in was an explanation to the ending, which had really thrown me when watching the film. The reasoning behind it I also found strange but I guess that’s just artistic license.
Then there is the isolated soundtrack to boot the extras.