Uninvited, The (Blu-ray)

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"The Uninvited" is slow and plodding and very, very familiar. Instead of developing any serious suspense, it depends on a few startling incidents, things jumping out at people, to scare us. Cheap tricks basically. By the time the movie ends, you may feel cheated.

Video:
My guess is that the high-definition video quality of "The Uninvited" closely matches its theatrical print. Unfortunately, that may not be saying much, as it appears that the Guard brothers were looking for a misty, dreamy quality in their footage. The DreamWorks engineers use a dual-layer BD50 and an MPEG-4/AVC encode to reproduce the film's 1.85:1 widescreen aspect ratio on disc, with results that seem to capture the filmmakers' intentionally soft-focused imagery. Colors do not exactly stand out as vividly as they might, and, in fact, look rather subdued and somber most of the time. Definition is OK for the atmosphere the film tries to project, with black levels adequate but not always too strong. The filmmakers look for a dark mood in the piece, with hues to match. Facial details suffer the most, too smoothed over, although medium and long shots appear much better.

Indeed, it is only on direct comparison to the standard-definition version of the movie that the high-def format reveals its clear superiority. Everything in the Blu-ray edition is more strikingly well focused, so, as I say, the transfer probably captures pretty much what's on the original print.

Audio:
The Dolby TrueHD 5.1 soundtrack does what it can to convey the aural tones of the picture, yet like the video it comes across somewhat subdued. There are a couple of big, dynamic thrusts that do more than the script does to jolt us out of our seat, but there aren't all that many such moments. Except in the musical backgrounds, there isn't a lot going on in the rear speakers, either. While this is not a soundtrack for showing off one's audio system, it is a perfectly competent one; and compared to its regular Dolby Digital counterpart on the standard-definition version of the movie, the TrueHD further smoothes out and clarifies the sound.

Extras:
Just as there isn't much going on in the movie we haven't seen before, there isn't much in the way of extras we haven't seen before, either. Things start with an ordinary behind-the-scenes, making-of featurette, "Unlocking The Uninvited" (HD), nineteen minutes; then a series of four deleted scenes (HD) totaling about five-and-a-half minutes; followed by an alternate ending (HD), less than a minute. At least they're all in high definition. Things conclude with fifteen scene selections; English, French, and Spanish spoken languages; English, French, Spanish, and Portuguese subtitles; and English captions for the hearing impaired.

Parting Shots:
This latest movie with the ubiquitous title "The Uninvited" is as cliché-ridden a horror flick as you'll get from a major studio. Although you might find it well acted and well produced, you might also find it provides practically nothing you haven't seen before, the movie relying almost wholly on its ending for anything remotely unusual. It's not enough, and high def can't save it.

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