Review of Tangled

Introduction

Tangled tells the story of Jenny, a beautiful young woman who is the object of desire of best friend David, and who also attracts the attention of his friend Alan (as is so often the case!).

The film starts with detectives questioning David, badly beaten and run over, with Jenny and Alan missing, possibly dead or injured. As is the trend nowadays, the movie is told in a series of flashbacks, leading up to the start of the movie, about 80 minutes in, with a short section after the paths meet where the unanswered questions are answered. The story focuses on the development of the relationships and emotions of the three, particularly the green-eyed monster jealousy…

Video

The video comes in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen and is of a reasonably high standard, with no sign of film grain or dirt on the print. The colours are vivid, and the image is bright and sharp.

The visuals aren`t especially exciting, with much of the movie set in and around the homes of the principal characters. The film gives the general impression of being made to a tight budget, with little imagination in the sets and locations.

In truth, the whole thing has the feel of a television movie.

Audio

The soundtrack comes in Dolby Digital 2.0, and although I would rather have seen a multichannel soundtrack, the sound reproduction was fine, and in no way hindered the movie.

The film mainly centres on dialogue, which is well presented and easy to understand at all times. Sound effects, where used sound reasonable, but, like the video, this is more akin to a television movie.

Features

The extras aren`t especially exciting, consisting of the trailer, production notes, cast notes and a gallery.

The disc is packaged in a black Amaray case, which contains some basic information about the film and details of the miserly 12 chapter breaks, along with some stills of the rather dull menus.

Conclusion

Overall, the main problem with Tangled is that is isn`t especially exciting, and ultimately fails to deliver on the early promise, becoming a predictable movie that goes around in circles telling a familiar tale about a triangle of love.

The three principal stars all play their parts very well, with Leigh Cook excellent as Jenny, the object of desire for David and Alan. The strong performances rescue the film from being a total disaster, as had there been a poor cast, it would have bordered on being unwatchably tedious at times.

At first the script is quite intriguing and the movie promises to be interesting, but after about thirty minutes, things become a bit slow and ponderous as the film ambles along to its rather predictable conclusion. The numerous plot twists don`t provide enough surprise to raise the interest level and the film really doesn`t offer anything new to the genre at all.

Technically, the DVD features above average video, but the stereo soundtrack is a little disappointing. The extras, like the film, are rather uninspiring and don`t really warrant much investigation.

Overall, this is definitely one to rent, as it certainly doesn`t deserve repeat viewing.