Notes on a Scandal

Review by Steve Rogers

Production Year: 2006
DVD Release Date: April 17, 2007
Studio: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
Director: Richard Eyre
Cast: Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett, Bill Nighy
Genre: Drama - Psychological
MPAA Rating: R

Based on the Zoe Heller novel What Was She Thinking? (Notes on a Scandal), the film stars two of today's most accomplished actresses, Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett. Buoyed by a witty and engaging script from Patrick Marber (Iris), the two Oscar winners are paired off in a potboiler of a plot that offers the viewer a raw and uncompromising look at two very different women, each dealing with the dehumanizing effects of loneliness and emotional isolation.

Dench plays Barbara Covett, a dowdy, bitter prig of a teacher in a working class North London high school. Enter Sheba Hard (Blanchett) as the newest faculty member, slightly bohemian, decidedly upper class, and strikingly beautiful. Barabara is immediately smitten by Sheba's coltish appeal, and a voice-over narrative, taken from her diary, begins to reveal a more complex and disturbing persona behind the proper facade. But it's Sheba's own emotional emptiness that sparks an affair with a male student. When Barbara spies the illicit tryst, it sets in motion a series of events that send the story spiraling towards it inevitable conclusion.

Director Richard Eyre has fashioned a taut, psychological thriller, allowing Dench and Blanchett to engage in a tour de force display of raw, emotive acting. The film is beautifully photographed by veteran cinematographer Chris Menges (The Mission, Local Hero) and perfectly captures a variety of striking images, from the muted hues of the dank English capitol city, to the beautifully lit figure of Blanchett, whose luminescent skin virtually glows in the lens of Menges. Notes on a Scandal ultimately succeeds as a riveting portrait of jealousy, lust and madness.

Video Quality

Presented in Anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1) it is wonderfully framed and colors are pleasingly realistic. There are no visible artifacts or distortions and the picture features a good amount of detail. Flesh tones in particular are perfectly distilled, juxtaposing the wrinkled countenance of a creepy looking Dench (commendable for a sans makeup performance) against Blanchett's porcelain-toned radiance.

Audio Quality

The dialogue driven film gives the 5.1 surround track very little to do and there are few lateral separation effects of note. (The only surround effect I recall is Sheba's cell phone ringing, but it's significant since the calls usually signal dramatic turns in the storyline - and trouble for Sheba). The score by composer Philip Glass is dramatic, adding a requisite amount of punch and suspense to the briskly moving plot, and it's rendered in dramatic fashion on this disc.

Special Features

The disc includes a number featurettes and webisodes, which tend to overlap and contribute to viewer fatigue with their frustrating redundancy. It would make more sense to gather these brief snippets together and edit them into a single cohesive documentary. There's also a trailer and a wordy Director's Commentary by Eyre that basically restates the obvious for most of the running time without offering much insight into his laudable directorial style.

Summary

Overall, this thoughtful and provocative film, which received four Academy Award nominations, has been given a respectable presentation on DVD, with a beautifully reproduced picture transfer that enhances one's enjoyment of the kinetic story and bravura acting. Suffice it to say the extras are skimpy and not very well thought out (grabbing 2 minute-clips from Fox Movie Channel and stringing them together in "webisodes" isn't much of a stretch). I would have liked to see a more comprehensive special edition for one of the most critically praised films of 2006.