Pride Blu-ray Review

     Actors: Bill Nighy

Format: Multiple Formats, Blu-ray, DTS Surround Sound, Subtitled, Widescreen

Language: English

Subtitles: Spanish

Aspect Ratio: 2.40:1

Number of discs: 1

Rated: R (Restricted)

Studio: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment

Release Date: December 23, 2014

Digital Copy Expiration Date: December 31, 2018

Run Time: 120 minutes

        The greatest success of Pride is the ability to keep the film hopeful and amusing, despite some heavy topics that might have easily carried the narrative into the realm of melodrama. It is a true story that is inspirational by facts alone, with no need for further embellishment or contrived cinematic manipulations. Instead, we are given the rare privilege of a film based on a true story that is as entertaining as it is inspirational.

 

        Pride is based on the unexpected collaboration between a group of gay rights activists from London and a small Welsh mining village on strike along with much of the blue-collar workers in Margaret Thatcher’s Great Britain. Seeing an opportunity in the strike to help the government’s latest victim of oppression, a group of homosexual activists reach out to as many towns on strike as they can, but only find one willing to accept their help. This partnership seems rife with complications, but ends up going far smoother than expected. Their acceptance into the community is fairly effortless, aside from one hateful woman and her spiteful spawn.

 

        Removing most of those elements of conflict frees the film us to focus on the characters, rather than the politics. What happened was amazing and true, but it is essentially just the structure for a lovely film about an odd pairing of friends. The true message of the film comes from the strength these characters have in acceptance and tolerance, and it is a joyful lesson to be learned in Pride.

 

        The Blu-ray release includes a collection of never-before-seen deleted and extended scenes, as well as a featurette about the true story which inspired the film.

 

Entertainment Value: 8/10

Quality of Filmmaking: 8.5/10

Historical Significance:  7/10

Special Features: 6.5/10