Blu-ray Review: New York, I Love You

Release Date: February 2nd, 2010
Running Time: 103 minutes

The Film

While I never saw Paris, je t’aime, the idea seemed like a brilliant one. A broad range of international actors and directors got together to show off the beauty of Paris and tell touching stories of love. The success of the unique film led producer Emmanuel Benbihy to expand the concept to other cities. What better city to explore than the gigantic cultural melting pot that is New York City? New York, I Love You is an interesting film experiment that finds success far more than failure. Anyone who has a serious love for NYC should absolutely give this film a watch, but be prepared to be disappointed by the lack of substantial special features.

New York, I Love You, like its Parisian predecessor, is a collection of 11 short films by a wide range of directors and actors. The unrelated shorts takes place all over New York but are loosely tied together with the universal theme of love.

Director Mira Nair crafts a tale set in the Diamond District where an Indian seller (Irrfan Khan) negotiates a deal and discusses life with a Hasidic woman soon to be married (Natalie Portman). Representing the Upper West Side is a story by Japanese director Shunji Iwai about a film composer (Orlando Bloom) who begins to innocently flirt with his director’s assistant (Christina Ricci). Central Park is tackled by Brett Ratner who tells the story of a young man (Anton Yelchin) who takes his pharmacist’s (James Caan) wheelchair-bound daughter (Olivia Thirlby) to the prom after his original plans fall apart. One of the best segments takes place in Greenwich Village, directed by Allen Hughes, starring Drea de Matteo and Bradley Cooper who are meeting each other and each remembering their previous night.

I don’t want to spoil the basic premise for every short, but other segments include: one in Tribeca directed by Jiang Wen and starring Hayden Christensen and two stories by Yvan Attal about people finding connections on smoke breaks starring Ethan Hawke, Maggie Q, Robin Wright Penn, and Chris Cooper. Natalie Portman even directs a short, and German director Fatih Akin weaves a story about a painter in Chinatown. But the film ends on its most touching and skilled short: a simple piece by Joshua Mastron set in Brighton Beach where an old couple (Eli Wallach and Cloris Leachman) take a stroll on their anniversary.

I found New York, I Love You to be a somewhat uneven experience. Though I am not intimately familiar with the city, I couldn’t help but notice some of the boroughs were completely left out. Why doesn’t Staten Island get any love? There’s far more to New York than Manhattan. Also, by the nature of the film, having so many different directors and actors causes the film to be stylistically all over the place and varying in quality. You will likely want to spend more time with certain characters and be completely turned off by others. The film tries to rectify this problem by having short “crossover” moments where characters from one story will pop by in another, but these moments feel unnecessary and forced. It doesn’t help the cohesion and ultimately lessens the impact of the individual tales.

On the positive side of things, the film presents a wide array of cultures through generally unique, interesting, and believable characters. There’s no denying that the cast is an all-star lineup, and the collection of international directors will expose audiences to the work of creative minds they have likely never seen. At the end of the day the passion and desire to make a solid short film is definitely there for all those involved and for the most part New York, I Love You is a success.

The Disc

The video is presented in a 1.85:1, 1080p high definition transfer. The image varies stylistically by director, but in general the quality is quite good. Vibrant colors aren’t prevalent as much is muted for style, but the intermittent bursts of primary colors (specifically in Central Park) look lush and saturated. Black levels are deep and preserve the shadow detail in nighttime sequences. Fine detail is excellent in close-ups, but what really impressed me was the detail and depth of the wider city shots. This may not be a transfer that pushes your HDTV to the limits, but I cannot imagine this material looking any better.

The audio is offered in an English DTS HD 5.1 master lossless audio track with English subtitles. The film is heavy on dialogue but it all remains balanced in crisp even with the hustle and bustle of the city. Ambient directional effects bring the city to life through traffic sounds, crowd atmosphere, and more. Smooth pans feel very natural and never draw unnecessary attention. Lastly, the music remains clean and balanced as well.

The Extras

Very few special features are offered.

The “Bonus Segments” are the most notable extra content. “These Vagabond Shoes” (12 minutes), written and directed by Scarlett Johansson, stars Kevin Bacon and centers around Coney Island. “Apocrypha” (13 minutes), written and directed by Andrey Zvyaginstev, follows a young man filming a couple who appear to be breaking up. Neither segment is very strong, but one could argue that they are better than some of the other entries in the film.

16 minutes of Director Interviews give comments from: Brett Ratner, Josh Maston, Mira Nair, Yvan Attal, and Shynji Iwai.

Lastly, the Trailer is offered.

Final Thoughts

New York, I Love You is an interesting compilation of work from a number of renowned filmmakers and actors, but the short story style is not for everyone and the lack of in-depth special features fails to shed much light on the project