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The Do-Deca-Pentathlon
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray A - America - Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Ethan Stevenson (25th November 2012). |
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The Film
 “In the summer of 1990, two teenage brothers engaged in a three-day sporting battle of epic proportions. 25 events. 2 brothers. 1 champion. It ended in controversy, and the brothers became estranged. But, the spirit of that mighty clash still lurks in their hearts and minds.” It’s natural for brothers to be competitive, constantly tying to one-up each other. At a certain age, there’s that whole assertion of dominance for the domain thing going on… battles over the imbalance of perceived power. Baby bears grown too big for the cave, so to speak. (Perhaps, the baby bear gets stupid, and attempts to even dominate Daddy bear, although that never ends well). This drive, strive for competition, coupled with the need to be the dominant dude of the domestic sphere, can—if not make each any enemy of the other—clearly create animosity, which cultivates deep-seeded anger issues with family later in life. But I’ve been lucky, I suppose. My brother and I get along just fine as adults, and we pretty much always have, even when we were kids. Arguments—attacks where words were our weapons— were few and far between even into the teen years, and it was rarer still for any disagreement to escalate beyond the verbal, into something decidedly more physical. In fact, I can recall only one instance where the raging hormones of preposterously idiotic puberty took over logic and reason, and we threw down with a little of ye olde fisticuffs—actually we pretty much choked each other out in, of all places, the tiny little hallway of our very small childhood home. For the most part, however, our subtle, only natural, sibling rivalry never boiled over into something more. In retrospect, it’s kind of a minor miracle. And I would assume a miracle my parents are rather glad was granted by whatever higher power they turned too hoping to tame two eventual teenagers. I mean, we should’ve been at each other’s throats constantly—much more than that one time, anyway. We’re nothing alike: he was a popular jock type, while I was… not. Intellectually, socially, physically and athletically, in nearly all regards, we clashed (on paper). And the tiny little house we grew up in really was too small for two budding boys becoming men, especially boys just four years apart in age (meaning, I was young enough to always be an annoying and immature ass to him, but he was not quite old enough for him to not be the same in my eyes too). We shared a bedroom for the better part of at least his teen years, and that should’ve been the final straw. Our home really ought to have resembled the Balkan Power Keg at the turn of the last century. I stress, it should’ve been. But, like I said, we somehow got along and still do, perhaps even a little better now some years into adulthood. The same cannot be said for Jeremy (Mark Kelly) and Mark (Steve Zissis), the two brothers at the center of “The Do-Deca-Pentathlon”. When they were younger, the brothers we’re the best of friends, but viciously competitive. That was, until one day during a sort-of-Olympics the duo dubbed the Do-Decca, a controversy erupted over who the actual winner of their 25-event competition was, and they were friends no more. The disagreement broke Jeremy and Mark’s brotherly bond. Two decades later, the broken bond still lay unmended. When Jeremy comes home unexpectedly for a family weekend on Mark’s birthday, he digs up an old VHS tape containing at least part of their infamous contest, and soon unpleasant memories from the past reignite a long dormant rivalry. What starts as a simple, somewhat secret, series of showdowns—games of pool, ping-pong, arm-wrestling and laser-tag—explodes into an all-out disruptive competition of outright craziness, which brings the entire family, including the boy’s mother (Julie Vorus) and Mark’s wife (Jennifer Lafleur) and son (Reid Williams), into the fray. “The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” is yet another low-budget indie film from real life brothers Jay and Mark Duplass, once again dealing with middle-aged men stuck in a state of perpetual adolescence. This is what they do, apparently, but the duo does it well, and they seem to have a knack for viewing that pesky state of arrested development through a warped, drama-comedic, lens. Sharing directing, writing and producing credit, the Duplass’ latest is a lot like their other work, in aesthetic and narrative style. Like the similar-themed “Cyrus” (2010) and, more obviously, the recent “Jeff, Who Lives At Home” (2011), “Do-Deca” is about the dynamics and definitions of family as seen through the eyes of man-children. Stylistically, the movie is done in the same naturalistic, cinema verité way as those two films, too. The handheld camerawork is a bit distracting at times, with haphazard zooms, but mostly the slice-of-life style works well. The Duplass Brothers let their actors improvise to a great degree, and seem to have worked in a sort of “set the camera up, say action, and see what happens” style. This translates into a majority of the film possessing an organic, low-key, realism. Slow—some might say deliberately—paced, long stretches of the film are little more than uncomfortable, increasingly antagonistic, arguments. Early on, a dinner unfolds in real time, devolving from typical small talk into an airing of familiar dirty laundry. Kelly and Zissis are very good in their roles, and they’re entirely why the film works, completely believable as brothers who can’t stand each other (yet, in the end, care). The most outlandish aspect of “The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” is, of course, the Do-Deca games themselves, which are often absurd and sometimes idiotic. But that’s part of the charm. Supposedly, although this might be a joke too, the titular competition is wholly grounded in reality—a contest concocted by two real life brothers, whom are seen in the supplements on this disc. Ridiculous or no, and regardless of the truth, Mark and Jeremy’s antics are all very funny. Indeed, the biggest joke is perhaps the simple sight of seeing two grotesquely overweight middle age men make fools of themselves in a hopelessly homemade Olympics. But like “Cyrus”, “The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” isn’t really a conventional comedy, weaving in just as much—if not more—drama to get this tale told. At barely over an hour—the film clocks in at 76-minutes with credits—“Do-Deca” is a small picture, and surprisingly easy to sit through. It has a lot to say, and says it well in a very understated and honest but humorous way. With a meandering narrative, and frankly anticlimactic end, I can’t say “The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” will be a film for everyone—if you haven’t liked any of the Duplass Brother’s other films, this isn’t likely to make you change your tune. But with its minimal, naturalistic, approach and credible acting, it’s a picture worth seeing for those who enjoyed “Cyrus” and “Jeff, Who Lives At Home”.
Video
The Duplasses and their cinematographer Jas Shelton filmed “The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” in a cinema-verité style using digital cameras (a mix of RED machines and off-the-shelf DSLRs). The camerawork is usually handheld with low-key, natural, lighting. The resulting image—delivered via a 1.85:1 widescreen 1080p 24/fps AVC MPEG-4 encode—is certainly not what most are looking for in a top-shelf HD-disc presentation, and won’t be anyone’s go it reference disc. Skintones are flushed, contrast dull and the picture is overall a bit flat, but blacks are inky and true, and detail is occasionally quite strong (if soft in spots, as well). The transfer has its share of aliasing and faint banding, and the photography has issues with rolling shutter and some rather heavy noise in dark scenes. But the flaws all seem a reflection of the digi-cam source, and the disc then is an accurate representation of what (and how it was) shot. It’s not pretty, but also far from terrible.
Audio
The English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 soundtrack (48kHz/24-bit) is front-heavy, and the film, dialogue driven. As you’d expect for low-budget movie of this type, the lossless soundtrack on “The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” isn’t much, although it does a serviceable job with the simple sound design. Dialogue is intelligible and crisp… for the most part (a few scenes sounded a tad tinny). Surround activity is light and low-end bass is in play even less. Julian Wass’s score—a percussive, Olympic-like thing, prominently featured during the competition scenes—is the highlight; otherwise, the track is rather slight, if hardly ever outright flawed. Other language options include Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1. Subtitles are available in English, Spanish and French.
Extras
Supplements include two featurettes and a couple of theatrical trailers. The disc is also authored with bookmarks and the resume playback function. “Meet the Real Brothers” (1.85:1 1080p, 5 minutes 31 seconds) is a brief featurette with Mark and Anton Solak, the real brothers whose competition inspired the film. The brothers discuss the origins of Do-Deca, their thoughts on the film, and even compete against each other in the latter half of this piece to settle a two-decade long family controversy. “Rock, Paper, Scissors with the Real Brothers” (1.85:1 1080p, 4 minutes 51 seconds) is the second, less engaging, featurette on the disc. The brothers engage in a thrilling battle of wills… actually, no. They just play rock, paper, scissors for five minutes. Pre-menu bonus trailers: - “The Watch” (2.40:1 1080p, 2 minutes 9 seconds) on Blu-ray and DVD. - “What is Blu-ray” promo (1080p variable AR, 1 minute 20 seconds).
Packaging
“The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” races onto Blu-ray under the 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment banner. The single disc, region A-locked BD-25, is housed in a simple eco-Elite keep case.
Overall
“The Do-Deca-Pentathlon” is another slice-of-life comedy from the Duplass Brothers, who once again ruminate on the ideas of family and men in a perpetual state of arrested development. They do this sort of thing fairly well, although it’s an acquired taste. A pair of performances—and the verité style of storytelling at its core—makes “Do-Deca” credible and worthwhile. The Blu-ray, in reflecting the low-budget production values, won’t be the sort of disc you use to show off the home theater. In the end, the disc is worth a look.
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