Juice [Blu-ray]

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Its expert level stuff and really Dickerson flaunting his vision and chops through shooting and post work. Even big action moments like when the cops are chasing after the crew early in the film or the key robbery sequence - the mix stays in that comfortable front/center realm. That’s made clear by trying to show the issues shared among the friends and conflict found between them and other groups, let alone the police.

Dickerson's film is notable for being chockfull of '90s hip hop, both on the soundtrack and in the cast. Its a role someone with his inexperience could have sullied up the movie with, but Tupac absolutely slays. However, he takes things to another level in terms of an action prowess and demonstrating levels of suspense not yet adventured into at the time with the canon of Spike Lee. Looking back at the early 90’s, it was littered with “urban” dramas that featured predominately black casts.

Film noir is a term that was used to describe the bleak themes and shadowy visuals of American dramas and B-movies that thrived during the 1940s and 1950s, reflecting uneasy times on theater screens with pessimistic tales about dishonest characters and world-weary antiheroes whose best-laid plans were usually shattered by the hands of fate as they succumbed to weaknesses and small desires. Let's get the rough patches out of the way first because most of the transfer is genuinely excellent. There’s that underlying message of the fleeting lusts of the street, but the heavy 90s “Salt n’ Peppa” style music and the old 90s gangsta lingo makes it a little harder to take seriously than it really should be.

Paramount's earlier UHD discs really were very fragile (I still think the HDR10 layer of Shaving Private Ryan is the single most wretched encode I've yet seen on UHD, and there are several more where the DV layer rescues them) but lately it's been smooth sailing, hardly a bad word said about their compression, and then they drop this.

Part of that has to do with my feeling Menace II Society and Boyz n the Hood are better-made films that this one doesn’t often come to mind other than to state the obvious “Tupac was amazing in it! From the getgo details are exceptional as the film opens exploring the home life of each member of the crew, we see all of the intricate details in decore and clothing. I watched this 4K UHD Blu-ray on my 55" Sony Bravia in a dark room before I read this thread or the reviews, and did not notice the "macroblocking" or "flickering" that has been mentioned by several others.

Starring a slate of first-time performers including Omar Epps, Jermaine Hopkins, Khalil Kain, and Tupac Shakur - the story of four friends pulled apart is just as searing today as it was 30 years ago. In terms of upgradability, that will rely solely on the video quality, as the extras and audio are clones of the 5 year old Blu-ray (which were already excellent to being with). Images copyright 1992 Paramount Pictures, Island World, Moritz/Heyman Productions, and 2017 Paramount Home Entertainment. A tale of four friends determined to make some money on the harsh streets of Harlem and featuring an outstanding soundtrack by hip-hop heroes Eric B and Rakim, Cypress Hill, EPMD, Big Daddy Kane and many more. For more about Juice 4K and the Juice 4K Blu-ray release, see Juice 4K Blu-ray Review published by Martin Liebman on January 23, 2022 where this Blu-ray release scored 3.I checked bitrates and most of the time the film is hitting high 50mbps with peaks in the 80mbps range, but for these macro blocking incidents, the bitrate plummets to the low 20s and then quickly shoots right back up once the artifacting resolves itself. Juice remains a seminal dark coming of age tale and terrific 90s teen-ish thriller full of style, character and charisma.