Blu-ray

Taking its cue from Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train, this likeable comedy stars Jason Bateman, Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis as three friends who decide to kill each others’ horrifically unbearable bosses (Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston and Colin Farrell, respectively).

It’s a neat comedic concept that pretty much everyone can get behind and, for the most part, the film serves it well. The entire cast are uniformly excellent, although it’s Jamie Foxx who gets the biggest laughs as ‘murder consultant’ Mother****er Jones. It’s just a shame that the narrative runs out of steam in the final act, leaving you with a sudden ending that makes you think that the filmmakers had no idea how to get out of the corner they’d painted themselves into.

Picture: This wicked comedy comes to Blu-ray with a splendid AVC 2.40:1 1080p encode that is very well behaved at all times. While black crush occasionally raises its head, it never intrudes too heavily on the film’s often shadowy visuals. Meanwhile the palette displays a richness and warmth that really benefits from the format’s native colour space. Film grain is also pleasingly resolved through, giving the movie a very natural look, although there are a couple of darker sequences that veer from native grain to something much more noisy.
Picture rating: 4/5

Audio: Horrible Bosses’ DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack follows the usual comedy route of focusing all of its attention on dialogue and music. While all of this is handled with aplomb, it does tend to shift the balance towards the front of the soundfield, meaning that there’s really very little going on in the surrounds for most of the film’s running time. Technically accurate it may be, but it’s not what you’d call exciting.
Audio rating: 3/5

Extras: The most inappropriate thing about this Blu-ray ‘Totally Inappropriate Edition’ is undoubtedly its meagre selection of bonus features. There’s a choice of the original 98min theatrical cut and a slightly flabby new 106min extended version of the film itself. These are joined by seven deleted scenes, and a trio of lacklustre featurettes where the cast and crew talk about unbearable jobs, their own ‘horrible boss’ experiences and how to deal with them. The closest we get to any real behind-the-scenes material is a short look at the creation of the film’s soundtrack – whoopee! The set also includes a DVD and Digial Copy of the film.
Extra rating: 1/5

We say: This disc serves up plenty of laughs, but disappointingly few extras

Warner Home Video, All-region BD/R2 DVD, £25 approx, On sale now
HCC VERDICT: 3/5