With Ridley Scott behind the camera and both Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe in front of it, 2008’s Body of Lies looked like a sure-fire hit. Apparently there aren’t any guarantees in Hollywood, however.

Lies earned a weak $39 million US and received a grand total of zero Oscar nominations. It came, it saw, it disappeared without a trace.

Lies follows the relationship between Roger Ferris (DiCaprio) and Ed Hoffman (Crowe). As the CIA pursues terrorist mastermind Al-Saleem (Alon Aboutboul), Ferris acts as the ground operative in the Middle East while Hoffman consults with him via the “eye in the sky”.

After one mission almost kills him, Ferris ends up on assignment in Jordan. As Ferris gets involved, he finds many of complications, some caused by Hoffman’s side endeavors. Ferris tries to do his job and stay alive while he also attempts to figure out who he can trust.

With its use of satellite technology, Lies often comes across like a more serious riff on 1998’s Enemy of the State. Is it a coincidence that Scott’s brother Tony directed that popcorn flick?

Perhaps. Nonetheless, the two deliver a certain similar feel, so I couldn’t help but flash back to State as I watched Lies.

While State took a more fantastic, Hitchcock-influenced view of technology, Lies tries to exist in the real world. And perhaps it does, as I thought the antics of State stretched credulity, whereas Lies comes across as much more believable.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean it works as much more interesting. State offered a certain level of simple fun, while Lies takes itself much more seriously.

Too seriously, to be honest, as the film’s pretensions threaten to undermine it. Lies wants to be an insightful, revealing take on anti-terrorism, but it lacks the substance to back up its aspirations.

Lies comes with a fairly muddled story. I understood the overview but the details became clouded along the way.

Perhaps I’m just slow, but I think the filmmakers dropped the ball here. At its heart, Lies offers a pretty simple tale, but Scott seems to want it to be less intelligible so it’ll appear more complex.

There really isn’t anything particularly clever or insightful here. The confused narrative just leads one to think it’s more three-dimensional because it buries us in details.

All of that’s too bad, as a terrorism-based thriller could be pretty interesting. Scott certainly brings the usual high level of production values to Lies, and one can’t fault the film’s star power.

Neither Crowd nor DiCaprio provide particularly strong performances, though I’m not sure how much room they have to breathe here. Poor Leo gets stuck in scenes where he’s supposed to pass for an Iraqi. That could look sillier than it does, but it’s hard to imagine.

My main problem with Lies is that it’s a thriller that never becomes thrilling. If it took a more focused approach to its subject, it might’ve become more involving. Unfortunately, it feels scattered and surprisingly dull.

Body of Lies appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 2.35:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. Across the board, the movie boasted a fine transfer.

Very few issues with sharpness materialized, as the majority of the flick looked concise and accurate. A few wider elements could lean a smidgen tentative, but those remained minor.

No signs of jagged edges or shimmering occurred, and I saw no edge haloes. Print flaws failed to materialize.

The movie’s palette varied between an arid amber and a moderate teal. The hues came across as intended.

Blacks were also deep and firm, and shadows looked smooth and clear. This image consistently impressed.

As for the Dolby TrueHD 5.1 soundtrack of Lies, it also worked fine for the movie. The soundfield made good use of various effects. Of course, gunfire and explosions created the majority of the material.

These elements opened up the mix well, and the track used music in an active, satisfying manner as well. Throw in a few vehicle sequences and the soundscape worked nicely.

Audio quality always seemed solid. Music was full and rich, with clear highs and tight lows.

Effects sounded accurate and dynamic as well, and speech was good. Dialogue came across as natural and concise. All of this was enough for a “B+”.

How did the Blu-ray compare to the prior DVD version? Both came with similar soundscapes, but the BD’s lossless TrueHD presentation seemed more robust than the DVD”s lossy Dolby Digital track.

Visuals also boasted stronger delineation, colors and blacks. Expect the standard Blu-ray upgrade here.

The Blu-ray includes the DVD’s extras and a few of its own. We start with an audio commentary from director Ridley Scott, author David Ignatius and screenwriter William Monahan.

All sit separately for this edited piece. They cover the project’s origins and development, the novel and its adaptation, cast, characters and performances, story elements and factual influences, shooting in Morocco, and other production elements.

Expect a pretty good chat here. As usual, Scott gives us too much narration, as he seems content to simply describe the onscreen action at times.

However, this tendency decreases as the movie progress, and all three participants provide a lot of useful information. I especially like Ignatius’s remarks, as he gives us a solid exploration of his work as a reporter and how this impacted the movie. Overall, the track succeeds.

Nine featurettes appear under Actionable Intelligence. These occupy a total of one hour, 19 minutes, 26 seconds.

Nine featurettes appear under Actionable Intelligence. These occupy a total of one hour, 19 minutes, 26 seconds.

Across these, we hear from Scott, Ignatius, production designer Arthur Max, location manager Christian McWilliams, producer Donald DeLine, executive producer Charles JD Schlissel, Middle Eastern technical advisor and consultant Sam Sako, set designer Sonja Klaus, costume designer Janty Yates, Huntsman manager Johnny Allen, stunt coordinator George Aguilar, special effects coordinator Paul Corbould, aerial coordinator Marc Wolff, and actors Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Strong, Golshifteh Farahani, Alon Aboutboul and Ali Suliman.

Viewers can access these as individual segments from the special features menu, as one long program, or as “Focus Points”. If one chooses the last option, the pieces pop up as the movie runs.

The clips cover aspects of shooting in Morocco, Scott’s style as director, the source novel and its adaptation, story/characters, cast and performances, production and costume design, stunts, various effects, research and attempts at realism. Some of the reels lean a bit fluffy - usually related to the actors - but the clips largely offer solid information.

Under Interactive Debriefing, we get additional eight interview clips. Taken together, they span a total of 17 minutes, five seconds and offer notes from Scott, DiCaprio, and actor Russell Crowe.

These examine story/characters as well as cast and performances. A few decent insights emerge but they feel fluffy in general.

Five Deleted Scenes follow. Including a one-minute, 3-second intro from Ridley Scott, these occupy a total of 14 minutes, 43 seconds.

The intro lets us know about Scott’s storyboarding/planning processes. As for the sequences themselves, they lean toward a bit more exposition and some character expansions. They seem fairly good.

We can watch the scenes with or without commentary from Scott. He gives us some info about why he lost the clips but he also just narrates them much of the time.

For a thriller ripped from its era’s headlines, shouldn’t Body of Lies provide a dynamic flick? Yeah, it should, but it doesn’t, as it remains moderately interesting at best and fairly dull at worst. The Blu-ray provides strong picture and audio along with a few pretty good supplements. While I have no complaints about this release, I still chalk up Lies as a cinematic disappointment.

Note that this 2025 Blu-ray of Body of Lies acts as a reissue of the original 2009 disc. It makes no changes to that version.

Also note that this set includes two other movies as well: 2008’s Pride and Glory and 2010’s Edge of Darkness. Each movie appears on its own disc so each also literally replicates its original Blu-ray release.