Video:

Jasper, Texas was shot in and is presented in full frame video and is satisfactory, if not spectacular. The picture is clean, but the colors are pretty dull. There's no evident artifacts or other distortions, even in the most jarring, violent cuts.

Sound:

There are three sound options on the disc: English Dolby Digital 5.1, English 2.0 and Spanish Mono. The 5.1 track is solid in the flashback scenes, but disappears a bit in the present day – not that there are many chances to show off in a quiet drama such as this.

Extras:

The disc includes interviews with Voight, Gossett, writer Jonathan Estrin and director Jeff Byrd. Again, all four manage to dance around the horror of the incident and talk about how "important" they felt the movie was to shoot. The fluff featurette from Showtime, all three minutes of it, gives no further insight. Two trailers for other films (Soldier's Girl, Out of Order) round out the disc.

This would have been an easy way to get into the incident itself. To base a film on a real-life story and then not include something, anything – newspaper stories, interviews, video footage of the town itself (the film was shot in Toronto) – is lazy more than anything.

Final Thoughts:

The film The Laramie Project (and the play the film is based on) has set the bar high in terms of what can be expected of art based on the tragedy of a hate crime. Jasper, Texas does not do right by Byrd to the level that The Laramie Project does by Matthew Shepard – and that's the real shame.