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Adam Duncan reviews

The Fly / The Fly II
DVD double-pack

Distributed by

20th Century Fox

    Cover
  • Cert:
  • Cat.no: 01983 DVD
  • Running time: 191 minutes
  • Year: 1986/1989
  • Pressing: 2001
  • Region(s): 2, PAL
  • Chapters: 24/24 plus extras
  • Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
  • Languages: English
  • Subtitles: English for the hearing impaired, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Finnish, Portuguese, Hebrew, Polish, Czech, Hungarian and Icelandic.
  • Widescreen: 1.85:1
  • 16:9-Enhanced: Yes
  • Macrovision: Yes
  • Disc Format: DVD 9
  • Price: £19.99
  • Extras: Trailers, Behind the Scenes (The Fly), The Making Of The Fly II, Cast and crew interviews.

In 1986, David Cronenberg released his remake of the 1958 film, The Fly and gave it his own unique version. Seth Brundle (Jeff Goldblum) has invented a new form of transportation: Telepods. With this invention, nobody will ever be car sick, air sick, sea sick or even tricyle sick again. Just one problem - they can only transport inanimate objects. With the help of journalist Veronica Quaife (Geena Davis), he gets it right and the pair fall in love.

One night, Ronnie (her nickname) pays a visit to her boss and ex-boyfriend Stathis Borans (John Getz) over an article that he has taken credit for. Mistaking this for cheating on him, Seth goes in the telepods himself. But, he doesn't spot the fly inside the pod....

The Fly II contiues where The Fly left off and is about Seth's son, Martin (Eric Stoltz) who is looked after by Seth's old company, Bartok Industries, led by Bartok (Lee Richardson). He continues his father's work in perfecting the telepods and has a relationship with one of the company's employees, Beth Logan (Daphne Zuniga).

But his dormant insect genes soon start to kick in and Martin starts his transformation into a fly. But he is determined to find a cure before it's too late.

Out of the two films, The Fly is the best. The acting is excellent particulary from Jeff Goldblum, the script is good and the oscar winning make-up effects are very good and suitably gory. The Fly II is still an enjoyable film but it's just not as good as the first film.


Both films are in their original 1.85:1 ratio and look great. The Fly looks almost flawless. There are very little picture problems and everything is clear and detailed. The Fly II also looks very good but not quite as The Fly.

Both films are presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 and sound pretty good. The Fly is the better sounding of the two. Howard Shore's music gets the most benefit here but there are some surround effects particulary towards the end. The Fly II's audio is also good but the music benefits from the mix it sounds very similiar to the music used in Hellraiser. In fact, it's by the same composer, Christopher Young).


Both films have the same extras:

The Fly

  • Trailer: Presented in 1.33:1 and lasting nearly 2 minutes, this trailer gives away quite a bit of the film and also uses a 80's synthesiser score that isn't too bad.
  • Behind The Scenes: A 6½-minute featurette which contains interviews and behind-the-scenes footage. Although it is rather short, there is some interesting info included such as an explanation of how the scenes with Seth crawling on the ceiling were acheived.
  • Interviews: These are additional interviews from the cast and crew. They include producer Stuart Cornfield ( 0:16 ), David Cronenberg ( 2:14 ), Jeff Goldblum ( 2:23 ), Geena Davis ( 2:01 ) and Chris Walas ( 0:55 ). Some of the footage is repeated from the featurette but conatins some additional insight such as Cronenberg expalining about how he got in the business and Goldbum's recollections in make-up.

The Fly 2

  • Trailer: Presented in 1.33:1, this trailer lasts just over a minute.
  • The Making Of The Fly II: This is a 5 minute featurette which contains some nice behind-the-scenes footage and interviews.
  • Interviews: These are additional interviews and include Eric Stoltz ( 0:56 ), Chris Walas ( 0:58 ), Daphe Zuniga ( 1:08 ), Lee Richardson ( 1:11 ) and Steven Charles Jaffe ( 1:18 ). Unlike the interviews on The Fly disc, none of these are taken from the featurette.

Overall, a pretty good package. The films are good especially the first, the picture is great, the sound is good and the extras are a nice bonus. If you can get this at a good price, then I recommend a purchase.

THE FLY
THE FLY 2
PICTURE QUALITY
SOUND QUALITY
EXTRAS




OVERALL

Review copyright © Adam Duncan, 2001.

E-mail Adam Duncan

The following is a list of all the Alien films reviewed online to date :

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DVDfever.co.uk - Est. February 25th 2000

As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B 37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.

PC games reviewed by the editor are on:

  • Since Jan 2011: Intel Quad Core Dell XPS 8100, i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz, 8Gb RAM, nVidia GeForce GTS 240, Windows 7
  • Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
  • Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
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  • Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
  • Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP