Dom Robinson reviews

Distributed by

Polygram

Cat.no: 047 806 2

Cert: 18

Running time: 101 minutes

Year: 1995

Pressing: 1998

Region(s): Code-free!

Chapters: 19 plus extras

Sound: MPEG Stereo

Languages: English, French, Spanish

Subtitles: English, French, Spanish, Dutch

Fullscreen: 4:3

16:9-enhanced: No

Macrovision: Yes

Price: £17.99

Extras : Scene index, Theatrical trailer, Biographies, Filmographies.

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Director:

Bryan Singer (Public Access)

Producer:

Bryan Singer & Michael McDonnel

Screenplay:

Christopher McQuarrie (Public Access)

Music:

John Ottman

Cast:

McManus: Stephen Baldwin (Born On The Fourth Of July, Last Exit To Brooklyn, Fled)
Keaton: Gabriel Byrne (Into The West, The Assassin (aka Point Of No Return), Miller's Crossing)
Fenster: Benicio Del Toro (The Fan, Basquiat, Excess Baggage, Swimming With Sharks)
Hockney: Kevin Pollak (Ricochet, Casino, A Few Good Men)
Verbal: Kevin Spacey (Swimming With Sharks, L.A. Confidential, Midnight In The Garden Of Good And Evil)
Agent David Kujan: Chazz Palminteri (Diabolique, Bullets Over Broadway, Mulholland Falls)
Kobayashi: Pete Postlethwaite (The Lost World: Jurassic Park, Brassed Off, Dragonheart)
Edie Finneran: Suzy Amis (The Ballad Of Little Jo, Blown Away)
Jack Baer: Giancarlo Esposito (Night On Earth, Fresh, Nothing To Lose)
Jeff Rabin: Dan Hedaya (Daylight, Fair Game, Blood Simple)

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This film proved itself to be one of the few great films of 1995, winning Kevin Spacey the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor, with both an Oscar and a BAFTA Award for Best Original Screenplay going to Christopher McQuarrie.

If you're after a film with strong acting, then you couldn't do better than this one. The five men lined-up to be stitched-up Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Benicio Del Toro, Kevin Pollak and Kevin Spacey each have their own character to play, but it's Spacey as the crippled Verbal Kint, known as Verbal because he talks too much...and usually to the wrong people, who shines through as the best and deserved his Oscar. Recently, he has also appeared in Clint Eastwood's Midnight In The Garden Of Good And Evil and should have won another Oscar for his perfect performance in Curtis Hanson's L.A. Confidential.

Chazz Palminteri is also very good as Agent Kujan, the detective in charge of getting to the truth of the matter, with good support from fellow detectives Dan Hedaya and Giancarlo Esposito. Finally, the ubiquitous Pete Postlethwaite appears as Kobayashi, the man who brings the chance of a lifetime to the famous five, tempting them with a $91 million offer.

The picture quality is first-class in most of the scenes on this disc. The only places I could pick out faults were in some scenes with little or no movement where artifacts would appear, one prime example being a cityscape shot at the start of chapter 9.

The film is only presented in fullscreen which is a shame as it looked terrific in its original 2.35:1 ratio. On a positive note, Bryan Singer shot the film in the Super-35 format so in the main, the matte ('those black bars' to the uninitiated) could be opened up to reveal more picture above and below the usual widescreen image, without losing much picture information, if any, at the sides. There's only a couple of scenes where a pan-and-scan shot rears its ugly head, one being at the start of chapter 11 with Chazz Palminteri sitting on one side of his office and Kevin Spacey on the other, but the image pans from right to left as Dan Hedaya enters the office stage-left behind Spacey.

The sound comes across very clear on this disc, with surround sound used mainly to set the tone for such a dark thriller, plus more active use in scenes where Verbal gives a description what happened when Keyser Soze found intruders at home and a loud explosion on a boat.

Extras :

Chapters/Trailer :

Cast and Production Notes :

Also Available :

Languages :

The film is presented in English, French and Spanish languages, with subtitles in each of the three plus Dutch.

Menu :

The interactive menu is a bit hit-and-miss at times. Sometimes you can click on what's on the screen, while at other times you need to use the onscreen remote control. Another thing to note is that on playing the disc you can't skip past the Polygram logo and copyright info.

This disc certainly has its plus points - the picture and sound quality is superb, it is quite well-chaptered and also code-free. Despite the "Region 2" symbol on the back cover, I played the disc straight after viewing a region 1 disc on my PC DVD-ROM drive and it didn't bring up the usual "wrong region" indication. I presume this is by accident rather than intentional, but it's definitely a bonus nonetheless.

On the down side, this release could be considered a missed opportunity. Not only is there no widescreen version, but it is also the director's commentary track which adorns the original NTSC Laserdisc release.

So overall, what's presented here is good, but given the aforementioned omissions, it could have been a whole lot more.

FILM	 		: *****
PICTURE QUALITY (4:3)	: ****
SOUND QUALITY		: ****
EXTRAS			: **
PACKAGE			: **½

Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 1998.