Film 

Watching this film, I kept asking myself why would an actor like Liam Neeson want to get involved in this project. It must have been quite a payday. The plot of Clash of the Titans is about as thin as it gets and is just an excuse for some battle sequences and some pretty nifty CGI.

The film’s premise is that Zues and the rest of the Greek gods, are upset that their people are no longer worshiping them and are in fact, in open rebellion against them. This infuriates Zues who created man for the sole purpose of worshiping him and the rest of the gods, thereby somehow increasing their power. In comes Zues’ brother Hades, who is naturally quite upset over Zues’ relegation of him to the underworld.

Playing on Zues’ sensitivity and anger, Hades concocts a plan to force man into dropping their rebellion and return to their worship of the gods. Unbeknownst to Zues, Hades was really using this opportunity to strike back at his brother and wrest control of Olympus from him. Into this family squabble comes Perseus, who is part god and part man, being the son of Zues after he essentially raped the wife of the king of the rebels. Perseus, discovering his true identity, wants no part of divine nature and wants to live his life as a man and wants to strike back at Hades for Hades’ killing of his foster family. Before Hades can complete his plan to crush man, Perseus joins a ban of warriors who journey into forbidden worlds, including the underworld itself, looking for the key to foil Hade’s plot.

While the plot sounds like a good idea, this film spends far too long on battle sequences and fails to delve into the feelings and true nature of both Perseus and the gods themselves. I would have liked to see more of a focus of the gods and their true role of Greek mythology in shaping Greek society and less on CGI. In short, a more thoughtful film. Far too often, CGI is used just for its own sake and as a substitute for a plot. Such is the case in this film. Is Clash of the Titans a terrible film? No, but is one that you will only want to see once and certainly not a film you would want to add to your collection. Therefore, if you must see this film, I would recommend that you do so on the basis of a rental only.

Video 

With the exception of a handful of dimly lit interior shots, the video quality on this release is excellent. The film has a nice natural looking color palettte with excellent skin tone rendition. The film’s locales vary from lush green locations to brown and tan deserts, and volcanic landscapes and are rendered beautifully here. Blacks are deep and stable and together with the high level of detail, produce an image of very nice depth. While this release is not 3D, it is clear where the hokey 3D effects were placed throughout the film and it is also clear why the theatrical 3D release was so poorly received.

While there is a bit of DNR and Edge enhancement visible in the image, they are minimal and not really noticeable on a screen size under 60 inches. Even with the application of some DNR, overall detail is excellent, including facial detail and skin texture, backgrounds, clothing and the like. The only real issue I had with the release were a few interior shots which looked very soft and a bit washed out and flat and having a very processed look. With these minor exceptions, I found this to be a very pleasing transfer. I wish the same could be said for the film.

Audio 

If you are looking for a film with a bombastic soundtrack, Clash of the Titans is the film for you. it will certainly give your subwoofer a workout. The film features excellent overall fidelity and dynamics. The fight sequences with the giant scorpions are true reference material for bass junkies. Not only will your entire room shake, but you may also shake the rest of the house and may have you scrambling for the remote if it feels like your house is about to crash on top of you.

The dialogue track is also well recorded and well placed in the mix, never getting drowned out or obscured by the cacophony of the battle sequences. The only real issue I had with the audio was the sound design itself which I would have preferred to be a little more immersive throughout the film and a little more refined. Don’t get me wrong, the film’s action sequences are certainly very immersive. It is just that I would have preferred the quieter interior sequences to have that same immersive feeling as well. This is a rather small complaint and one which did not impact my viewing experience to any significant degree.

Special Features 

The Blu-ray edition of Clash of the Titans is certainly packed with many extras. The release is a combo pack so it includes a second disc containing a DVD copy of the film as well as a digital copy.

The extras contained on the Blu-ray disc feature deleted scenes and an alternate ending of the film. Also included is a featurette on Sam Worthington entitled “Sam Worthington: An Action Hero for the Ages”.

The best and longest of the extras is what Warners calls maximum Movie Mode which runs concurrent;y with the film where Sam Worthington, Liam Neeson, Ralph Fiennes and director Louis Leterrier discuss various aspects of the making of the film. As it runs concurrently with the film, you really should watch the film first and then rewatch the film with the Maximum Movie Mode enabled. The only downside to this approach is that it will result in you having to watch the film twice.

The Maximum Movie Mode focuses on a number of areas including Sam Worthington is Perseus, Harnessing the Gods, Zeus: Father of Gods and Men, Enter the World of Hades, Calibos: Te Man Behind the Monster, Tenerife: A Continent on an island, Scorpioch, Actors and their Stunts, Wales: A Beautiful Scarred Landscape, Bringing Medusa to Life and Prepare for Kraken. All in all, the Maximum Movie Mode features more than 40 minutes of PIP commentary.

Final Thoughts 

If you like mindless action adventure film, Clash of the Titans just may be the film for you. For the rest of you, if you must, I would check out Clash of the Titans on the basis of a rental only. All I know is that once was more than enough for me.

Films

Sudden Impact & The Enforcer are two very different films, everything from their visual style to their stories’ content differ. Sudden Impact is a very dark and gritty crime story with a seedy and mature story, whereas The Enforcer follows a more average crime storyline.

Sudden Impact centers around a revenge tale of a woman who was tricked into a situation where she ends up getting gang raped, where although she survives she vows to exact revenge against all those involves. The film carries on with Harry Callahan following the murders and piecing together her story. Harry then has to decide if her actions are just. One downfall to Sudden Impact is Sondra Locke’s performance, which isn’t terrible, but it doesn’t surprise me that after her divorce with Clint Eastwood she wasn’t able to find much work.

The Enforcer follows Harry as he tries to foil a terrorist group while showing his new female partner the dangers of police work. Where Sudden Impact told a dark tale, The Enforcer is a bit easier on the audience and actually provides a politically correct tale which shows women in an equal light. In comparison to the other sequels such as Dead Pool, these films stand out as the lesser of the four sequels. Just remember however that in Dead Pool we’ve got to deal with a high speed chase with a remote control car (I think there was a reason it was the last film). So even though The Enforcer & Sudden Impact aren’t the best installments to the series they do cover some interesting subject matter.

To newcomer Eastwood fans, see the original Dirty Harry first and make the informed decision of whether or not you want to see the continuation of Harry Callahan’s story, but make sure you realize none of the sequels really live up to the original, however if you do get around to watching Sudden Impact, you get to witness the delivery of the famous line”Go ahead make my day”.

Video

Both films’ video is displayed using the VC-1 codec at 1080p in their original aspect ratios of 2.40:1. Both films are free of artefacts and above-average amounts of grain. The Enforcer has a slightly softer image and comes off brighter than Sudden Impacts’s contrasted lighting scheme.

Both films’ have some extended night sequences, which really showcase the limitations of the film stocks of the time. That isn’t much of an issue, considering basically every film around the time had the same issues, but Sudden Impact’s noir style cinematography is a bit hard to follow.

The motion within the video is pretty smooth and skin tones are natural, however the colours are slightly muted. Considering the age. of the material, the films look pretty good!

Audio

Both film’s audio comes at us using the DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio, with a Dolby TrueHD lossless encoding as a secondary option. Both options for our listening pleasure are pretty much on even keel, if you’re an audiophile then it’s pretty much a standard to just stick with DTS-HD, however I noticed that the track had a different balance when listening to the TrueHD version.

Most notably the main difference with the TrueHD vs the DTS-HD track is the surround presence as well as the score. The DTS-HD version has been remixed to have some sound come from behind, wheras the TrueHD relies on surround bleeding for most of it’s  rear presense.   The score on the TrueHD version however pops a bit more, which may not be great for Sudden Impact due to the very dated style of score.

Special Features

Although a lot of these double feature value packs are sometimes quickly put together with little care put into the special features section. Both films have audio commentaries, The Enforcer‘s commentary is by the film’s director whereas Sudden Impact’s commentary is done by a historian/eastwood biographer.

There’s also a handful of featurettes including a career retrospective on Eastwood, which seems to be the big thing now with the Eastwood filmography catalogue getting rereleased to celebrate his body of work, however the featurette is only about twenty minutes and doesn’t cover any fresh ground.

Final Thoughts

Both films, although dated are great examples of the classic era of the action genre, if you’re a fan of the dirty harry films then these affordable double feature collections might be a good way to get your favorite films from the series. If you’re a newcomer who’s interested in seeing a couple fun action flicks from the past, then this film will make a good rental. With decent audio/video presentation and a good amount of special features makes this a worthwhile rental.

Film 

The best way to describe The Warlords would be to imagine a cross between a marital arts film and The Longest Day or the opening 18 minutes or so of Saving Private Ryan.

The film is set in China during the 1860′s and stars Jet Li as General Pang whose troops were victims of a massacre during the Taiping Rebellion. General Pang escaped death during the massacre by playing dead under the bodies of some of his less than fortunate troops. He pulls himself out from under his dead soldiers after the battle and comes upon a group of passing bandits lead by Er Hu (Andy Lau) and Wu Yang (Takeshi Kaneshiro).

After Pang helps Er Hu and Wu Yang defend a helpless village that is under attack from the forces of General Ho, the three take an oath as blood brothers, pledging loyalty to each other until the death. At Pang’s urging, Er Hu and Wu Yang as well as other members of the group join the army to lead what Pang describes as a more honorable life. The three lead an army during the rebellion that has remarkable success.

The film is filled with some rather gruesome and realistic battle sequences featuring plenty of blood, gore, decapitations and some marital arts. At the end, the three blood brothers are done in by some intrigue involving political ambitions on the part of Pang as well as Pang and Er Hu’s desires for a beautiful woman. Despite the unnecessary gore, I found The Warlords to be an interesting film, providing a glimpse into Chinese history that I knew little about.

While I enjoyed the film, I found its pacing to be a bit slower that I desired. I also can’t imagine sitting down and watching this film more than once. Accordingly, while I enjoyed the film and feel that it is definitely worth a look, I would suggest that you do so on the basis of a rental only.

Video 

After having watched a bit of this film on HD Net, I can say that the Blu-ray release offers a significant upgrade over the TV experience as the Blu-ray does not possess the MPEG-2 motion artifacts that were visible on the cable version I saw. The film is not exactly a bright and colorful film. Most of the color palette of the film consists of varying shades of brown, black and gray. The film itself is very gritty looking with occasional pops of color, especially bright red blood which is seen far too often for my tastes.

I found detail, especially facial detail and clothing textures to be quite impressive with excellent blacks. Overall clarity is very good as well as is shadow detail. I was not able to detect any evidence of the application of significant levels of digital noise reduction or edge enhancement as the film clearly retains the gritty look and feel of the film I saw originally on HD Net. All in all, the Blu-ray release of The Warlords represents a significant upgrade over the prior cable release of the film and is one that should please fans of the film.

Audio 

The release of The Warlords on Blu-ray includes two lossless tracks, Mandarin and English. While the dialogue track on the English version sounded better, I preferred watching the film in the original Mandarin with English subtitles. There is just something about dubbed films I just don’t like. Maybe its the dialogue that continues once the lips stop moving that freaks me out. It is great that this release gives you the choice of two lossless tracks so you can decide which one best appeals to you.

If there is one thing I can state without hesitation, is that this film has some of the deepest bass I have yet to experience at home. Normally I would take the position that too much bass is just about right. However, in the case of this film, I found the bass to be a tad excessive and at times, unrelenting. From thundering horses to massive cannon blasts which just about knocked pictures off the walls in my room, this film is a bass junkies’ dream. Unfortunately, all this bass comes at the cost of nearly overwhelming the rest of the sound mix and at times does.

As for the rest of the sound, I found it to be a bit on the thin side, lacking a bit too unnatural, lacking the smoothness and depth of the better sounding tracks I heard. I wouldn’t describe the sound as harsh as it isn’t. It just lacks the fullness of the better sounding tracks, especially the dialogue and musical score which I would describe as sounding a tad shallow. The dubbed English dialogue sounds much better than the original Mandarin. The surrounds, as one would expect from an action film, are quite active throughout most of the film, creating a nice immersive sound field, especially during the battle sequences. If you are fan of unrelenting bass this release may just be for you. Just make sure that you take the pictures off the wall in your room before you screen the film.

Special Features 

The Blu-ray release of The Warlords contains many extras, most of which are in Mandarin with English subtitles. As such, it can get a bit tedious going through them all, especially all the brief featurettes detailing many aspects of the making of the film.

The extras include the usual deleted scenes as well as a Making of Featurette where numerous aspects of the making of the film are detailed, from the use of horses to battle sequences. It appears that no aspect of the making of the film is too small to be included in the featurette. Also included is a the featurette “The Warlords 117 Days: A Production Journal which I found to be very tough to follow as well as a Behind the Scenes special and HDNet: A Look at The Warlords featurette. Also included is the international trailer for the film.

If I had to choose, I would suggest that you check out the Behinds the Scenes Special as well as the HDNet special if you felt compelled to delve into the extras included with this release as I found them to be the most accessible.

Final Thoughts 

The Warlords is without a doubt a gritty and at times gruesome look at the subject of war. While the premise and execution of the film is interesting, I can’t say it is the type of film that I would want to watch more than once. While it surely deserves a look, I would suggest that you check it out on the basis of a rental only.

Film  

Like I said in the paragraph above, unlike the previous two sequels, this fourth film keeps the serious tone of the original one.  And interestingly enough, Rambo holds the record for the most kills out of the entire franchise with an astonishing 236.  Stallone has gone on record stating that the violence in the film is justified as to draw attention to what’s really happening in Burma.  I cannot disagree.  One viewing of this had me wanting to give up my freedom and take sides with the Karen rebels out there.  The way those innocent people are brutally slaughtered and mutilated is just sick.  It truly is hell on Earth there.  And this is where the movie completely tugged on my emotions and re-opened a lot of deep wounds.  I really wanted to make a difference in the world after watching this one.  And when you are left feeling like this after watching a movie, you know the director perfectly executed his job.  I give much respect and admiration to Sylvester Stallone for bringing about the awareness of this war torn region to moviegoers everywhere.  Now, if we can just all do something about it!  I can hear the film’s moving score in my head right now as I pen this review.  Brilliant!

Anyone already familiar with the 2008 film probably needs no refresher on the plot here.  It is what it is.  That is… Rambo returns to action, with the help of hired militia, to rescue U.S. missionaries who go missing from a village in Burma.  One of the missionaries in particular, Sarah Miller (Julie Benz), previously struck an emotional accord with John Rambo before leaving.  She made Rambo search his heart and he found out that he really does care about people and events going on around despite his previous beliefs and statements made.  John has put his war torn past aside for 20 years now only to find himself come full circle with who he really is… a killer… this time with a humanitarian interest.  Go Rambo!

The realism/believability part of the story comes into play where this time around, it’s not only Rambo making the difference, but it’s a cumulative team effort.  With the help of the hired militia (mercenaries) and Karen rebels, Rambo joins forces to temporarily overthrow the iron-fisted rule of the Tatmadaw led by Burmese military officer Major Pa Tee Tint.  At first I was kind of taken aback by Rambo not going all out on his own, but let’s face it, the dude is in his 60’s and he can use some help… finally!  Anyway, the mercenaries are hilarious and well developed in the screenplay.  They are a much-welcomed addition to the film and in hindsight; I would not want it done any other way.  It’s not like Rambo doesn’t save the day anyway in the end.  Right?

And as far as the action goes, well it doesn’t get any better than this folks.  Thanks to the brilliant score of Brian Taylor, the action is exemplified to the umpteenth degree.  I want to give kudos to Brian and Stallone for ingeniously arranging this.  From the heart pounding escape scene from the claymore to one of the most brutal Act III resolutions in modern film history, Rambo will not disappoint you in the action, brutality, believability and emotional categories.  You can take that to the bank and cash it.  Why did Stallone wait so long in life to develop this script and the Rocky one, I will never know?  But I do know this, both of those films are some of his best work, and despite the final like ending we have here in Rambo, I’m hoping for at least one more adventure.  Please Mr. Stallone.  Feed my hunger!

But I bet the real reason you are all here reading my review is because you want to know what differences you can expect from this 99-minute cut of the film compared to the original 91-minute one.  Right?  Well that’s easy, it’s 8 minutes of difference.  LOL.  No but seriously, I painstakingly put together this bullet point list below of all the MAJOR differences I found between the two.  I purposely left out some of the minor differences that I was just too lazy to write down.  Enjoy!

• The film is titled JOHN RAMBO, but nowhere on the box art or disc is this name associated.  Weird huh?
• There are a few more brutal real images at the beginning newsfeed.
• There’s more snake catching and more playing around with the snakes as Johnny bags them up.
• There’s more of Julie Benz bugging Rambo to take her group on a boat ride into Burma.  In fact, there’s a whole new scene of her begging him.  The law of 3!
• There’s a longer night scene in a village that’s being raided.
• They completely changed the “what is” speech on the boat that takes place in the rain between Julia’s character and Rambo.  John talks about politics and war and admits he wasted his life on war.  That’s a true statement I guess.
• There are longer conversations to be had between the missionaries and Rambo on the boat ride to Burma.
• There’s a slight change to the pirate shootout scene.
• There’s a longer goodbye scene between John and Sarah when drops them off in Burma.
• There are new flashback scenes when Rambo (I keep wanting to call him Rocky) is burning the pirate ship.
• The raid on the village where the missionaries are starts out quicker.  In my opinion, it feels too abrupt.
• There is a new scene where the missionaries are at the prison camp.  They talk about the treatment and torture of the prisoners.
• After the pastor told Rambo about the missing prisoners, the hammer scene is a bit different.  Instead of Rambo’s voiceover where he says, “war is in his blood and all…” you hear a voiceover from the pastor.  It kind of loses meaning now in my opinion.
• There are some slight variances in the rescue of the missionaries.  I did not mind this, as it is the thumping music that really fuels these scenes after all.
• After the rescue, Rambo now notices that Sarah hurt her foot.  He wraps it up for her.  What a nice guy.
• And last but not least, there is a longer goodbye scene between Rambo and Sarah at the conclusion of the brutal warfare resolution of Act III.

So there you have it.  Obviously, as I stated before, I did not list every little change above.  The above bullet points were the most notable changes I saw so I wanted to make sure they were captured on your computer screen for your reading pleasure.  All in all, if I had my way, I would prefer the theatrical presentation of the film any day.  I was excited to hear about this project when Cliff Stephenson announced it at Comic-Con two years ago (here), but ultimately I felt that these new and modified scenes did not lend themselves well to the flow and pacing of the story.  If I had not seen this, I would have lived life being completely satisfied with only my theatrical Blu-ray.  It’s still a must-see and probably a must-purchase for all the fans out there, but casual viewers may want to think twice about spending 99 minutes of their lives watching something they didn’t much care for in the first place.  However, the movie is still one of my favorite films from the new millennium so that’s the reason for the high score despite my sentiments toward the Extended Cut.  It would have been super if Lionsgate would have packaged this with a theatrical Blu-ray disc as well, but no such luck.  If you want to own the Extended Cut, then you are going to have to double dip.  Sadly, there’s no way around that!  But let’s move on and discuss the Blu-ray vitals of this new presentation, shall we?

Video  

The video presentation is where I always had problems with Rambo on Blu-ray.  I know a lot of critics will praise it, but to my eyes, it has always been a bag of mixed goods.  But enough of my jibber, let’s tackle the vitals first. Rambo: The Extended cut is presented in AVC MPEG-4 video with a 2.40:1 widescreen aspect ratio.  And now back to my jibber…LOL.  When the video is looking good it’s razor sharp and pristine, but when it’s looking drab it can be a little blurry and hazy at times.  The jungle truly comes to life in all its breathtaking glory on this disc, but the night scenes are riddled with distracting grain at times.  Thankfully, this is not always the case, but I do have to point out the fact that it’s there.  When the sun shines, so does this Blu-ray.  Every drop of sweat and blood is gorgeously captured on this razor sharp1080p transfer.  The thing that strikes me odd about this disc though is that sometimes the blacks are not deep enough like we have come to expect from recent Blu-ray transfers.  This of course is a very minimal complaint about an otherwise phenomenal film.  I cannot give the video a score of a 5, but I’m oh so close to a 4.5.  Take it for what it’s worth.

Audio  

If this disc has its bright spot, then it’s the bombastic 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio surround track.  It’s absolutely divine, but it’s not perfect.  Yep, you were probably waiting for me to be the narcissist and I didn’t disappoint.  There isn’t much that doesn’t get past me, but rest assured, my complaints here are very few and far between.  Like in the video, the jungle comes to life here.  In fact, I never heard a jungle sound so fantastic, not to mention the rainfall.  I’m general a tropical person by trait, but I hate being trapped inside by the rain.  However, let the rain fall down here!  In fact… all around me!  It is quite blissful hearing that rain pour from every which direction.  This surround track is simply killer.  But wait… it gets better!  There are loud explosions, bombastic bass and bullets zinging from every which direction.  And that score… I could go on forever about it, but I won’t.  It’s simply brilliant.  Dialog, for the most part, is spot on.  However, that is my one complaint.  One fear I have where scenes are added in to make an alternate cut of the film is how good are these extra scenes going to sound and look.  There were a few instances where the dialog level wasn’t up to snuff in the extra scenes.  I had a problem hearing one line of dialog in a particular scene.  Had it not been for this minimal distraction, this one would have easily scored a 5.

Special Features  

Are you ready for this?  There’s trailers and one production diary to be found here.  That’s the special features section ladies and gentleman.  Thanks for stopping by.  No seriously, there’s not even a digital copy included like there was for the former release of the theatrical presentation.  How sad.  Well to make up for the lack of special features to discuss here I figured I would throw in a screenshot of the disc’s menu below and an image of what the Blu-ray disc’s icon looks like when popped into my favorite Blu-ray player… the Playstation 3.  Enjoy!

• “Rambo: To Hell & Back” Director’s Production Diary - This one is 1 hour and 23 minutes long and is definitely worth your time checking out.  It’s kind of a like a day-by-day production diary of the movie shoot.  It’s interesting seeing Stallone behind the camera and scoping things out.  There’s much to be learned here.
• Trailers – The Expendables, Terminator 2: Skynet Edition, and a Lionsgate commercial featuring their catalog Blu-rays that contain peeps from the upcoming Expendables.

Final Thoughts  

This final score would have been a bit higher had it not been for the lack of special features here.  Thanks to the special features department, or lack thereof, I had to round up to a 4.  It’s quite simple folks.  Do I think this is worth double dipping on?  Absolutely… if you are a fan of the franchise.  But if you were just a casual fan, then I would say a rental would be fine for now or wait until Wal-Mart has it in its $5 bin one day.  I’m going to go ahead and recommend this one as a purchase here, but buyer beware… I’m being biased here.  This movie is a favorite of mine, and I will go down swinging in opposition to anyone who bashes this film.  It is motivating, heart wrenching, action packed and completely brutal in its realism as it depicts the longest running civil war in the world and the genocide of innocent people.  And oh yeah… it’s Rambo!  “Let the bodies hit the floor!”

Pre-order  Rambo: Extended Cut on Blu-ray today!

Film

Steven Seagal plays John Hatcher, a DEA officer who after accidentally gunning down the naked prostitute that killed his partner (seriously…), realizes he has become what he most despised. He retires from the force and decides to go back home and live with his sister. Obviously, trouble has a way of finding its way back into Hatcher’s life when he gets mixed up in a drug war between the mafia and a Jamaican gang run by a mysterious, possibly magical villain named Screwface (again seriously… I can’t make this up).

Screwface is played deliciously over-the-top by actor Basil Wallace. He’s one of those slightly insane bad guys that even gives his own men the creeps. Although, who could blame them. There is a scene in the movie where Screwface is in the middle of a game of dominos when he receives some upsetting news. He freaks out, flips the table over, rips off one of the table’s legs and proceeds to beat one of his men almost to death with it. And of course, he is believed to have magical powers or something. Who knows? Still, he’s one of the more entertaining bad guys to ever chew scenery around a Steven Seagal movie. I imagine Tommy Lee Jones (Under Siege) and Michael Caine (On Deadly Ground) somewhere giving Wallace a pat on the back. “You’re in the cool club now boy!” one of them would say. I know Marked for Death came out before those other movies, but I can dream it can’t I?

The movie is competently directed by Dwight H. Little, the man behind the camera on movies like Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers and Free Willy 2: The Adventure Home. The guy seems to be able to handle any genre with ease and this movie has a real strong pace. The action scenes are very well choreographed, with Steven Seagal using his aikido techniques to take on as many as six guys at once almost effortlessly. There is a particularly good scene that takes place in a Tiffany’s and involves Hatcher throwing people through numerous glass display cases. As well, the final battle between Hatcher and Screwface literally has to be seen to be believed. (Spoiler Alert!) All I’m going to say is that if you have already turned someone into a blind paraplegic, you don’t also have to throw him down an elevator shaft. (Spoilers end)

Excellent fights scenes, mixed with an interesting Voodoo element and you got yourself Marked for Death, a classic ‘movie for guys who like movies’ complete with a funky reggae soundtrack. Steven Seagal fans already know this movie as one of the better early ones and they won’t be disappointed. It still holds up after all of these years. Although, the problem with bad stunt doubles lately in his movies, now clearly seems to have always been a problem.

As a P.S., it’s funny seeing actor Danny Trejo as a goon Steven Seagal casually beats up and throws into the trunk of his car in an early scene in this movie. Although they would also star in the direct to DVD action flick Urban Justice together, ironically enough, this fall, twenty years after the release of this movie, Steven Seagal would star in his first theatrical release in nine years as a villain in Machete, opposite Danny Trejo as the lead. Hopefully, the magic will strike twice.

Video

Marked for Death’s video is displayed in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 using the AVC MPEG 4 codec. The film is one of those catalogue titles that doesn’t get much care or restoration, but at least the negative is a pretty clean one.

Colours are a bit plain and skin tones are reddish at times. The palette is pretty neutral, which is a staple of early 90’s flicks as well as the indoor scenes have that awesome foggy looked created by actually using a fog machine to fill the set with a hazy smoke to soften the image.

Besides having some dated attributes the film’s video quality isn’t too bad, scenes that are shot in daylight look really great with little to no visible grain and even some of the lower lit indoor scenes are pretty clean. However when we move to the late night scenes, especially during the Jamaican assault the grain is noticeable.

The image is pretty sharp and some scenes really display some great detail, such as the pores and texture of an actor’s face in a close up, but a lot of early 90’s did their best to soften the image, such as the fogging technique. There’s definitely not an issue with an overly soft image, but it would’ve been nice to have a slightly crisper display.

Audio

Marked for Death’s audio comes at us using the DTS-HD Master audio 5.1 mix, but as we’ve learned many times before; having one of the best audio codecs doesn’t mean we’re getting some of the best audio and this film is no exception.

We’re given a pretty straight forward mix with little to no “outside-of-the-box” play. A lot of the sound effects come through the main speaker and the low end frequencies don’t come out that much. A lot of the explosions and crashes that occur barely register, but regardless we get a very clear mix nonetheless.

The dialogue is clean, while staying in the center. The score, which just screams early 90’s action flick, stays in its place and doesn’t overshadow the sound effects. The sound effects themselves are somewhat flat, but do have some pop considering the film is 20 years old. A bit of irony in the mix is that the Jamaican assault near the end of the film uses mostly silenced weapons, so it was interesting to try and critique the sound effects when there were none.

Special Features

Although this is the 20^th anniversary of Marked for Death, we don’t get a single special feature.

Final Thoughts

If you’re into classic mindless action, then look no further than Steven Seagall. The audio and video presentation on this disc makes my old VHS copy look like it had taken a karate chop from Seagall himself; it’s a great presentation for a catalogue release and although it doesn’t stand out as showcase worthy it could’ve been a lot worse.

Film

When I was younger I would watch terrible action films with my brother who had a soft spot for them and considering my mind was impressionable at a young age, my heroes growing up weren’t just my father but rather the likes of JCVD, Sly and Bruce Willis. Actions films will always have a special place in my heart, but nowadays it’s hard to find one with a good story or at the very least a cool bad guy (which to me is as important as a cool hero).

Enter the Undisputed films, which reminds me of JCVD’s Bloodsport… or more realistically a half dozen of JCVD’s fight tournament flicks. The film starts off with some flashbacks to the previous film; having already seen the first one with Wesley Snipes and Ving Rhames I had a bit of back story on what may have been going, but apparently it didn’t really matter because Undisputed III is more so related to Undisputed II (both of which have the same director). Undisputed III follows the continuation of Scott Adkin’s character from the second film, who is still in a Russian prison and is still sporting the broken leg that Michael Jai White had left him.

Our injured hero however has a fury within that makes him ache for a fight, even though he’s wounded… The antagonist has now become the main character in this flick and just his luck he’s being brought to a tournament similar to the one he lost in the sequel. However as we learned from that film, Adkin’s character wasn’t a push over and may have a chance this time around. We may not have a cool bad guy, but Adkin’s character who isn’t exactly good is at least fun enough to watch jump and flip around. The spin on this flick however is that now the games are being rigged, so we get to see the far-fetched become even more so and that lends itself to even more over the top action… it’s like a triple decker sandwich of awesome (my lame analogies don’t end yet).

The story may not be the most exciting nor original in a while, but the fight choreography is pretty fantastic. I read into the award the film one that was displayed on the sticker and apparently the award was from a festival known as ‘Action-Fest’. However that doesn’t seem so impressive right? Think about it, it’s a festival dedicated to action flicks, from all ranges of the spectrum… From classy action dramas to all out brawl films like this one and out of all those Undisputed III won best director and best fight choreography. If that doesn’t impress you, then how about knowing that Chuck Norris was on the jury that chose?

That’s what I thought. The film might not be on par with Scorsese’s work, but for a fun night and some mindless action then there’s nothing better then relaxing and just watching some spectacular fights… It’s sort of like Cirque De Soleil but with way more blood (now the analogies end).

Video

Undisputed III ‘s video is displayed using the 1080p VC-1 codec in it’s original 1.78:1 aspect ratio. When I heard that this film was shot on the RED camera I was excited to see how it looked on my projector and was pleased to find that I wasn’t wrong. The film’s detail is insanely sharp, considering this film’s a fairly low budget direct-to-video sequel, the texture of skin can be seen on the close-up of the punches.

Skin tones come through clearly even with the contrasted colour palette that is used to give the film that overused Hollywood film look with crushed blue blacks and orange highlights. Although the film doesn’t have much story backing it, the flick is a great watch even on a 100′ screen.

There’s no visible noise (grain isn’t an issue considering we’re dealing with digital video opposed to film with the RED camera), there’s absolutely no artefacting and the motion is smooth with little to no motion jittering.

It may not be the best flick to use to showcase your display or projector, but it’s definitely your worst choice.

Audio

Undisputed III ‘s audio comes at us using the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 Surround codec in English only, but there are subtitles in French, Spanish and English. Just like the video quality the audio quality is up there. I find that a lot of times these mindless actions flicks have to have impressive technical quality to make them appealing to those who would simply avoid the silly film itself.

The audio is very crisp and dialogue comes cleanly through the soundtrack and sound effects most of the time, however there’s a few instances where the music tends to overpower everything. Whoever did the mix was talented and made a dynamic audio track to go along  with the beautiful image, however this is one of those audio tracks that doesn’t showcase subtlety.

Everything is pushed to extreme, there’s loud bass notes that make your subwoofer work overtime and the soundtrack is played loud and proud, which forced me to turn my receiver down.

If the mix was a bit more even, then it’d be a great showcase mix that would definitely put a sound system through it’s paces, but unfortunately some of the balance issues made it annoying to listen to at times, when it’s known that audio is 60% of the film watching experience, it’s a bummer when it’s not done as well as the fantastic 40% that video holds.

Special Features

Unfortunately there are no special features.

Final Thoughts 

For a film this cheesy and campy, it might just be the perfect rental for a night with the boys, especially if you want to show off your home theatre equipment with an impressive A/V presentation and watch some mindless and spectacular fight sequences. However if you’re not a fan of the genre then I’d say pass on it for this disc isn’t worth much more than a cheap rental especially with no special features to increase the value.

Films 

Kelly’s Heroes and Where Eagles Dare are two very different films covering the second World War. Where Eagles Dare was one of the films that inspired Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds and Kelly’s Heroes creates the mould for Three Kings to take shape in thirty years later as well as one of the pieces of score “Tiger Tank” was also used in Inglourious Basterds; thus everything comes full circle.

Kelly’s Heroes is a tale of soldiers who overhear that there’s millions in Nazi bouillon ready for the plucking in enemy territories, thus they’re encouraged to ready a ragtag group of soldiers and go looking for the gold. The humorous journey involves crossing dangerous terrain and also trying to outrun their overseeing officers who hear that they’re in enemy territory but think they’re trying to run a covert mission and thus want the credit. The premise is rather amusing and unfortunately the long running time takes away from some of the excitement as the film drags a bit, some air could’ve been let out making the whole experience a bit more entertaining but that didn’t stop the film from making it on Channel 4’s top 100 war films at number 34.

Where Eagles Dare is a more serious take on the second world war film ethos, where we have a group of soldiers of MI:6 soldiers and an American Ranger (good ol’ Clint Eastwood) trying to rescue a captured ally, however as the mission progresses it becomes apparent that all is not what it seems and a traitor may be amidst.

Both films centre around different perspectives on the war, both are very far-fetched, whereas Kelly’s Heroes is a story which shows the army as an almost Laurel & Hardy –esque environment where mischief can go on with so much ease. Where Eagles Dare is a story of how easy it is to penetrate a heavily guarded German facility with ease, as Tarantino said in an interview; that was the last war of white people against white people, so language and accents played such a big role in being a tell as to who may or may not be a spy. So Where Eagles Dare tries to fool us into believe that Clint Eastwood is so great with the eccentricities and the particulars of the German language, pronunciations and inflections that he can simply gain access. Both films are great nonetheless.

Video 

Both of these film’s use the VC-1 1080p codec and are displayed in their original 2.40:1 aspect ratio. Both films’ video quality are indicative of their time; they both contain some grain issues, which is apparent in night time scenes (especially Where Eagles Dare), the colours are almost muted at times due to the limitations of the original film stock and possible due to aging of the original negative.

Kelly’s Heroes has a softness issue and at times the contrast causes some loss of detail as well, however the image is fairly clean. However I think that the lack of grain is due to the softness issue.

The colours like I mentioned before are fairly muted, skin tones come off reddish at times, but the colour palette does lend to a desolate atmosphere that most war flicks tend to prefer, although I believe that this was due to aging rather than a conscious decision.

Where Eagles Dare’s video quality has more grain issues then Kelly’s Heroes due to the aforementioned softness issue of Kelly’s Heroes but on the other hand there is some nice sharpness. The detail and sharpness is most notable during scenes where destroyed cities lay in piles of rubble, you can clearly see the lines of bricks and beams. For both films the video quality is above mediocre but not superior enough over the DVD version to warrant a double dip.

Audio

Both films’ audio comes at us in DTS-HD 5.1 in English, have a mono French track and a stereo Spanish track. Also there are subtitles in all the aforementioned languages. Both films are about equal in terms of audio quality.

There is some flatness to the mix, which is common for films of the era, but at times there were a few dynamic showcases of low end and high end sounds. Being war films, it’s hard not to compare it to some of the recent releases, Saving Private Ryan’s mix comes to mind and unfortunately these classic catalogue releases can’t keep when compared to the fantastic mix of a film like that. The gunshots and explosions have a little power behind them, but I wish a updated mix was considered when releasing two great WWII flicks.

The dialogue comes through nicely and I never had an issue trying to hear anything. Some sound effects definitely have that “canned” sound to them, which makes it easy to spot the stuff added in foley. But overall it’s not a bad sounding set of films.

Special Features 

Considering the age of these films and the fact that they’re being packaged together to help boost sales of one another, I didn’t expect much from the special features. There’s a theatrical trailer for both films and a featurette on the making of Where Eagles Dare. The featurette isn’t very insightful and I found it to be a rather underwhelming watch, I expected a bit more depth, but again a lot times these double features are usually quick cash grabs so they’re slapped together pretty quickly.

Final Thoughts 

Although the films have merit the technical qualities of the films and the lack of special features make this a rental at the most. If you already have the DVD’s of these films then I’d suggest keeping them, there’s nothing new found on the Blu-ray and the quality isn’t as much of an improvement to warrant buying again unless you’d want both films in one package to save space on the shelf. However if you’re interested in the film and are a newcomer then this may be a great rental to catch both flicks.

Film 

All in all, I found The Book of Eli to be entertaining but not entertaining enough to rate more than a recommendation as a rental. Any film starring Denzel Washington and Gary Oldman (who in this writer’s opinion is one of the world’s finest actors) should be worth a rental and this one surely is.

The film is produced by the Hughes Brothers and stars Denzel Washington as Eli, who is on a 30 year trek across the great expanse of the US that has been turned into a wasteland after some sort of nuclear war. The people who are left after the war seems to be bent on nothing but violence as food and water are scarce. Eli is a bit of a different role for Denzel as he is cast as the righteous, religious warrior, protecting the last known Bible on the whole planet, and is on a mission from God to deliver the book to a mysterious outpost somewhere out west.

Eli’s main protagonist is Carnegie, played by Gary Oldman, who is searching everywhere for a copy of the Bible as he wants to use the words of the Bible to manipulate the people of a town he is trying to build into a his fiefdom and expand, a trick he seems to have learned from watching TV evangelists as a child before the war. He views the Bible not as the Word or God or even a prized religious relic, but a book that will enable him to wield political power and control. Carnegie and his men attempt to track down Eli and take his book which forms the basis of the the main plot of the film.

The idea behind the film is certainly an interesting one and there are several issues in the film that are open to various interpretations. I will not discuss those as it would reveal too much of the plot for those of you who have yet to see the film. There are also several holes in the film’s plot, a couple of which are so big as to be able to drive a truck through them. However, the film does feature two fine performances by the two leads and is certainly worth a look, if only on the basis of a rental. I say as a rental as this is not the type of film I would find myself watching more than once and I reserve my buy recommendations to films I would want to see several times. Experiencing Eli once was enough for me.

Video 

All in all, this is one fine encode. The film itself has a very stylized appearance as the director and producers of the film use color, actually the absence of color, to create a mood and depict their vision of a post apocalyptic America. As a result, most of the film is bathed in nothing but blacks, grays and browns and at times almost appears black and white and at times sepia toned. There are very few instances of any other colors being used in the film. Even the sky appears gray. If you re looking for a bright and colorful film, The Book of Eli is not the film for you.

While the film lacks much in the way of color, it does have excellent levels of detail and clarity, producing an image of excellent depth and three dimensionality. Facial details and background details, such as facial stubble and pockmarks are all clearly visible as are the fine textures of clothing and the rest and dirt covered object strewn all of the landscape of what is left of rural America. The film is free of any obvious digital noise reduction or edge enhancement and looks about as good as the film could possibly look in the home, given the sate of today’s technology. If you are a fan of the film, you will be more than pleased with the quality of the video presentation on this release.

Audio 

I was just as pleased with the audio on this release as I was with the video. The audio, encoded with DTS HD Master Audio, sounds fantastic. It is immediately apparent from the very outset of the film that the surrounds would be used very aggressively throughout the film to produce a very immersive sound field and they are. The overall sound is smooth and open with excellent transparency and imaging and excellent dynamics. Listen to the sound of Eli sharpening his rather long knife. The sound of steel on steel is very realistic sounding. The same is true of the various gunshots and blasts during the film which have the appropriate sense of heft that we have come to expect from action sequences.

Bass response is excellent as well with some deep bass that will shake the walls in your room, especially during some of the music that scores the film. Sound effects are well placed in the sound field and are seamless as the sound moves across the front of the room and then to the side and rear of your seated position. There is one car crash sequence in particular near the end of the film where a vehicle moves from the front of the room off to the left down the side of the room and out to the rear of the room sounding very realistic and is definitely demo material. The dialogue track is also well recorded and well placed in the mix, even during the action sequences. All in all, the audio presentation is top notch and is sure to impress fans of the film.

Special Features 

The Book of Eli is released as a two disc combo back including the Blu-ray version of the film on one disc and a DVD version along with a digital copy of the film on the other. The extras themselves are rather pedestrian but are presented in high definition.

The extras included several deleted scenes along with a featurette “Lost Tales: Chapter 1 (Carnegie’s Story) which is a graphic novel style presentation of BIlly Carnegie’s early life as a boy and illustrates why he views the power of the Bible in the manner that he does in the film itself.

The extras also contain two featurettes on the making of the film entitled “Starting Over” and “Eli’s Journey” with interviews with the producers, director and stars of the film and are both rather standard faire. Also included is another featurette discussing the music composed to score the film. The disc is also equipped with Maximum Movie Mode which features 40 minutes op PIP commentary with the Hughes Brothers as well as Denzel Washington. The release is also BD-Live enabled.

Final Thoughts 

Any film starring both Denzel Washington and Gary Oldman is worth a look and The Book of Eli certainly is, but on the basis of a rental only.

Although Star Wars IV was always my favourite, one day I found Escape from New York in my favourite Selectavision player.  I was suitably impressed (as most 14-year olds are) with the post apocalyptic artwork on the cover, so on went the player, and into my memory went one of my favourite movie memories of my preteen life.

It was therefore surprising that when the long-awaited sequel Escape From L.A. came out in 1996, I had no real interest in seeing it.  So was it worth the 14-year wait?

Film

In a nutshell, no, this movie was not worth the wait.  Cheesy artificial looking sets, bad primitive CGI, and every action-movie cliché available including my personal favourite: everything that is shot or crashes blows up.

In many ways, this movie is not much different than its predecessor.  Stick something in Snake Plissken that will kill him, give him a count down timer, make him retrieve something from a city which is now a penitentiary (L.A.), and have everyone try to kill him except for the odd helpful criminal.

However, instead of this movie being set during World War III, it is set 16 years later during a Pax Americana where the US is the unquestioned ruler of the world.  Run by a fundamentalist Christian “President for Life”, the US possesses technology orbiting Earth that can render all electronic or mechanical devices useless. 

However, this technology has been stolen by the President’s daughter who has fled into L.A. with it.  Snake is sent in against his will to retrieve the control system for this technology, and to kill the wayward daughter.

This is a very self-aware movie.  John Carpenter revels in the idiocy he puts on screen, including a society of plastic surgery victims, surfing in an aqueduct, hang gliding through L.A., and his gleeful destruction of many recogniseable Hollywood and L.A. landmarks.  In short, this movie does not take itself too seriously.  Overall, it is fun to watch, and provides decent entertainment.

Where it does not work is that self-aware movies can’t be self-aware all the time.  Case in point – Army of Darkness has to be one of the best self-aware movies I’ve ever seen, yet it does so with humor, action, and a reasonably good storyline – it does not always rub the viewer’s nose in its cleverness or outlandishness.

Also, there was a certain dystopian creepiness to Escape From New York that is sadly absent from Escape From L.A.  Possibly, part of it is the poor sets, part of it may be the superior villan Isaac Hayes was as the Duke of New York.  Possibly part of it is that something that was a unique concept in 1982 now feels rehashed.  Regardless, this movie is like a pale imitator of its superb predecessor.  

Video

The video in the movie is not bad, considering the original year of its filming.  Unfortunately, the Blu-ray treatment makes this movie look worse, as the increased sharpness over DVD highlights all of the poor special effects and amateurish sets used by John Carpenter.

Grain is noticeable, and does effectively soften the picture at points.  This is made even more challenging by the fact the majority of the movie is shot in low light.  However, macroblocking and black crush were pleasingly absent.

Overall, a decent presentation, but one that highlights the shortcomings of the film itself.

Audio

The Dolby TrueHD 5.1 audio presentation of this movie was fine, but sounded very “crushed” – the dynamic range was not what I would expect from an action movie.  Surround channels were used lightly, though dynamic levels were pretty good, and dialog was clear through the centre channel.

Generally, there was nothing remarkable about the audio on this disc, and was it was overall more resemblant of an average Dolby Digital track rather than a Dolby True HD one.

Special Features

Well this is pretty easy – the Blu-ray includes the original theatrical trailer.  Not much to review here.  It is what it is.

Final Thoughts

I’ve often thought that many of the things we like when we’re 14 lodge themselves in a special “fond” area of our memories, regardless of if it was even actually good or not.  Escape from New York is one of these pleasures for me, and I still found I enjoyed it when I recently saw it rerun on a movie channel.

Unfortunately, I do not believe Escape from L.A. will lodge itself in the memories in the same way.  Being over-the-top, self deprecating, and clichéd will relegate this movie to the bottomless pile of movies labeled as “mindless entertainment”.  That the Blu-ray presentation was so average further relegates this film to an afterthought.   

Film  

Elektra opened theatrically to mostly negative critical reviews on January 14, 2005.  The movie stars Jennifer Garner, Goran Visnjic (ER), Kristen Prout and Terence Stamp.  The Rob Bowman directed film barely churned a profit.  Astonishingly, it was released less than 3 months later on the DVD format.  I remember that fondly because I thought that was the quickest I ever recalled a feature film coming out on the home video format.

The film’s story continues right after the events that unfolded in 2003’s Daredevil.  Thank God for continuity.  In Daredevil, the Marvel comics character Elektra Natchios (Garner) was killed by Bullseye.  Thankfully, our Blu-ray film today explains how Elektra was given a second life and able to walk among the living again.  Thank God again for martial arts masters with secret reviving life powers.  Where would we be without them?  Well, I guess I should at least be thankful for the fact that at least Elektra does not do a Michael Myers and wake up all the sudden in the back of an ambulance after being fatally shot in the head point blank.

Before we move on, here’s an interesting point to consider.  Remember me telling you about Elektra’s lightning fast DVD release in 2005?  Well the film was also released again later that year in a 2-Disc Director’s Cut edition.  And guess what?  It contained a whopping 3 minutes of extra footage.  That brought the runtime to a whopping 99 minutes.  And now we sit here discussing the May 4^th 2010 Blu-ray release of Elektra and believe it or not, I was initially pounded with rumors that it would clock in at an alarming length of 139 minutes.  Sad to say, that’s not the case.  This Blu-ray release is the Director’s Cut of the film, just like it was on DVD.   So if there is any truth to this super extended cut rumor, then we might see another Blu-ray release of Elektra in the near future.  Depending upon how much you liked the previous 2 editions of the film, this could either be a good thing or a bad thing.  It worked for Daredevil on Blu-ray, so why not Elektra?  I guess if there is one thing I am disappointed in on this Blu-ray release, then it is the fact that this rumored Extended Cut did not see the light of day on Blu-ray.  Maybe it was just all that.  A rumor?  Only time will tell I guess.

As I mentioned 2 paragraphs ago, Elektra (Garner) was murdered in 2003’s Daredevil, but a blind martial arts master, Stick (Terrence Stamp), brought her back to life.  He trains her in the martial art of Kimagure, whose practitioners can control the flow of life and death and live only to destroy the evil organization known as The Hand.  After several years of intense training, she eventually leaves her clan and finds herself employed as a hired assassin who never fails.  However, I shouldn’t use the word “never.”  The moment she receives a contract for $2 million to kill Mark Miller (Goran) and his daughter Abby (Kristen Prout) things forever change in Elektra’s world.  She doesn’t really fail, but she doesn’t really complete her assignment either.  Elektra must make a difficult choice between good or evil in executing her deadly mission while battling her childhood demons and also, singlehandedly taking on the terrifying warriors of The Hand.  At the end of the day, will she win or lose?  That’s the question, isn’t it?  Now it’s up to you to find out the outcome.  Are you up to the challenge on Blu-ray?  You better do your pushups!

Video  

I have to admit; I was pleasantly surprised by the visual presentation of Elektra on Blu-ray.  Given the fact that so many filmgoers hate this film, I was really concerned with how good it would look on Blu-ray format, but more importantly how much effort the studio would put into cleaning this title up for a quality transfer.  I love to be wrong about things like this.  Elektra looks absolutely stunning on the Blu-ray format.  The only reason you are seeing a score of 4.5 and not a 5 is for the reference quality factor only.  The heavy CGI-laden effects coupled with the mostly dark scenery doesn’t make this the most visual reference disc to show off your collection with in comparison to the newest king of Blu-ray, Avatar.  However, Fox delivers a near home run with this 1080p/AVC MPEG-4 video encode.  The contrast heavy film is presented in a 2.39:1 framed aspect ratio.  Despite the many dark sequences, the level of detail here is outstanding, especially in the fabric of Elektra’s many outfits (the important parts here).  The colors vibrantly pop right off the screen during the forest battles.  From what I heard about the previous DVD transfers, it looks like we have a winner here folks.  Let’s check in with the audio department and see how Elektra ranks there.

Audio  

Like the visuals, the Blu-ray’s audio presentation is near flawless.  There are little things here or there I can nitpick about, but for the most part, Fox did a bang up job on the bombastic DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround mix.  Yes I used the word “bombastic.”  And for good reason too!  The fight scenes, the chases and the zany martial arts action all utilize deep thumping bass dynamics.  Me like!  While I was tempted a couple of times to actually turn my sound down, I didn’t for one simple reason.  A couple of times I found the dialog to be just a tad low.  It wasn’t that it wasn’t audible or a deal breaker, but it felt oddly low in just a couple of spots.  If not for that, then we may be talking about a possible 5-star rating.  But let’s be honest.  Not many people were expecting much from this Blu-ray release so we should be thrilled that it actually turned out this good.  While much of the movie is passive in dialog, the action sequences come to life thanks to the DTS-HD track that delivers non-stop zany action all around you.  I mean, who doesn’t like a good throwing star zinging by your ear every now and then?

Special Features  

Elektra makes its Blu-ray debut with a heaping helping of extras.  It may not look like much on paper, but believe me; you’ll definitely be taking a few bathroom breaks trying to squeeze all the features into one gigantic viewing marathon.  Unfortunately, it’s a mix bag of goodies.  What I mean by that is the fact that the extras are not all in High-Definition (insert a sad face).  However, the two main ones we care about here are (at least in pseudo Hi-Def).  Let’s cut to the chase and get into the good stuff.  You wanted extras, then you got your extras!  Elektra’s supplemental materials are as follows.

• Commentary by Director Rob Bowman and Film Editor Kevin Stitt – Just your standard every day commentary track.  If you’re interested in this film, then you already know you should check this out.
• Relentless: The Making of Elektra Part 1: Production (HD) – This was a long one.  Almost a whole hour and a half long.  Wow!  I never expected to learn so much about this film.  It was interesting to learn about Jennifer Garner’s hesitation towards this project.  She was very concerned this movie was going to suck and ruin her career.  Rob Bowman assured her he wouldn’t let that happen.  What do you think?  Also, interesting to note, is the discussion over the low budget and number of shooting days they had to work with.  This was another concern of Jennifer’s and rightfully so.  And finally, I was really perplexed to find out that they were not allowed to make this a love story at all.  They had their instructions.  Hmm.  That goes against everything I learned these past 5 months in film class.  You always have that B-love story.  In my opinion, I think Rob did a good job with what he had to work with.
• Relentless: The Making of Elektra Part 2: Post-Production (HD) – Here’s another long one clocking in just over 53 minutes.  If you like editing, special effects and sound mixing, then this is the place for you to be.
• Deleted Scenes (SD) – There’s a total of 3 scenes with optional commentary by Rob Bowman and Kevin Stitt.
• Alternate/Extended Scenes (SD) – There are 7 scenes here with optional commentary by Rob Bowman and Kevin Stitt.
• Elektra: Incarnations (HD) – This is really cool.  This 52-minute documentary takes a look at the history of Elektra in the comics.  It explores Frank Miller’s early work to the present.  This was very interesting because after watching this, I really don’t believe that Jennifer Garner’s passive character was the right choice for this film and Daredevil, to be fair.  After all, she seems like she was a cold-blooded killing machine in the comics.  Unless I am wrong, her character is not conveyed in the film like this?
• The Mythology (HD) – Dr. Katerina Zacharia, of Loyola Marymount University, discusses iterations of the Elektra story in Greek Mythology for a casual 15 minutes of runtime.
• Theatrical and Teaser Trailers (SD) – It is what it is.  Here you have the various Elektra trailers in glorious High-Definition.  Not!  Sadly, they are only presented in Standard Definition.  Boo!

Final Thoughts  

Well there you have it folks.  Elektra is one of those films you either like or you despise.   With me, the film is a guilty pleasure of mine so I stand by resolute in my feelings towards it.  It’s not the most exciting film ever made, but it’s also not the worst.  It’s my Blu-ray review so ultimately I have the right to feel the way I do about it.  I’m going to give it the green light and recommend a purchase for all the fans of the film that want to own it on the Hi-Def format of choice because of the stunning Blu-ray transfer in both the audio and video worlds, as well as the special features package, which is enough to keep you busy for hours on end.  All others should proceed with caution and maybe try a rental first.  So for all my Elektra fans out there, make sure to check out Jennifer Garner as she kicks some ninja clan a$$ in HD and at the same time looks good doing so (that’s always a plus in my opinion).

Bring home Elektra today on Blu-ray!