An attorney named Robert Clayton Deane (Will Smith) meets up with an old college buddy - very briefly. During this brief encounter, Deane is slipped evidence about a political murder without his knowledge. The man responsible for the murder is a top official of the National Security Agency (Jon Voight), who, already tracking the whereabouts of this evidence, knows Deane is now in posession of it. If the evidence goes public, the murderer will end up behind bars, and he's pulling out all the stops against Deane to make sure that doesn't happen. Deane's entire life is torn about; his credit cards no longer work, his home has been severely vandalized - and they stole his blender. When Deane crosses paths with an ex-NSA official who is now on the other side of the fence (Gene Hackman), he begins to understand why this is happening to him, and looks to Brill (Hackman) to help clear both their names.
I was very interested to see how this DVD would turn out. Enemy of the State is a Buena Vista release, after all. This studio believes it's library of titles is far too extensive to waste time bulking up on special features. The first thing I noticed about this title is the lack of that hideous "Widescreen" banner Buena Vista typically places on the front of their releases. This time, it has been put only on the side. It's very small and out of the way there; I hope this is where it stays. They finally shed that terrible Widescreen banner? Well then, maybe they'll also surprise with some great special features.
No such luck. Enemy of the State features a theatrical trailer and two very short, useless featurettes. There are three additional trailers, but they're used as promos for other Buena Vista releases (Armageddon, The Rock, and Con Air). Let's not forget "Film Recommendations," where "If you enjoyed this movie, be sure to check these out!" As usual, the films listed are of very little relevance to Enemy of the State. The premise for this film makes for some truly awesome menus, but Buena Vista failed to put forth the effort into delivering. Instead, we get static menus with absolutely no audio or animation. Audio quality is just as good as the video; a 5.1 channel soundtrack rocks the speakers in either French or English. Subtitles are only available in English. One annoying element present in this disc (and many others) is that you cannot change audio or subtitle tracks on the fly. You instead need to go back to the main menu and change there. A minor complaint that would be more of a problem if there were more tracks such as audio commentaries and 2-channel audio, but nevertheless still an annoyance.
The film is presented in a widescreen 2.35:1 aspect ratio and is not enhanced for widescreen television sets. Still, the video quality is truly impressive, as is the 5.1 Dolby Digital channel soundtrack. I honestly couldn't ask for anything more in the audio-visual department. Still, this disc could have been so much more with fantastic menus and some useful, informative and interesting special features. A typical effort from Buena Vista (Touchstone).
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