The overall rating of a review is different from a simple average of all individual ratings.
Advantages:
Excellent quality sound; inclusion of an interesting and relevant documentary; not one but three audio commentaries .
Disadvantages:
The print is not anamorphic ( ! ); slight faults in reproduction of black space are occasionally noticeable, especially during credit sequences .
David Cronenberg has long been acknowledged a master of the macabre, with a plethora of excellent films to his name, from classic horror films from the seventies and early-to-mid eighties (‘Scanners’, ‘The Brood’) to his later excursions into science fiction (‘The Fly’), the fantastic (‘Naked Lunch’) and less generic but no less unconventional work (‘Dead Ringers’, ‘Crash’). With ‘eXistenZ’, Cronenberg revisits science fiction again with a script penned by himself. Cruelly under-distributed theatrically, we now have the opportunity to view this excellent film on the similarly excellent medium of DVD; as one of the characters in the film says, it’s going to be a wild ride.
THE FILM Starting with the unveiling of a new game system (this is the ‘eXistenZ’ of the title, with the audience’s attention being deliberately drawn to the distinctive “capital X, capital Zee” properties of the title) at a market testing session, games designer extraordinaire Allegra Gellar is attacked with a bizarre firearm by a fanatical representative of the ‘Realist’ movement, who are fiercely anti-Game (i.e., anti-VR). Gellar is carried from the melee by Pikul, a public relations trainee who was acting as doorman for the gathering. The two speed away from the scene in Pikul’s truck, only for Gellar to demand that they both play the game at the earliest opportunity, since she believes that the game pod, a small structure made from amphibian DNA and synthetics, may have been damaged in the attack. After Gellar discovers that Pikul does not have a game port installed in his back, and can therefore not play the game, the duo travel to a petrol station where they can obtain such a port illegally. Unfortunately, the port the attendant installs is flawed, and the game pod is damaged further … the attendant has heard that there is a massive cash reward from the Realists for the dead body of Allegra Gellar and the destruction of her game pod, and is planning to collect.
From this point on, Gellar and Pikul become involved in a complex plot
involving the anti-Realists, who wish to preserve the gaming industry at all costs, the Realists, and a group of Game scientists who plan to defect to a corporate rival and take eXistenZ with them. And, as time goes on, they become less and less sure where reality ends and the game begins, and the difference between what is real, and what is virtual…
THE DISC
· Distributor: Alliance Atlantis / 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment [AA019DVD]. Alliance Atlantis, who are now better known for sci-fi TV series such as ‘Earth: Final Conflict’ and ‘Andromeda’, were the Canadian company which was one of the key financiers of the film. Most of the duties for the DVD distribution seem to have been handled by Fox, but Atlantis seem to have had a large hand in the design of the disc itself.
· Rating: 15. Apart from a little swearing and some mild violence (which has a deliberately ‘staged’ air in any case) there is very little in this film which I believe could be found offensive. Perhaps this is a predictable rating by the BBFC, although as per usual I would have been more lenient in their place. Perhaps the cutting of the umbi-cord towards the end of the film might have been a factor.
· Region: 2 (PAL encoding). This disc should play on any region 2 player or any multi-region or region-free player equipped to handle PAL playback. If yours is a UK player then there should be no problem at all — otherwise, check the specs.
· Type and case: DVD9 with clear Amaray keepcase. DVD9s are 12 cm discs with a double data layer on a single side of the disc. They can store about 7.95 gigabytes, if anyone’s interested.
· Running time: feature 93 minutes approx. Essentially the theatrical release of the film, taking into account 4% PAL transfer speedup.
· Picture format: 1.85:1 letterbox widescreen. THIS is the real source of my annoyance with this disc. Having equipped the disc with a good quality soundtrack and some nice extras, the DVD producers miss an opportunity for total success which was, metaphorically speaking, an open goal. Why oh why oh (you get the picture) could that extra little bit of care not have been taken and an anamorphic print included on this disc. If the print is not anamorphic then anyone, such as myself, watching on a widescreen TV must zoom into the image, hence stretching it both horizontally and vertically, to view the film at correct proportions. Even though PAL has more pixel lines per image than NTSC, this results in the film’s resolution suffering BADLY, and is a large disappointment for the DVD purchaser.
Given that the print is non-anamorphic, it is of generally okay quality, with flesh tones faithfully reproduced and colours generally vibrant (although, in this film, some things are intended to appear a little unnatural, staged and flat … this is part of the plot and no fault of the DVD print). There is, however, a slightly noticeable flaw in the black reproduction which appears most prominently during credits.
· Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1. Howard Shaw’s music is a rich and multi-layered tapestry of sound, and here it is reproduced very well indeed. The sound mixing in general is, in fact, spot on, with the elegantly simplistic fades between the different virtual layers of the film being particularly assisted by the sound because of this.
· Subtitles: English for the Hard of Hearing.
· Extras: FX Documentary, US Theatrical Trailer, David Cronenberg commentary, Peter Suschitzky commentary, Jim Isaac commentary, Sega Dreamcast segment.
The FX Documentary is entitled ‘The Invisible Art of Production Designer Carol Spier’, and is part of the ‘Frame by Frame; sequence created for Canadian television. The documentary begins by chronicling Spier’s work on no-budget Canadian films in the era when that country’s film industry was first being set up, through to her many Cronenberg credits. The largest section of the film, however, chronicles her work on eXistenZ and is entirely relevant to this DVD. This is a very engaging documentary, well created and with a good range of footage, including interviews with both Cronenberg and Spier herself. It is presented in 4:3 standard and has a duration of just under 54 minutes.
The US theatrical trailer is presented in 1.85:1 letterbox widescreen approx. As always, this is a welcome disc inclusion and the recent nature of the film ensures that this trailer is not in quite as dire a state as many seen on DVD recently. It lasts slightly less than 2 minutes.
I personally find the inclusion of a commentary on a DVD a cause for celebration, and to be presented in this case with no less than three must therefore be regarded as a treat indeed! Director David Cronenberg’s commentary deals with a wide variety of subject matter, and is constantly engaging; this is a film which Cronenberg both wrote and directed, and his enthusiasm for the project is very clearly displayed here.
Visual & Special Effects Supervisor Jim Isaac is equally enthusiastic, and if he cannot but help to be a little too eager to show off the accomplishments of his team I think he may be forgiven. Although slight overlaps in subject matter between this commentary and Cronenberg’s are inevitable, they are infrequent and, if you can stomach the occasionally pompous phraseology, this is a good commentary.
The commentary by Director of Photography Peter Suschitzky, a man who is very obviously very British, is also good while it lasts. The unfortunate thing here is that Suschitzky seems to run out of things to say on many occasions, and we are left with vast periods in which the film’s volume has been turned back up and we are simply watching the film as per normal. Perhaps, in retrospect, it might have been worth having Suschitzky do a second run-through? Nevertheless, an engaging and worthwhile inclusion.
The Sega Dreamcast segment, accessed through the main menu, is a nine-minute advertisement for the console in 16:9 letterbox widescreen. Hardly much of an extra, methinks.
· Menus: the Main Menu, which allows access to the Extras menu, the Film itself, the Dreamcast segment and the subtitles, is animated and has the theme music to the film playing in the background. The Extras menu is static. Both menus are designed according to the organic gamepod motif of the film, with a central eXistenZ logo being the source for red lines which sprawl outwards, umbi-cord-like, towards the various options as they are selected. A competent design job, although not spectacular.
CONCLUSION For the most part, this is a very good DVD release indeed for what is, at the end of the day, a relatively little-known film. The sound is faultless and the extras unexpectedly numerous, including not only three audio commentaries but a full documentary (and a good one too). Unfortunately, however, the producers seem to have forgotten that DVD was intended to go hand-in-glove with widescreen TV, and that this was why anamorphic prints were introduced in the first place. For me the print on this disc was a grave disappointment on my TV, and this was made all the more annoying by the fact that my monitor seems able to reproduce the film to a very high resolution when playing this disc — the print, it seems, is good enough after all, but there is simply no way for my television to access this capacity.
Re-release, anyone?
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Production Year: 2007 - Science Fiction - Director: Francis Lawrence - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Alice Braga, Charlie Tahan, Dash Mihok, Will Smith, Salli Richardson, Willow Smith
Production Year: 2007 - Science Fiction - Director: Francis Lawrence - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Willow Smith, Dash Mihok, Will Smith, Charlie Tahan, Salli Richardson, Alice Braga
Nothing offensive? People get human teeth shot in their chests and one guy gets half his face blown away! And the whole bio-port thing smacks of deviant flavour bum-love! Watch the film again, man...
mike081179 14.01.2003 21:49
Great op. Strange film and I must admit I did get lost in this. - Mike
Advantages: An intriguing plot effectively and intelligently executed; valid and relevant discussion of current ethical issues related to technology; visually striking and with good cast performances. Disadvantages: Will not reward a viewer who is impatient or in need of a very linear narrative; open to charges of repetition of ‘Videodrome’; are the faults a deliberate part of the simulation or just the result of bad filming?
B.Bligh 08.07.2001 ·
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of eXistenZ - DVD
![Existenz [DVD] [1999]](http://picnica.ciao.com/uk/78529516.jpg "Existenz [DVD] [1999]")
Jul 3rd, 2001
very helpful by (94%):
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