Sony G90 manual Special Editions Few Weird Thoughts, What Dreams May Come

Alien Resurrection – we find each at its correct

aspect, 2.35:1 for all save the James Cameron-direct-

ed Aliens, done here at 1.85:1. All are enhanced for

widescreen displays. All are in Dolby 5.1 surround, which,

as we shall soon learn, is not always an unmixed blessing.

And all have value-added features, ranging, at the simplest,

from Resurrection’s making-of featurette, to the chock full

of goodies on the original Alien, now in its “20th Anniver-

sary” edition.**

The bad news? The sound on Alien is stinko. In earlier

laser transfers of the film, the sound is quite remarkable,

especially in terms of low-frequency weight and articula-

tion and in overall dynamics. Considering its l979 origins,

the surround sound was most effectively deployed.***

But on this DVD, there is no low bass to be heard, and lit-

tle in the way of dynamics. Indeed, if you want a notion of

how far off the sound is, you don’t have to look up the earli-

er editions; all you have to do is select and play back the

music track itself (one of the nice features of the disc) and

see how vitiated, anemic, and jejune the sound has become.

Castrated is the word that pops to mind, if not to body.

This disc should be recalled, a new attempt made to

squeeze its wideband response into Dolby Digital’s narrow

band of bits.****

Visually, it’s a hard choice. I think my Palme d’Or for visu-

al excellence would go to Aliens (viewed in enhanced fash-

ion), which is up there with the best in my experience. *****

Nearly, maybe just as good is Alien Resurrection, but

what a mess its script is, and its director Jean-Pierre Jeunet

(Delicatessen, The City of Lost Children) brings little of his

outrageous visual flare to bear on the proceedings. Given

its box-office reception, nearly as bad as the critical drub-

bings it took, I doubt there will be another in the series,

although I find the implied prospect of aliens loose on a

futuristic planet earth yummy (maybe they would physical-

ly morph into the sleaze-spitting Matt Drudges of the world

to come). Alien3, which repulsed me when I saw it in the

theater, actually plays better on the smaller screens of the

home theater. ******

***I saw a 70mm blow-up of this film in one of Long Island’s best the- aters, before United Artists split it into three theaters and finally razed it to the ground. The sound design helped scare the pants off me and virtu- ally everybody else who was there.

****I intend to undertake a lengthy analysis of the all-too-often crum- my AC-3 sound on DVDs. I have tarried for DTS capability, on the thought that the DTS soundtracks that haven’t been souped up to the high Andes might provide a useful comparison, provided I can find a DTS disc that has not been dicked with.

*****I am working on a comparative listing, in terms of visual excel- lence alone, for an upcoming Super DVD compilation. So far, for those of you who cannot wait, that list would include Starship Troopers, Crash, Austin Powers (but not for content - yes, I just don’t get it), Dark City, Ronin, Elizabeth, and Gods and Monsters, to name but a few.

****** I saw, with Tom Miiller some years ago, the opening day show- ing of John Carpenter’s The Thing in a 70mm blow-up, and it left me feel- ing queasy with stomach over easy, much as did a reading recently of Thomas Harris’ Hannibal, which cannot, without the dread NC-17 rating hovering overhead, be translated faithfully to the screen. Those who have read the ending will know what I mean. When I again saw The Thing, in the first of its t wo laserdisc editions, I found it fascinating and what had been repulsive was tamed almost into an objet d’art field day for the gift- ed Rob Bottin. The home-theater experience seems to f avor feeling over impact, expanding our ability to identify or “read in” to the emotional context of a film, while shrinking the film’s ability to overpower, trans- port, or disgust.

It certainly makes more sense. The look that

director David Fincher (Seven) bestowed on it was

radical in several senses and made following its con-

voluted goings-on, particularly where the monster was con-

cerned, difficult on first viewing. 3 isn’t as bad a movie as I

first thought, though it is not in the same starry pantheon as

the first two movies. Is it heresy to say that Cameron’s only

two good films are the original Terminator and Aliens? If so,

so be it. And the restoration of the 17 minutes he had to cut

to accommodate the marketing powers that be makes sound

emotional sense in the deepening of Ripley’s character,

although I think I could have done without the prolog of

what happened to the colonists. The film works better, I

think, if the way the aliens connected with the people in the

off-world settlement is left a mystery. I find it particularly

objectionable that it is the parents of the one survivor who

first got alienated, so to speak. Too pat. Being pat to the point

of obviousness is one the things I object to most about

Cameron’s work. In Terminator II, he throws away suspense

and the unexpected, unanticipated shock for the gratuitous

special effect. If the morphing villain of II could change him-

self into anything including the floor, the suspense of where

he’d pop up next ought to be killing, but Cameron doesn’t

once take advantage of this inherent license to scare the

remaining wits (not much these days, judging from what’s

making money at the box office) out of the audience.

These discs are available separately, to be sure. So you

might save a buck or more by cherry-picking the best of the

series. I don’t recommend the Alien disc and won’t short of

a remastering (unlikely, I’d think) to solve its sonic woes.

Aliens is a must. Whether or not you go for the other two

would depend entirely on your compulsiveness about these

things. I think you could pass, but then I didn’t, did I?

Special Editions:

A Few Weird Thoughts

I seem to have developed a kind of journalistically induced

schizopolis when it comes to the “added value” stuffings found

in laserdisc and DVD special editions. I deplored the lack of

these features in the Kubrick set and have wondered what

else, beside the kitchen sink, might be found on the DVD of

What Dreams May Come.

As a general rule, I have no use for the “making of” fea-

turettes on DVDs since they are basically promo stuff that

adds virtually nothing to my understanding of the background

of what I’ve just seen. Exception: The all-too-short film made

during the filming of The Shining. Proving the rule: The film

accompanying the release of Gods and Monsters (“Worlds of

Gods and Monsters: A Journey with James Whale”), which I

expected to further enlighten me about the life of that director.

It didn’t.

Oddly, I think, given my endless fascination with film tech-

nology, I really don’t want to know how every special effect has

been done – some things are better left mysteries, as any prac-

ticing magician can tell you. And I find some of the blather from

directors self-indulgent to the point of narcissism. I under-

stand, from a standpoint of pure ego, the desire of directors

and stars to leave behind some sort of permanent record that