Constantine (Warner HD-DVD)

 

Picture: B     Sound: B+     Extras: C     Film: C-

 

 

In the 1970s, when DC Comics went up for sale, many passed on the company (or in the case of the defunct Mego Toy Company, could not figure how to finance it) until Warner Communications figured they would be better off buying them outright than licensing Superman for the Christopher Reeves feature films.  Since then, the company has built and rebuilt the company up, for better and sometimes for worse, focusing on the big heroes, but other interesting characters have existed since the 1930s and new ones surfaced since (including in the new Vertigo label) the acquisition that would make for great film projects.  Constantine has been a favorite for years, but when it was announced that Keanu Reeves would play the title role, that was the end for fans and the resulting Francis Lawrence film did not perform well at all at the box office.

 

A Music Video director, Lawrence has not handled narrative features very well, despite some interesting past work with music artists.  As much as I would like to blame him for the film’s many failures, the core problem is turning too much of the property into a Keanu Reeves film instead of waling the line between his persona and what made the graphic novel comic books work so well.  As demon hunter John Constantine, Reeves is one of those heroes who sees and knows a dark underworld of supernatural evil few know or understand, and must use wild weapons to battle and eliminate these invaders into the world of the living before a catastrophe happens.  Too bad he did not use one of those deadly weapons of supernatural mass destruction on the screenplay!

 

Reeves is one of the best lead movie star actors around, but he has an uncanny knack for picking projects that usually do not work for him or hit for the studio.  For every Matrix, Speed or Bill & Ted, he seems to land up in far more misguided fiascos like this or Johnny Mnemonic that do not do his comic skills justice.  That many demographics can accept him as the hero in action and comedy is rare and there are just not enough talented writers around who can (or care to) write for his specialized talents.  As a result, what could have been the next Matrix franchise is a total dud and part of it comes from the imbalance between comedy that falls flat too much and action that is bombastic to the point of being silly, only outdone by revisionist takes on Christianity that are like Da Vinci Code for idiots (which that says something) and a Fantasy genre mess like Elektra that is really a bad Lord Of The Rings cash-in not-so-cleverly disguised as a Superhero genre film.  Even Rachel Weitz, Shia LaBeouf, Tilda Swinton, Djimon Hounsou, Gavin Rossdale and Peter Stormare are shockingly wasted, and that’s a solid supporting cast.  In this case, read the book, skip the movie, unless you want to enjoy the technical proficiency of the image and especially the sound on HD-DVD as demo material.

 

The 1080p digital 2.35 X 1 High Definition image was shot by cinematographer Philippe Rousselot, A.F.C., A.S.C., in not-always-super Super 35mm film, but is so plastered with endless digital work that his better work here gets lost, even when it offers a certain gloss.  Color is a bit off here, which was actually even the case in the 35mm prints, but annoying in either case.  That Lawrence started as a Music Video director only seems to compound the situation, with sloppy editing and a choppiness that is just a wreck.  That the graphic novel comic is so much more visually compelling is an understatement.

 

The sound was an early first for the home video market because it is one of only four titles so far in the new format so far to offer Dolby TrueHD, roughly the same sound format as the Meridian Lossless Packing (MLP) format from the DVD-Audio format (reviewed often on this site for the now-dead format, TrueHD expanded its capacities) that Dolby has been licensing for years.  It actually (supposedly) promises to be up to three times as clear, but we are still skeptical.  For this review, we initially felt we were not able to adequately test the new format due to the limitations of current hardware, but will note that with only Phantom of The Opera, Training Day and The Perfect Storm (all from Warner) offer TrueHD as of the original posting.  This film has a mixed score by James Horner and was issued as a full 8-track sound film in Sony’s SDDS (Sony Dynamic Digital Sound) format.   Finally though, two recent action films join two music driven films in this respect.

 

The Dolby TrueHD 5.1 mix when revisited on the proper equipment, was superior as expected with constant surround activity, even holding up many years later.  The film is on the forgotten side, not a big hot or one of Reeves more memorable outings, plus fans of the books thought the lead should have been British and not Reeves.  It is now the default highlight of the film.  The Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 mix still shows the aggressive soundfields produced for films magic and fantasy themes, plus being a showcase for a DC Comics superhero, Warner made sure the sound was state of the art.  The score by Brian Tyler & Klaus Badelt is not memorable, but when this sound kicks in, it is the highlight of the film.

 

Extras include the new “in-movie experience” interactive function intended to be like the next step after an audio commentary, with director Lawrence in this case leading the possibilities, though he still is joined by writer Goldsman on one commentary track.  The other is with screenwriters Kevin Brodbin & Frank Cappello, who try to explain the radical changes from graphic novel comic book to Keanu Reeves custom commercial film without much luck.  You also get 14 featurettes, a Music Video and the original theatrical trailer, but it all adds up to how NOT to do a comic book adaptation.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo