Bleak Future (Fantasy/Comedy)
Picture: C Sound: C- Extras: C+ Film: C-
Brian S.
O’Malley’s Bleak Future is not
another dystopic Science Fiction piece, but a disjointed Fantasy/Comedy piece
that is silly and all over the place, made worse by a gap of several years
between the earliest shooting and final cut.
Slangman and three other outcasts land up going though time and space,
falling into various adventures. Too bad
there is no coherent script, but these do not even add up to a good series of
vignettes. Supposedly, the goal is
finding something called “The Source” or the like, but it unfortunately has
nothing to do with a coherent or challenging script.
However,
it is the mix of Super 8mm film shooting and trying to integrate that with new
technology that does not match. The film
was finished in Super 8 only years ago, except they did not have the money to
do the sound! This is the completion of
the project years later than might be too late.
The image
has various aspect ratios, more or less, since with was shot in Super 8mm film (1.66
X 1) back in the mid-1990s as Kodak was discontinuing full color sound stock
cartridges and some pick-up shots were forced to be shot on digital (1.33 &
1.78 X 1) made in vein to look like the Super 8mm film in a failed way. They cannot settle on a final ratio, so
images are stretched at some point no matter what kind of playback or monitor
you use. The Dolby Digital 5.1 mix is a
sincere attempt to upgrade any old audio and add new voiceovers. Unfortunately, I have heard 1930s radio
dramas with better fidelity. Whoever
directed the revoicings, they overdid it.
Extras,
however, are the best reason to give this disc a look, including text on how
this was all finally finished in detail that film and videomakers in particular
will enjoy. You also get 500 stills
split into seven galleries, outtakes, deleted scenes, trailer, cast/crew text
information, DVD-ROM accessible script, DVD-ROM MP3 soundtrack, DVD-ROM
wallpaper, two audio commentaries and seven behind the scenes pieces. Though the result is not good, its making is
an interesting look into the changes in very low budget filmmaking and how
digital has at least overtaken Super 8mm enough to kill it. With HD still trying to totally conquer 16mm,
we will see a repeat of this in a decade or so at the soonest.
- Nicholas Sheffo
