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  Directed by
  Starring
  Specs
  • Widescreen 2.35:1
  • 16:9 Enhanced
  • Dual Layer (RSDL 66.48)
  Languages
  • English: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
  • Spanish: Dolby Digital Surround
  Subtitles
    Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese, English - Hearing Impaired, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish
  Extras
  • Theatrical trailer
  • Audio commentary - Kathryn Bigelow lecture - approx 50 min
  • Featurette

Strange Days

Lightstorm Entertainment/Universal . R4 . COLOR . 139 mins . R . PAL

  Feature
Contract

Back in 1995, it all seemed so bleak. The end of the millennium was almost upon us, and according to the doomsayers, everything we knew was going to be turned upside down overnight come January 1st 2000. Computer experts with an eye on lucrative contract work predicted that the “Y2K Bug” would bring the world to a halt and cause planes to fall from the sky. Religious nutters everywhere predicted everything from a variety of second comings to the complete annihilation of the planet. And civilians around the world prepared to be thoroughly ripped off by those hosting big-dollar events to mark the turn of the century, everyone convinced they had to party like there was no tomorrow but uncertain as to exactly why. Looking back on it all now, it seems quite ludicrous. But when James Cameron penned the story that would become Strange Days, the idea of the millennium marking the disintegration of society as we know it seemed almost believable.

Strange Days, while a James Cameron script, was handed over to director Kathryn Bigelow in its journey from page to screen (the kinetic action flick Point Break was the first collaboration between Cameron and Bigelow, though that movie was written by others). Bigelow, well known and highly regarded for her ability to create an all-pervading mood of tension in her films (see the superb Near Dark for a textbook example) was undoubtedly a better choice for Strange Days than Cameron himself - an intensely dark story with generous helpings of extreme violence, it was tailor-made for Bigelow’s no-holds-barred directorial style and her fondness for full-throttle editing (handled here - as it was on the Bigelow-directed, Cameron-produced Point Break - by Howard E. Smith, though with Cameron reportedly assisting uncredited). And while it looks and feels like a James Cameron movie at times, Strange Days takes things further - quite a bit further, in fact, with its relentlessly bleak outlook only tempered slightly by a romance sub-plot that feels like the product of test screenings and/or political correctness.

The story here is essentially straightforward. In December 1999 (at the time of the film’s release, the “future”) the world is degenerating quickly into near-anarchy as the new millennium approaches. It’s a familiar world - the kind we’re used to seeing on the nightly news, minus the fluffy-puppy stories - but everything is amplified, more nihilistic. Inhabiting this world is Lenny Nero (Ralph “Silent L” Fiennes), a good-hearted but cynical ex-cop who’s made the black market his way of life. What Nero sells is software - discs containing recordings of the actual thoughts, feelings and experiences of the person that recorded them, made using a head-mounted device called “SQUID”, which literally records brain activity and can then play it back with the help of suitable equipment (amusingly, though the script constantly refers to the recordings as “tapes”, the prop used to represent them is the humble Minidisc, a choice most likely made because of the discs’ shiny high-tech appearance). On playback, the “viewer” effectively lands in the brain of the person that made the recording, experiencing not only their point of view but also their sense of smell and touch along with their hearing (the latter in full surround sound - an impressive effort for such a small disc and a possible explanation as to why run time is so limited on each recording!)

Nero, the consummate scam artist, makes a perfectly good living out of his “tapes”, as well as taking advantage of the technology himself to relive his own fading memories. But when he is anonymously given a “tape” that shocks him to the core (the contents of it, graphically depicted on screen, will likely shock many viewers as well; this is the main reason for the movie’s R rating - and incidentally, for those concerned about censorship, this R4 disc appears to contain the full, uncensored version of the film) he starts to unravel a very, very nasty plot that could very well extend to the highest level. Nero, though, is driven more by a truth that’s closer to home - that his self-destructive former girlfriend, rock singer Faith (Juliette Lewis, whose attitude-packed songs in this film were actually written by PJ Harvey) is in extreme danger with her New Man, the suitably menacing Philo Gant (Michael Wincott, in his best attempt yet at impersonating Clancy Brown’s memorable Kurgan from Highlander).

There’s social statement aplenty here - much of it lifted from the headlines of the time during which the story was conceived - and while some of it comes across as forced and self-conscious - especially the all-too-neat and almost winningly naïve way the story is wrapped up, a Cameron trademark - this is a movie with something to say, fortunately backed by a solid story, Bigelow’s cranked-to-eleven directorial style and some terrific performances, particularly from Fiennes and co-star Angela Bassett. High-tech, loud, brash and bleak on the surface, Strange Days is really a more conventional goodies-versus-baddies thriller than its creators would like you to believe - but it’s so viscerally exciting and so skilfully made that it’s not at all difficult to be convinced you’re seeing something entirely new.

  Video
Contract

Those who’d looked at reviews of the region 1 version of the Strange Days DVD and noticed it was a non-anamorphic (but high quality) transfer will be rather pleased to hear that Universal’s long-overdue local disc (in the US the DVD was released by 20th Century Fox) is 16:9-enhanced and presented at its correct aspect ratio of 2.35:1. The movie was shot on Super 35, many scenes in low-light conditions - and that is immediately apparent, with a fair amount of film grain visible in many of the more dimly lit scenes. More annoying, though, is the tendency of some shots in a scene to look “washed out”, with too-high black levels, while the shots that surround them during the same scene looking perfectly clean and balanced. From memory, this is the way the film looked in cinemas, but on DVD it looks slightly distracting. There are also a few scenes where film damage - mostly very slight scratches - is clearly visible. However, for the bulk of the running time the telecine transfer is of the highest standard, and it has been beautifully encoded on DVD with not an artefact in sight anywhere. The “SQUID Tapes” sequences are of lower visual quality in terms of both colour resolution and contrast, but this is, of course, deliberate.

This fairly lengthy film is encoded across a dual layered DVD; while well placed in a very unobtrusive position, the layer change took a little longer to negotiate than we’d have liked.

  Audio
Contract

Just bought a 5.1 sound system and want to show it off? This is the disc for you. With sound design by the incomparable Gary Rydstrom, the soundtrack of Strange Days was impressive in the cinema, and is even more so on DVD. Right from the SQUID sequence at the start of the film, the viewer is completely immersed in an intensely active sound-world that makes extensive use of both surround channels as well as the subwoofer track; the SQUID sequences in particular are thoroughly immersive. Ironically, despite the over-the-top aural action this is a very natural soundtrack, with voices and effects intelligently placed across the soundstage, the live music sequences really conveying the feeling of being in the room with the audience. A magnificent soundtrack, this one also downmixes well to Dolby Surround (with an extremely active surround channel) but thanks to its extensive use of the rear channels it may make for a disturbingly disorienting experience at times when listened to in straight stereo, especially in headphones.

  Extras
Contract

Sadly, despite the technical intricacy of the movie, there’s very little worthwhile here in the extras department. Annoyingly, the deleted scenes included on the region 1 disc do not appear here, despite plenty of space being available for them.

Audio Commentary: Don’t get excited. Kathryn Bigelow hasn’t actually recorded a commentary for this film - rather, someone has recorded a public lecture of some kind that the director gave to an audience, and simply added it to the disc as an audio stream that plays behind a truncated version of the film - the commentary and associated video (authored using the same video files but as a separate, truncated “title” on the disc) runs for about 50 minutes, but is silent for a good while before finally starting up. This “lecture” is not screen specific, is very much directed at film students and nobody else, and is very, very poorly recorded. A huge disappointment, this track does contain some interesting info, but the fact that Bigelow’s obviously talking about something other than what we’re seeing - as well as her stream-of-consciousness speaking style here - will put most people off completely.

Trailer: One of a handful of trailers made for Strange Days, none of which captured the essence of the film even remotely. A whole lot of sound and fury signifying nothing, to paraphrase a man named Will. Presented letterboxed but not 16:9 enhanced.

Featurette: A bog-standard EPK-style featurette running to nearly seven minutes (and amusingly still bearing the 20th Century Fox logo from its US incarnation), this offers very little of substance, though as always the on-location footage is interesting to behold. Presented full-frame with compromise-letterboxed film footage.

  Overall  
Contract

An undeniably kinetic and exciting sci-fi thriller, Strange Days manages to use its style and energy to make a fairly standard plot seem like something much more innovative. Extremely paranoid and surprisingly less dated than you’d expect a “millennium” film to be, it’s solid entertainment in the James Cameron style, but with added bite - bite that may not be to everyone’s taste. As a show-off-your-system DVD, however, this one’s near the top of the pile.


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      And I quote...
    "...so viscerally exciting and so skilfully made that it’s not at all difficult to be convinced you’re seeing something entirely new..."
    - Anthony Horan
      Review Equipment
    • DVD Player:
          Sony DVP-NS300
    • TV:
          Panasonic - The One
    • Receiver:
          Sony STR-AV1020
    • Speakers:
          Klipsch Tangent 500
    • Surrounds:
          Jamo
    • Audio Cables:
          Standard RCA
    • Video Cables:
          Monster s-video
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