Frighteners, The: Peter Jackson's Director's Cut (HD DVD) (1996)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Horror	Menu Animation & Audio Audio Commentary-Peter Jackson (Director) Featurette-Making Of-(225:34) Theatrical Trailer-(2:09)
Rating
Year Of Production	1996
Running Time	125:09 (Case: 123)
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Peter Jackson
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Michael J. Fox Trini Alvarado Peter Dobson John Astin Dee Wallace Stone Jeffrey Combs Jake Busey Chi McBride
Case	Amaray Variant
RPI	$39.95	Music	Danny Elfman

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	1080p
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired French	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    A mystery heart condition is striking fear into the population of the town of Fairwater, a sleepy seaside village that has more than it's share of skeletons in the closet. People are literally dropping like flies without warning, and the sudden affliction doesn't seem to discriminate between young or old, rich or poor. In all this chaos and uncertainty, there's one person who's certain to profit from people's superstitions; Frank Bannister (Michael J. Fox), a trickster and swindler who despite having a legitimate talent for communicating with those on the other side, uses his ghostly contacts to scare honest people out of their hard earned cash. Frank is an outcast, seen as a vulture by many, and rightly so. The media are onto him as well, but he sees himself just as a guy trying to make a living.

    A talent like communicating with the other side must come with a down side, and Frank certainly has his work cut out for him. Frank's unique ability allows him to see jagged, glowing numbers carved into the foreheads local towns people, and he soon realises that these numbers are connected to the sudden, unexplained deaths in the town. With the help of a local doctor, Lucy Lynskey (Trini Alvarado), who believes in his abilities, they discover that the recent deaths in their town may be connected to a killing spree that was perpetrated by an orderly at the local sanatorium many years ago. Is the town being terrorized by a ghostly serial killer? When his dear Lucy becomes the phantom's next target, Frank must make the ultimate sacrifice in order to protect her.

    The Frighteners is a fantastic, humorous and mildly scary ride that has been brought to the screen with a superb cast and lively direction from Peter Jackson. Michael J. Fox and Trini Alvarado are a convincing on-screen pair, who obviously have a great chemistry. Some great talent can be found in the film's support roles as well, particularly Jeffrey Combs, who appears as very quirky, hilariously anal-retentive FBI agent Milton Dammers.

    One should remember that in the mid-1990s when this film was made, digital effects were very much in their infancy. The scope and sheer volume of the digital special effects contained in the production was unprecedented at the time, and it's quite amazing to know that it was all pulled off in New Zealand. Jackson views this film as the stepping stone from small-budget independent filmmaking (Heavenly Creatures) to major studio block busters (Lord of the Rings) and that transition is easy to see when the film is viewed alongside the accompanying making-of documentary.

    The feature's runtime includes a 2:40 introduction by Peter Jackson that can be skipped manually. This Director's Cut version of the film includes a lot of additional pieces of footage, most of which is pointed out by Jackson in his informative audio commentary. Many of these scenes were trimmed for timing and pacing reasons, but some are very funny and it is great to see them included here. This is undoubtedly the definitive version of the film, presented very nicely on HD DVD.

Video

    This HD transfer is consistent with the film's theatrical aspect ratio of 2.35:1, and presented in a native 16x9 frame.

    This is a very sharp transfer, with a great level of depth visible in the image throughout the film. The clarity and detail in the image can be seen at 71:28 in the  light rain and distant green landscape. Shadow detail is also excellent. During a particularly dark, shadowy scene at 51:15, the wrinkles and shades in Dammers' dark suit can be clearly seen, as well as brickwork in the spooky, dimly lit corridors. There was no low level noise evident in the transfer.

    Colours are bright and lifelike, with accurate skin tones and deep, rich reds and greens.

    This transfer uses a VC1 encode, and there aren't any compression issues to speak of in the slightest. Some film artefacts and grain are present, but these never extend beyond a few intermittent specs of dust and dirt. The film transfer is otherwise very stable, and the new scenes for the director's cut have been seamlessly integrated into the original cut.

    An English subtitle stream is available for the hearing impaired via the setup menu. The text is very accurate but the font is large and the text often occupies up to three lines on the screen, making it rather obtrusive.

    This disc is dual-layered (HD-30).

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The film's original English soundtrack is presented here in Dolby Digital Plus 5.1. The dialogue is crystal clear and always easy to discern above effects and score. The ADR is generally solid, but I did notice a few instances in which the dialogue replacement didn't quite match the performance on screen. Audio sync seems fine.

    The surround channels are used sparingly for all manner of atmospherics and directional foley effects. Ghostly thuds and whooshes are common in the rear channels, as well as your typical street noise and weather. Voices are generally confined to the front centre channel.

    The fantastic score is by Danny Elfman, and has a very dramatic, classic horror feel. The newly inserted scenes for this director's cut were not originally scored by Elfman, so other pieces of music were inserted from other parts of the film.

    The subwoofer is very active from the film's opening frames. Thunder, crashes and thuds are very nicely augmented and the occasional tense, supernatural rumble doesn't go astray.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    These extras were made for the laser disc edition and were included on the 3-Disc Director's Cut DVD. Both the documentary and feature film include brief video introductions from Peter Jackson, that were made for the DVD release.

Menu

Audio Commentary- Peter Jackson (Director)

    Peter admits early on that this is his first attempt at a commentary, and he does a very good job considering. The information flies thick and fast, and it's all good. Peter discusses every aspect of the filmmaking process, from script writing to photography and casting. There is also quite a bit of detail offered about hiccoughs that occurred during production, as Peter often refers to his past projects, including Heavenly Creatures. There were some difficulties in selling the idea of filming in New Zealand to the studio, but pressure from their enthusiastic producer, Robert Zemeckis, helped move the production along. This is a fantastic, informative commentary that maintains a great level of interest despite many overlapping facts being in the accompanying making-of docco.

Documentary- The Making of The Frighteners (225:34)

    Running at close to four hours, this is the most lengthy, most comprehensive account of filmmaking you're likely to find. This Making Of begins with cast and filmmakers sharing their personal experiences with the supernatural, but soon launches into the making of the film itself. Jackson describes how they first hatched the idea, then write a brief outline for their agent. The development of the screenplay itself is also covered, as well as their meeting Robert Zemeckis. At this point in time, WETA was in it's infancy and had managed to handle some minor digital effects for Heavenly Creatures on a single computer. Here, we see Jackson building WETA's processing ability in order to handle the sheer volume of effects needed for The Frighteners. This informative docco includes lots of cast and crew interviews, blue screen footage, early SFX composite shots, deleted sequences and bloopers. It's presented in standard definition, 1.33:1 video.

Theatrical Trailer (2:09)

    Your typical trailer for a film like this, highlighting the action and humor. Presented in standard definition 1.33:1 video, with stereo audio.

    The video transfer is sharp and film-like.

    The audio transfer is lively and crystal clear.

    The extras are extensive and detail a lot about the making of the film.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall