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PLEASE NOTE: Michael D's is currently in READ ONLY MODE. Anything submitted will simply not be written to the database.
Lots of stuff is still broken, but at least reviews can now be looked up and read.
Snatch: Collector's Edition (2000)

Snatch: Collector's Edition (2000)

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Released 24-Apr-2001
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Details At A Glance

General		Extras
Category	Comedy	Main Menu Introduction Main Menu Audio & Animation Dolby Digital Trailer-Train Scene Selection Anim & Audio Audio Commentary-Guy Ritchie (Director) & Matthew Vaughn (Producer) Deleted Scenes-+/- Director's Commentary (6) (8:57) Alternate Subtitles-Pikey subtitles Music Highlights Trailer-2 Interviews-Cast & Crew Gallery-Photo Featurette-Making Of-Making Snatch (24:40) Production Notes Biographies-Cast & Crew TV Spots-(4) (1:09) Filmographies-Cast & Crew Storyboard Comparisons-3 Featurette-B-Roll (4:56) Easter Egg-Fines;Doug's Ring;Doug's Message;Swearing Montage;One-Liners
Rating
Year Of Production	2000
Running Time	98:34
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (68:11) Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu	Cast & Crew
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Guy Ritchie
Studio Distributor	Sony Pictures Home Entertain	Starring	Brad Pitt Jason Statham Vinnie Jones Dennis Farina Stephen Graham
Case	Soft Brackley-Transp-Dual	Starring
RPI	$42.95	Music	John Murphy

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	Auto Pan & Scan Encoded	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No	Miscellaneous
Subtitles	English Hindi	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

NOTE: The Profanity Filter is ON. Turn it off here.

Plot Synopsis

A film like Snatch is one that is quite hard to summarize without spoiling it for the viewer, so I'll try to keep things as general as possible. Directed by Guy Ritchie, Snatch is a film with several storylines juxtaposed in such a way so as to conflict as the climax is reached, similar to Ritchie's previous film Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels.

As the tagline "Stealin' Stones and Breakin' Bones" suggests, the film has two main plot lines. The first, "Stealin' Stones", centres around the possession of a large diamond, although large would be an understatement as the stone in question is eighty-six carats in size (!). The second, "Breakin' Bones", revolves around an unlicensed boxing circuit. Not all of the characters in the film interact with each other, although the two separate plots do intertwine with each other a fair bit, and it is possible to link every character in the film in a "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" kind of way.

The first plot line starts as Franky Four-fingers (Benicio Del Toro) steals the diamond from Antwerp. He is meant to pass it on to Doug the Head (Mike Reid), the cousin of Franky's friend Avi (Dennis Farina), but he is betrayed by one of his comrades as information about the theft is passed onto Boris the Blade (Rade Sherbedgia). Boris then employs Vinny and Sol to do his dirty work for him i.e. get the stone from Franky Four-fingers. More follows but that's when the fun starts.

The second plot line of the film is about Turkish (Jason Statham), a struggling boxing promoter, and his sidekick Tommy (Stephen Graham). After having their prize fighter Gorgeous George taken out of commission in a sale gone wrong, they acquire a trailer park fighter in the guise of unruly Mickey (Brad Pitt). Due to their loss of George, Turkish is now in debt to a much bigger boxing (and also other forms of illegal fighting) promoter Bricktop (Alan Ford). Again this is just the basic premise which merely suggests what can and will happen in the film.

Following on from Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels are a few actors, namely Jason Stratham, Vinnie Jones, Alan Ford and Jason Flemyng. Jason Flemyng in particular, as stated in the commentary, only turned up on the set to take some "photographs", but ended up playing a minor but important role. The feeling this imparts to Snatch is that we are just about watching the same film, but remade with more money and a bigger emphasis on the seriousness of the film.

Snatch has become one of my favourite movies, even surpassing Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels in my book. See it again and again - it just seems to get better, and I know this after watching it at least five times in recent weeks.

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Transfer Quality

Video

Snatch is presented with a technically perfect transfer, only marred by some of the techniques used by the director.

Presented in a widescreen TV friendly aspect ratio of 1.78:1, it is 16x9 enhanced and also features Automatic Pan & Scan Encoding for the less enlightened film viewers out there.

As mentioned above, Guy Ritchie has shot the film to imitate the dark and dreary look of the East End of London. This is not without its consequences though, and is what stops this transfer from receiving a reference quality rating. Nonetheless, it is still a crystal clear and razor sharp transfer. During one part of the film, Guy Ritchie has shot at 800 frames per second for effect, instead of the usual 24 frames per second. The few seconds where this footage is used are very dark and lack detail.

Shadow detail is impeccable. Snatch is quite the disc to show off such qualities as a result of its visual composition as a dark film with brooding shadows throughout. The scene in which Turkish and Tommy's arcade is destroyed shows this off quite well, as does the caravan burning scene. The only fault with this approach is that some background details are lost due to the dark scenery used by Ritchie - this is not a problem with the transfer though.

Colour was intentionally muted for the majority of the film. Most scenes were quite drab in appearance, apart from a scene at 41:00, which has a green tint to it a la The Matrix for effect. Even with this choice of colour style, the transfer still consistently showed well-saturated tones of colour, albeit being on the boring side of the colour spectrum.

Problems with the transfer were at an absolute minimum, with a moderate case of aliasing during the opening credits at 2:51 being the worst artefact noted. I did also notice one spot on the print.

This disc is RSDL formatted with the layer change occurring at 68:11. The place of the change is at a natural fade-to-black and is hardly noticeable at all.

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

Audio

A nicely suited audio mix accompanies the film, presented in Dolby Digital 5.1. The other audio track on this disc is an English Audio Commentary presented in Dolby Digital 2.0. I listened to both tracks.

Being a predominantly dialogue-driven film, the all-important centre channel needs to be clear, and it is, though not perfectly clear. At around 79:00, some of the dialogue is a little hard to make out, though not at all incomprehensible. Additionally, Brad Pitt's thick Pikey accent is so hard to understand that at times you will need to go back to hear what you have missed. Luckily, Pikey subtitles have been provided as an Easter Egg which activate themselves as Brad Pitt speaks, though I can remember at least a few lines where no subtitles were provided.

The soundtrack for this film has been sourced from various artists, as Snatch does not have much of an original musical score, though music is credited to John Murphy. The tracks in the mix are all very British sounding, ranging from We Don't Like Cricket to Massive Attack. Also, there are a couple of tracks with the same big beat sound as The Prodigy included.

The surround channels are utilized to good effect at times, such as 4:04, 4:24, 44:03 and for music at 48:40 and 60:28. Surround channel usage is at a minimum during low-key scenes but picks up tenfold during the action sequences - it's nice to hear well-used surround channels at these times. The LFE channel does get a bit of a workout during musical sequences but not too much elsewhere.

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

Extras

Snatch is accompanied by an almighty package of extras, some really good, some good, and some merely decent. They are showcased in this two-disc set. Note: Disc 1 is dual-layered while Disc 2 is not.

The menus are fully animated (both discs) with the feature disc running through all the main characters with a clip of them from the film before looping back to the start. The second disc doesn't have video clips from the film like the feature disc but does still have some nice animation in a yellow and black colour scheme.

Disc 1:

Dolby Digital Trailer - Train

The only problem I have with this trailer is that it was presented in non-16x9 1.33:1, when basically everything else on the disc apart from the Columbia Tristar logo and some trailers is presented anamorphically. The trailer itself shows off the Dolby Digital soundstage quite well.

Audio Commentary - Guy Ritchie (Director) & Matthew Vaughn (Producer)

An interesting commentary from the makers of the film. Unfortunately, Jason Statham wasn't able to make it on the day of recording or he would have been featured as well, which was a disappointment. Guy Ritchie does the majority of the speaking, even going to the extent of bagging Matthew Vaughn about not talking enough. As well as being a funny commentary, it gives many insights into the film such as what happened behind the scenes with Brad Pitt and also about the few incidents that the dog caused. In something that I haven't heard before, Guy Ritchie explains what is going on behind the scenes... no, behind the audio commentary actually, making numerous references to men in black suits.

Stealing Stones - Extended Cut via "White Rabbit" Branching Feature

Turning on this feature from the main menu causes a diamond to appear on-screen at certain times during the film (29:39, 39:59, 46:17). Pressing Enter/Select at these times takes you to a deleted scene that has been re-inserted into the film, in something of a "Director's Cut". The only problem is that the deleted scenes (which I will detail later on in the review) are full screen and are of fairly poor quality, so the seamlessness of it all is rather tainted, but it is still a good addition to have.

Easter Egg: Alternate Pikey Subtitles

By moving the cursor onto the dog's toy in the main menu, you will get a comic book style speech bubble with various %&!$#@-type characters inserted into it. Selecting this will take you to a separate page that tells you that Pikey subtitles are now on. This will then activate subtitles for Brad Pitt's dialogue. If you can't be bothered going through the process, simply select Subtitle Track 4 while watching the film.

Disc 2:

Song Selection (7)

Knocked Out (1:15)
Coursing (1:50)
Big Fight (2:49)
Retreat (1:14)
A Pikey's Wake (1:24)
Punishment (2:25)
Credits (1:54)

This basically plays the scenes in question with the music at a higher volume than normal compared with the dialogue and other effects. The mix has been downgraded to Dolby 2.0. No song names are listed unfortunately.

International Trailer (1:43, 1.33:1, DD 2.0)

Trailer (0:53, 1.78:1 16x9, DD 5.1)

An odd trailer, presented as a slide show featuring the main characters. Should have been labelled as a teaser trailer rather than just a trailer.

Soundbites (23:39)

For once, Cast & Crew interviews that go on for longer than a few minutes! Extensive questioning of many cast & crew members from the film such as Guy Ritchie, Vinnie Jones, Dennis Farina, Jason Stratham, Stephen Graham and Benicio Del Toro. Each answer has a splash screen before it detailing the question being asked, and even tells the viewer the amount of time the answer will take - very nicely presented. Also, each answer is chapter marked - DVD formatting at its greatest! Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78, with 16x9 enhancement, and Dolby Digital 2.0 audio.

Photo Library (03:19)

Unlike most photo galleries present on DVD, this one is a slideshow presentation. All-in-all there are around 50 photographs, but you aren't able to access each one separately, only sequentially while watching the presentation. Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78, with 16x9 enhancement, and Dolby Digital 2.0 audio.

Featurette - Making Snatch (24:40)

A decent making-of that isn't overly promotional like so many others. It features Jason Statham interviewing (in a way) both Guy Ritchie and Matthew Vaughn in a casual environment as well as behind the scenes footage, such as Vinnie Jones firing his Desert Eagle .50. Some film footage is also included but it is very dark. Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78, with 16x9 enhancement and Dolby Digital 2.0 audio.

Production Notes

Very detailed notes are present on this disc, detailing;

Synopsis
The Snatch Cast
The Family
Fights, Gypsy Camps and Dogs
About the Cast...
About the Filmmakers...

Worth reading is you have the time, but as I said, they are very detailed.

TV Spots (4) (1:09)

These are of excellent quality but are very repetitive. They are chapter marked so each one is easily accessed.

Deleted Scenes - +/- Director's Commentary (6) (8:57)

The six deleted scenes are:

An extension of the scene where Turkish and Tommy go to see Bricktop. *
Sol, Vinny and Tyrone trying to get the combination for the suitcase out of Franky Four-fingers. *
Bricktop's henchmen, Errol and John, interrogating (well you could call it that) Mullet for information about the bookie robbery. *
Bullet-tooth Tony and Cousin Avi making a visit to Bricktop about the stone.
Further development of the scene before this one.
Sol and Vinny back at the campsite looking for the dog.

*: the scenes marked with an asterisk are the ones that can be inserted into the film using the Stealing Stones feature.

It's easy to see that most of the scenes have been left out in order to keep up the pace of the film (1,3,4,5), though a couple are funny and could have been kept. Also, removing these scenes lowers the complexity of the film, as it can get somewhat confusing as it is. The quality of these scenes is on a par with VHS, and they are presented in full screen with production audio in Dolby Digital 2.0.

Filmographies (6)

Brad Pitt
Dennis Farina
Guy Ritchie
Jason Statham
Vinnie Jones
Benicio Del Toro

Listings of the films the participants have appeared in/worked on. As an added extra, they have a one-liner button where their classic line from the movie is replayed for your convenience. My favourite line would have to be Jason Statham's.

Storyboard Comparison (3)

The three comparisons are:

The clip where Avi comes to London. (00:11)
The clip with everyone in. (1:10)
The clip with the fight in. (5:17)

The way these work is that there are three separate viewing angles to choose from: Full Screen Film Clip, Film and Storyboards, or Storyboards. Full Screen simply plays the clip. For Film and Storyboards you have two separate windows running synchronized with the audio playing - this is definitely the best angle as you can see the exact transformation from storyboard to film. Storyboards is exactly that, with audio playing to match the boards.

Featurette - B-Roll (4:56)

This is some production footage shot on location. It shows some preparation work as well as the takes themselves from a different angle. The quality is very good.

Easter Egg: Fines

To discourage on-set problems and delays, the makers introduced a fine system where if you did something wrong such as having a mobile phone ring during a take then you would be booked for a certain amount. Fines were of the order of 5-10 pounds. This is the list of all the different fines you could incur. To access it, highlight "Making of Snatch" on the first extras page and press up three times. A diamond with a dollar sign in it should appear - press Enter/Select.

Easter Egg: Doug's Ring

This is the ring tone that Doug the Head uses in the film, so you can program it into your Nokia mobile phone if you so desire. To access it, highlight "Making of Snatch" on the first extras page and press up twice. A diamond with musical notes in it should appear - press Enter/Select.

Easter Egg: Doug's Message

This is Doug the Head telling you to F*** off - quite odd I'd say. To access it, first get to Doug's Ring page detailed above and then highlight the picture of Doug and press Enter/Select.

Easter Egg: Swearing and Gunplay Montage (1:32)

A highlights package of all the best offensive lines and action sequences - fun stuff. To access it, move onto the second page of extras, then highlight "B-Roll" and press up twice. A diamond with a exclamation mark in it should appear. Press Enter/Select. On the next page you are asked if you are easily offended - selecting no leaves the cursing uncensored, selecting yes has swearing beeped out.

Easter Egg: One-liners (1:30)

This is a short segment with some of the one-liners from the Filmographies plus others in it. To access it, move onto the second page of extras, then highlight "B-Roll" and press up three times. A diamond with a 1 in it should appear. Press Enter/Select.

R4 vs R1

NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.

This disc has yet to be released in Region 1, although it has been released in Region 2, with that disc being identical to the Region 4 version.

Summary

Snatch is an excellent movie presented as a phenomenal DVD package. Visually, it's a treat and the audio is very well done for this type of film. The extras are extensive, interesting and fun to watch.

Ratings (out of 5)

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

Review Equipment
DVD	Pioneer DV-626D, using Component output
Display	Toshiba 34N9UXA. Calibrated with Video Essentials.
Audio Decoder	Built in to DVD player.
Amplification	Yamaha CX-600 Pre-Amp, Yamaha MX-600 Stereo Power Amp for Mains, Yamaha DSP-E300 for Center, Teac AS-M50 for Surrounds.
Speakers	Main Left and Right Acoustic Research AR12s, Center Yamaha NS-C70, Surround Left and Right JBL Control 1s

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