eXistenZ (1999) |
BUY IT |
General | Extras | ||
Category | Science Fiction |
Theatrical Trailer-2 Biographies-Cast & Crew |
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Rating | |||
Year Of Production | 1999 | ||
Running Time | 93:06 | ||
RSDL / Flipper | No/No | Cast & Crew | |
Start Up | Menu | ||
Region Coding | 2,4 | Directed By | David Cronenberg |
Studio
Distributor |
Sony Pictures Home Entertain |
Starring |
Jennifer Jason Leigh Jude Law Ian Holm Don McKellar Callum Keith Rennie Sarah Polley Robert A. Silverman Christopher Eccleston Willem Dafoe |
Case | Brackley-Trans-No Lip | ||
RPI | $39.95 | Music | Howard Shore |
Video | Audio | ||
Pan & Scan/Full Frame | None |
English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) |
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Widescreen Aspect Ratio | 1.78:1 | ||
16x9 Enhancement |
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Video Format | 576i (PAL) | ||
Original Aspect Ratio | 1.85:1 | Miscellaneous | |
Jacket Pictures | No | ||
Subtitles |
English Spanish Czech Danish Finnish Hungarian Norwegian Swedish |
Smoking | No |
Annoying Product Placement | No | ||
Action In or After Credits | No |
Forced to flee and go into hiding, Allegra enlists the help of a young assistant, Ted Pikul (Jude Law). After finding a safe place to hold up, Allegra turns her focus back onto her eXistenZ game. She is worried that it has been damaged, and the only way to confirm what damage has been done is for both of them to plug in and play it. This is where the lines between reality and fantasy become unclear.
It's now your turn to plug into eXistenZ. Are you game?
The transfer is presented at an aspect ratio of 1.78:1. It is 16x9 enhanced.
The sharpness, shadow detail and colour are all perfect.
Pixelization or graininess was non-existent on my big screen, which is always welcome and extremely impressive.
No low-level noise was noted. There is some minor edge enhancement present in a couple of scenes but it is not at all detrimental to the picture quality.
There were no MPEG artefacts seen. The lack of aliasing in this transfer makes it a pleasure to watch. I cannot remember seeing even a single occurrence of aliasing. I'm sure if you looked hard enough you would be able to find one or two occurrences somewhere, but really... Only three tiny film artefacts were seen during the movie.
Sharpness | |
Shadow Detail | |
Colour | |
Grain/Pixelization | |
Film-To-Video Artefacts | |
Film Artefacts | |
Overall |
There are only two audio tracks on this DVD; English and Spanish. The default is the English Dolby Digital 5.1, 448Kb/sec soundtrack and this is the one that I listened to.
The dialogue was clear and easy to understand throughout the movie, with only one of Jennifer Jason Leigh's lines being hard to understand, however this was more likely to be the actor's fault rather than the transfer's fault.
No audio sync problems were noticed with this transfer.
Howard Shore's musical score is excellent. It enhances the movie's mood and adds to the on-screen action beautifully.
The surround channels were very aggressively used for ambience, music and lots of special effects. Precise sound placement within the sound field were the norm rather than the exception, putting you right in the midst of the action at all times, not just during the action sequences. Hold on a minute... eXistenZ is paused… Sorry, just had to check that I wasn’t still inside the game.
Using the Sony 725’s internal Dolby Digital decoder, there was almost no .1 channel usage. It could only be heard or felt during the loudest parts of the soundtrack. As an experiment, I plugged the .1 LFE channel into one of the stereo mix-down outputs on my DVD player (which are derived from the 5.1 soundtrack). I immediately heard and felt a dramatic difference. I found that the subwoofer was not only extremely active during the loudest parts of the movie but it was also quietly rumbling away adding extra bass to the whole soundtrack. This left me with two possibilities, one the .1 channel is poorly integrated or two that the Sony's .1 channel decoder isn't doing its job right. I'm am more inclined to believe the second as I have experienced this problem before, so after saying all that, here is my appraisal of the .1 LFE channel usage: the .1 LFE channel is used to subtly add bass to many scenes, and is quite active during the dramatic sequences.
Dialogue | |
Audio Sync | |
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts | |
Surround Channel Use | |
Subwoofer | |
Overall |
NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.
Addendum 29th April 2000:
Canadian Region 1 version:
It has been brought to my attention that there is another Region 1 version of eXistenZ available, in Canada. It boasts not one, but three audio commentary tracks; Director - David Cronenberg, Cinematographer - Peter Sushitzky and Effects Supervisor - Jim Isaac, plus a 50 minute behind the scenes documentary called ‘The Invisible Art of Carol Spier’.
If you do not mind the loss in picture resolution associated with the NTSC format, then this version would definitely be the way to go.
The video quality is excellent, and is easily of reference quality.
This is a magnificent audio transfer, and is also of reference quality.
The extras are limited to two Theatrical Trailers and Talent Profiles for the Cast & Crew.
Video | |
Audio | |
Extras | |
Plot | |
Overall |
Review Equipment | |
DVD | Sony DVP-725, using Component output |
Display | Sony Projector VPH-G70 (No Line Doubler), Technics Da-Lite matt screen with gain of 1.0 (229cm). This display device is 16x9 capable. |
Audio Decoder | Built in to DVD player. Calibrated with Video Essentials. |
Amplification | Onkyo TX-SV919THX |
Speakers | Fronts: Energy RVS-1 (3), Rears: Energy RVSS-1 (2), Subwoofer: Energy EPS-150 (1) |