DVD Review: Serenity
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::Movie review
I only managed to catch a couple of episodes of Firefly when it originally aired. Although I really liked it, I never seemed to manage to find the time to watch it. Considering that the show was cancelled relatively quickly, apparently I wasn't the only one who had trouble watching it. This is a shame because the show was created by Joss Whedon, who is consistently one of the cleverest writers working in Hollywood.
Whedon is also, apparently, one of the most tenacious writers.
At the cancellation of a show, most people might suppress their disappointment and move on. Especially when that person enjoyed a 7 year run on the unexpected phenom Buffy: The Vampire Slayer (and a 5 year go at the spin-off, Angel). But like most of his characters, Joss Whedon is a little unexpected and he refused to let Firefly sail quietly into the night.
To say that the odds of a television show that only ran for half a season could be resurrected would be a massive understatement. Then again, look at what happened to Star Trek after it was abruptly dismissed in its third season. (Interesting side note: would Star Trek be as popular today if the original series had played out on its own terms?) After shopping the series around to other networks, Universal unexpectedly agreed to adapt Firefly into a feature film and the rest is history -- or Serenity.
One of the things that I truly admire about Whedon's writing is that he is able to be so in love with a genre that he can make fun of it mercilessly without ever disrespecting it. Take, for instance, an early scene in Serenity: we are treated to a very classic science fiction moment. The "hero" space ship, the Serenity, majestically flies by the camera and enters the atmosphere of a planet. So far, it's an image we've seen in many other films. Except this time, something breaks off the ship. Mal (Nathan Fillion), the captain, and Wash (Alan Tudyk), the pilot, look at each other in alarm and both wonder, "what was that?" Mal then calmly announces to the rest of the crew that there's a problem and "we might experience some slight turbulence and then explode."
These strange twists of humor are intertwined with a plot that is refreshingly smart. Taking place in the far future, the human race has left Earth for another solar system. Governing this system is the Alliance , while separatists inhabit the outer planets. Serenity is set just after a civil war, in which the separatists lost.
The focus is on a young girl named River Tam (Summer Glau). River was part of an Alliance experiment to create a super psychic warrior. Unfortunately, a careless scientist demonstrated River to several high ranking Alliance officials and, being a psychic, River now knows Alliance secrets. With the help of her brother, Simon (Sean Maher), River escapes and finds refuge aboard the space ship Serenity.
The rest is pretty obvious: The Alliance hunts Serenity. Serenity evades and fights back against the Alliance . And so on and so forth. It's how all of this plays out that makes Serenity a really great experience. The movie borrows from a number of other sources (such as the wild west, or the "lived in" aspect of the Star Wars films), and makes them its own. The characters are engaging, funny, and very quickly we're inspired to care about them. Whedon wisely provides just enough exposition to jump start the story and then leaves the rest for the audience to discover along with the characters.
What I most appreciated was that, while Serenity maintains a clear sense of fun, there is a point to everything that happens within the story. Compare, for example, the space battle above a planet near the end of Serenity with a similar battle at the beginning of Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith. Structurally, these are both similar scenes and both are very chaotic. The difference is that the Star Wars battle is mere eye candy and seems to exist only so that George Lucas could prove he could do it. Serenity's battle, on the other hand, has evolved naturally from the plot and this allows the audience to make an emotional investment in the outcome.
As far as I'm concerned, the only real downside to Serenity is that 2 hours just doesn't seem like enough time to spend in this world. Yes, there are the handful of episodes from the series, but even that doesn't quench the thirst. Serenity is a welcome addition to the science fiction genre and if here is any justice in Hollywood, this won't be the last we see of these characters.
::Video
For a two hour movie with deleted scenes, outtakes, featurettes and a commentary all on one disc, you kind of have to cross your fingers when it comes to the video presentation. Careless mastering of this disc could have produced a very sub-standard picture. Thankfully, that didn't happen. To be fair, this image isn't quite as stunning as it probably could have been, but it certainly isn't bad, either. Colors are good and the contrasts are fantastic. Director of Photography Jack Green really does some wonderful things with the lighting of this film and it all comes across nicely on this DVD. The only problem I noticed was a touch of edge enhancement here and there.
::Audio
The audio presentation on Serenity is really fantastic. One choice Joss Whedon made here was to not use sound effects in space -- a choice I wholeheartedly agreed with. One great example of this is the introduction of the ship Serenity. When it first appears on screen, we only get music cues. And then it hits the atmosphere and an onslaught of sound hits us. The bass rumbles and the roar of re-entry completely fills the listening space. This is a loud and boisterous track and perfectly suited to this material.
::Special Features
Universal has provided a nice set of extras for Serenity, beginning with a feature length commentary by writer and director Joss Whedon. Whedon is an interesting person to begin with, and he really knows how to fill a commentary track. I found his comments to be very insightful and he does a very good job of justifying his various choices for what remained and what was cut from the film. He also manages to point out a number of little touches and mistakes that all but the most careful of viewers would have otherwise missed. Also, given how much more entertained I was by this film than Episode III, I found his little jabs at the Star Wars franchise (and how it has been systematically watered down over the years) particularly amusing.
Next up are about 14 and a half minutes worth of deleted scenes. With many films, the deleted scenes are obvious throwaways. This isn't the case here, where many of the scenes are valuable character moments. Most of these must have been very difficult cuts and Whedon does explain why each scene was removed, both in the main commentary and in the option commentary with these scenes.
Following the deleted scenes are about 6 minutes of outtakes. Outtakes normally bore me to tears because, for whatever reason, the studios somehow seem to always manage to muster up the most inane missed takes you can imagine. I can't honestly say that all of the outtakes here don't fall into that category, but there are also some genuinely funny ones, too.
Future History: The Story of Earth That Was runs just a little over 4 minutes, but provides some good insight into Whedon's inspiration for the series.
What's In A Firefly is over 6 minutes and a little misleading. You might think that it would be 6 minutes worth of a tour of the ship -- and you'd be wrong. Instead, this featurette focuses on the impressive effects work on the film.
The longest featurette, at over 9 minutes, is Re-lighting The Firefly and it deals with the sudden demise of the series and Whedon's undying (dare I say fanatical?) efforts to not let this show die.
Wrapping things up is a special Introduction by Joss Whedon.
::Bottom Line
Serenity managed something that very few films these days can do: it created a real sense of peril for its characters. There is a moment late in the film, when all of the heroes are locked behind a blast door and horrible cannibals (Reavers) are clamoring to get in, that it really seems like they might just all die. And knowing that Joss Whedon really likes to pull unexpected twists with his stories, imminent doom seems all the more likely. It takes great storytelling to create moments like that, because such fear means the audience is truly involved with both the characters and the story. I really don't think the marketing did justice to how good this film really is. Yes, at its core it's a science fiction film, but it's a damn good one and well worth your time.
| Movie |  |
4.5 / 5 |
| Video | |
4 / 5 |
| Audio | |
4.5 / 5 |
| Extras | |
4 / 5 |
| Family Friendly | |
3 / 5 |
| Serenity is, in a lot of ways, like Star Wars. There is some intense action and violence, but nothing too terribly explicit. The only possible trouble area for the youngsters would be the Reavers subplot. | ||
| Overall | |
4.5 / 5 |
- Robert Wurth, ©2005
::Technical Specs
Studio:
Universal Home Entertainment
Year of Theatrical Release:
2005
Disc Format:
1 single-sided, Dual Layer
Image Format:
Anamorphic Widescreen
Aspect Ratio:
2.35:1
Region Encoding:
1 (North America)
Sound Format:
Dolby Digital 5.1, Dolby Digital 2.0 (pro logic)
Running Time:
119 minutes
Director:
Joss Whedon
Stars:
Nathan Fillion, Alan Tudyk, Adam Baldwin, Summer Glau, Morena Baccarin
MPAA Rating:
PG-13
Disc Supplements:
- Feature Length Commentary with Director Joss Whedon
- Deleted Scenes
- Outtakes
- Future History: The Story of Earth That Was featurette
- What's In A Firefly featurette
- Re-lighting The Firefly featurette
- Introduction by Joss Whedon
