Stargate [Blu-ray]

Stargate is the name given to a mysterious circular item found in Egypt eighty years ago and witnessed by a young girl called Catherine. In the present day the government still haven't figured out how it works, that is until reluctant expert Dr. Daniel Jackson has a look at the new-found discovery.

He deciphers the seventh and final code necessary to activate the phenomenon, allowing anyone or anything to cross through time and space to another point in the galaxy. Teaming up with an army team led by Col. Jack O'Neill who has his own troubles - his son shot himself dead accidentally, they set off to explore what's on the other side, finding an enslaved tribe held under the control of an evil God, Ra.

At the start of the expedition, O'Neill and Jackson are on opposing sides, mentally, especially since O'Neill's orders are to make sure those on the other side can cause no harm towards the people of Earth, but once they find their common goal it forces them to overcome their differences and find a way to defeat Ra.

The two main characters played by Kurt Russell and James Spader spar well together. Russell is more used to action/adventure films having been through Backdraft, Escape From L.A., Escape From New York, Executive Decision and Tango And Cash. Spader on the other hand has usually taken the more arthouse/low-budget route through Hollywood. When his star was in the ascendancy he started in comedies such as Mannequin and Pretty In Pink, then went onto the dramas Sex Lies and Videotape, White Palace and Two Days In The Valley, before Crash-ing into controversy with the censorship board with David Cronenberg's bizarre movie. Today, neither of them are particularly big Hollywood draws. How things change.

Jaye Davidson is still best known as Dil from The Crying Game, and we all know what happened in his role in that movie. Out of the entire cast though, Alexis Cruz, as the young boy Skaara, is the only member to appear in the spin-off television series "Stargate SG-1".

This disc contains both the theatrical and 130-min extended Director's Cut versions of the film, the first of which comes after the Stargate is unearthed in 1928 and shows petrified Horus guards near the cover stones, giving the idea that some had tried to come through the Stargate after its burial, but this was cut to shorten the running time.

Presented in the original 2.40:1 anamorphic widescreen ratio, the picture is nicely detailed but has a weird shimmering effect on it which also caused Optimum's Luc Besson Blu-ray releases to suffer. For the record, I'm watching on a Panasonic 37" Plasma screen via a Samsung BD-P1500 Blu-ray player.

As for the sound, this is in DTS 7.1 HD Master Audio in English (with a 5.1 option in French and German), or DTS 5.1 for those, like me, without the full technical dohickey. For a special effects film, expect the usual whizz-bang explosions usually associated with a Devlin/Emmerich production nicely represented here, not to mention the fact that your room will vibrate when the Stargate powers up for the first time! I can still remember seeing this one at the cinema and how exception the sound was, as my local, Manchester Showcase, was only just starting to equip a couple of its screens with DTS audio.

The extras are as follows:

* Stargate: History Made (22:19): A present day look back at the concept of the film, the casting and a general 'making of', all mixing in clips with chat from key cast and crew members. This featurette has 3 chapters

* Making of Stargate (52:02): A more in-depth look at the movie, presented in 4:3 and spread over 9 chapters, and this time filmed at the same time as the movie was made.

* Is There a Stargate? (12:11): A featurette pontificating on whether aliens have been here before.

* Original Stargate Previews (17:19): Five made-for-TV segments narrated by a man with a deep voice, made to promote the movie on its original release.

* B-Roll (6:03): Various on-set footage without narration.

* Gag Reel (3:13) Does what it says on the tin, although it's basically the cast and crew messing about and all in one take.

* Trailer (2:38): In rather ropey-looking 16:9. Come on, Optimum, you could've sourced a better print than this?

* Audio commentary: with writer/director Roland Emmerich and co-writer/producer Dean Devlin.

* Picture-in-picture: Stargate Ultimate Knowledge: Loads of additional info as the film progresses for the Stargate afficianado.

* BD Live: Connect your Blu-ray player to the internet and it sounds like you'll be able to get info the IMDB page for this film. I've never got my player to go online properly before, so I'll just visit IMDB anyway.

The menu mixes a short piece of the theme with some mediocre pyramid-style animation, and the text is available in English, French of German. Oddly, after it plays the music once, it then reloads the menu but doesn't need to do it again. Chapters-wise, this time there are 3 more than the average Optimum release, which makes a change, but still, 15 over a 2hr+ running period is just simply not enough. Finally, when it came to subtitles, Optimum are bad enough at the best of times with dropping them, but this is the ultimate insult - there are subtitles in French and German, but not the film's original language of English!

Film: 8/10
Picture: 7/10
Sound: 10/10
Extras: 7/10

*** THIS REVIEW IS FOR THE 2010 BLU RAY REISSUE of "STARGATE THE MOVIE - ULTIMATE EDITION" ***

This March 2010 Blu Ray reissue (15th Anniversary) of Roland Emmerich's 1994 Sci-Fi blockbuster is a bit of a mixed bag. At least it has 4 hours of NEW extra content (on top of previously released features) and both the Extended Director's Cut and the Theatrical versions of the film - but its print is gorgeous one moment and awful the next...

There's a lot on here, so let's get to the spec details first:
* 1080p High Definition Print in 2.40:1 Aspect Ratio
* Opening Menu Offers - German, French and English
* Theatrical Version (121 minutes)
* Director's Cut (130 minutes)
* New 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio for English
* 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio for both French and German
* Subtitles English, German and French
* New "Deciphering The Gate: Concepts And Casting" Featurette
* New "Opening The Gate: The Making Of The Movie" Featurette
* New "Passing Through The Gate: The Legacy" Featurette
* New "Never-Before-Seen Gag Reel"
* New "Picture-In-Picture STARGATE Ultimate Knowledge" Feature
* "Is There A Stargate?" Featurette
* "The Making Of Stargate" Documentary
* Audio Commentary with Writer/Director Roland Emmerich and Writer/Producer Dean Devlin
* Original Stargate Previews
* B-Roll Footage
* BD Live

As you can clearly see from the impressive list above, this Optimum Releasing/Studio Canal reissue isn't blindly throwing the film out there - there's really great new extras on here and fan-orientated too. But having said that, the whole shebang is let down somewhat by the actual print itself.

Primarily because of how the movie was originally filmed and the mercilessness of the Blu Ray format - the outdoor sequences are beautiful to look at - but anything 'indoors' - inside the secret American site where the circle of stones is held - the Stargate device sequence - arriving at the entrance of the new world - in the slaves sand-filled shacks - in fact anything involving 'indoors' is full of bad lighting and blocking. So while you are impressed with the beauty of the opening 'Indiana Jones' desert-sequence at the beginning of the Theatrical version and the car pulling to Kurt Russell's home to get him on board the project - you are sent in the opposite direction by how bad the wedding sequence is between James Spader and the lovely Israeli actress Mili Avital - the spaceship landing on the pyramid when 'Ra' returns and Russell's soldiers are trapped underneath - and so on. In short, if you're looking for pristine picture quality all the way through, then this Blu Ray print will disappoint... Having said that and all things considered - this release is being pitched at less than ten quid, it has great sound and genuinely superb extras - and when the print sparkles, it really does.

To sum up - this Blu Ray is probably the best were going to get by way of presentation for the hugely entertaining and eminently re-watchable "Stargate - The Movie". Just be prepared to accept and forgive the less-than-great visual bits in between...

Into the Stargate, 9 Jul 2007

"Stargate" is, obviously, the movie that later spawned the hit "Stargate SG-1" TV series, and its spinoffs.

But taken on its own merits, "Stargate" is a pretty entertaining blockbuster with some big flaws. It uncomfortably straddles the fence between "shoot-em-up bombs'n'action" and "mythology sci-fi," but provides a solid villain, some sketchy writing, and the foundation for a hit TV show. Well, it's definitely far better than your average sci-fi blockbuster.

Egyptologist Daniel Jackson (James Spader) has just lost his job, when a mysterious old lady invites him to become involved in a secret military project. Soon he finds out why -- a massive stone ring found in Giza decades ago, with strange symbols on a central ring. When they use his calculations, the Air Force is able to open a wormhole to a distant galaxy.

Obviously a recon team is sent through, led by the grieving Colonel O'Neil (Kurt Russell). This new world is a desert planet, inhabited by a race of primitive human slaves who practically worship the strangers. But things turn deadly when a pyramid ship descends on the desert, and a malevolent "god" decides to obliterate Earth -- using a nuclear bomb O'Neil brought along.

It's a pretty straightforward action plot -- scientist opens gateway to new planet, bad guy shows up and makes trouble, good guys attack bad guy with the help of plucky natives. "Stargate" doesn't add much to the typical formula, but it does dress it up with gilded robes, giant stone statues, glittering starships and sandswept deserts.

In fact, spectacle is what "Stargate" excels at -- it has big armies of invading, big ships, big pyramids, and big battles with Ra's warriors. When it comes to gun battles and explosions, Roland Emmerich does a pretty decent job. However, he gets mesmerized by the gilded interior of Ra's starship and the prettyboy alien slinking around -- the middle part of the movie is very slow-moving.

It's more clumsy at the intimate stuff of character development, such as Daniel's serious romance with a chief's daughter, or O'Neil's depression over his son. It just never feels natural or deep. The accompanying dialogue is usually pretty solid, but sometimes gets downright clumsy ("I don't want to die. Your men don't want to die. These people don't want to die. It's a shame you're in such a hurry to").

Spade pretty much steals the show as a lovable geek who sticks to his guns, even if it makes him a laughingstock. And the geek gets the girl, not the military grunts -- a nice change. Russell is stuck with a rather stiff, humourless military man, although he loosens up in the last lap. And Alexis Cruz, Mili Avital and Erick Avari all get kudos for making the lovable, deep characters come alive without a word of English.

"Stargate" is a fun movie for the spectacle and slam-bang action scenes, so long as the weak scripting doesn't hold you up. And it served as a good foundation for one of the best "exploration" sci-fi series in ages.