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Specifications: - Region 1 - Run time: approx. 113 min. - Subtitle: English, French -
Menus: Animated - Package: Keep case
Video Features: - Aspect ratio: 1.85:1 widescreen
Audio Features: - English: Dolby Digital 5.1 - English: Dolby Surround -
French: Dolby Surround Bonus Materials: -
Paul Verhoeven, Kevin Bacon, and -
Isolated Music Score with Jerry -
"Hollow Man: Anatomy of a -
Deleted scenes (3) with director's -
"Fleshing out the Hollow Man" - VFX picture-in-picture comparisons - Theatrical trailers (5) - Talent files - Production notes (2-page spread) Theatrical Release: 08/04/00 DVD Release: 01/02/01 Review Date: 12/28/00
List price: $ 24.95 On-line price: $ 17.46 Pre-order price was: $ 15.99
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| Hollow
Man Special Edition |
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Starring: Kevin Bacon, Elisabeth
Shue, Josh Brolin,
MPAA Rating:
R Studio: Columbia TriStar Home Video |
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Movie: A- Video: A- Audio: A- Extras: A-
Summary:
"Hollow Man"
is a sensational action-thriller that features dazzling
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The Story
Dr. Sebastian Caine (Kevin Bacon) is a genius who comes up with a mean to transform laboratory mammals to an invisible state. Unfortunately, Dr. Caine is as egotistical as he is ambitious, and he possesses the "God" complex. After transforming a dog and a gorilla into the invisible state, Dr. Caine struggles with the formula to bring them back to the normal, visible state. Eventually, the brilliant Dr. Caine makes a breakthrough and successfully brings back the gorilla to the visible state. His elation is short-lived when he realizes that the Department of Defense would take over the project and begin conducting experiments on human subjects without his oversight. Taking matters into his own hands, he proceeds to conduct his experiments on a human subject -- using himself as the test subject!
After his successful transformation into the invisible state, Dr. Caine breaks some of his own research and laboratory rules and ventures outside of the secret underground laboratory compound. Out in the real world, he could not resist taking advantage of his invisible state to spy on his team members and do more than just "casual" voyeurism. Dr. Caine begins to transform into an evil person, perhaps as a side effect of being in the invisible state?
The
visual special effects, particularly during the "bio-phase
shifting" (the gradual process in which a mammal transforms from a
normal state to that of invisibility, or vice versa) scenes, are
visually dazzling. They're awesome! I've never seen visual special effects
that look so
real! Hats off to the Sony Pictures ImageWorks visual special
effects team -- spectacular work!
The 15-minute HBO making-of featurette is a good overview of the film and offers an inside look at how they made the film. It includes narration from members of the cast and crew. They even talk about their fantasies if they were somehow able to lead an invisible life. The "Fleshing out the Hollow Man" featurette consists of fifteen segments, including an insightful study of director Paul Verhoeven and explanations of how the invisible effects were shot given the various conditions and locations.
The VFX (visual effects) picture-in-picture comparisons show the live action characters (Kevin Bacon in black and green body suits) in the main screen, and the finished film with the invisible effect in place in the small screen in the lower right corner of the picture. The comparisons consist of three scenes: "Kramer's Death", "Sprinkler Attack", and "Sebastian's Demise".
The three deleted scenes entitled "Was It A Dream?", "Sebastian Attack", and "Sebastian On The Prowl", show an earlier version of the movie that was edited out after feedback from early screenings. The picture is of finished film quality and contains enough context for the audience to recognize where they would have fit into the movie. It would have been great if the DVD seamless branching feature was used to show the original cut as an alternate storyline selectable by the viewer.
Video & Audio
The image quality of this anamorphic widescreen DVD is excellent. The colors are accurate and saturated, with good shadow details. The Dolby Digital 5.1-channel surround sound is well balanced. The dialogue is clear while the soundtrack effectively engages the viewer.
Recommendation
"Hollow Man" is one movie science fiction fans and action-thriller fans won't want to miss. The visual special effects are dazzling and incredibly realistic. I haven't been this impressed with visual special effects since "Terminator 2: Judgment Day". With an awesome set of bonus features, "Hollow Man" should prove to be one of the more collectible DVD titles for 2001.
Buy
the "Hollow Man" Special Edition DVD at:
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Rent
it at NetFlix.com
(Sign up for
NetFlix.com "Unlimited" DVD Rental Service Visit the "Hollow Man" web site and the Columbia TriStar Home Video web site.
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