Blu-Ray/Documentary Review: Aliens Expanded

 

Aliens Expanded is a massively long documentary (just under five hours if you watch the entire credits sequence) created by a group of documentary filmmakers who were fans of the 1986 movie Aliens. Of course, Aliens was the sequel to Ridley Scott's original movie. It was the second entry in what has become a franchise of films and the only one written and directed by James Cameron. This disc does not include the movie itself. Still, it does feature interviews with most of the surviving cast and crew members, including James Cameron, producer Gale Anne Hurd, Sigourney Weaver, Michael Biehn, Lance Henrickson, Jenette Goldstein, Carrie Henn, Paul Reiser, Colette Hiler, Mark Rolston, Willam Hope, Cynthia Dale Scott, Daniel Kash, and Ricco Ross. 

The film talks about pretty much every aspect of making the movie, from the initial approach by the studio to Cameron to write the screenplay, the casting process, including getting Weaver to reprise her role as Ripley, to the almost mythic battle that Cameron had working with the crew at Pinewood Studios in England, who were pissed off that a "yank" with no experience (Terminator had barely come out when Aliens was being made) was replacing Ridley Scott, to the grueling process of actually shooting the film. There is a discussion of the infamous "Tea Lady" incident in which Cameron (who is notorious for being difficult to work with anyway) kicked the tea cart that was brought for the crew every day, shutting down production while the crew drank tea and ate scones, and yelled at the tea lady to get the fuck out and ripped into the crew for being lazy. 

If you have watched the behind-the-scenes material and have listened to the commentary tracks on the physical media releases of Aliens, then you will have heard some of the stories that are discussed in the documentary, but this goes into much great depth and includes discussions of things that are not included on the official commentary tracks, such as why Michael Biehn replaced James Remar as Corporal Hicks. 

The documentary can be ordered on the website aliens-expanded.com. You can order a digital edition or a region-free Blu-Ray. The digital edition of the film itself is about $18, and the Blu-Ray is about $112-$119 (including the shipping cost), depending on whether you get the T-shirt. If you order the Blu-Ray, you get swag to go with it, including a patch, a poster, a certificate of contribution, and a T-shirt. If you ordered before the release date, you had the option of the T-shirt or having your name appear in the credit sequence.  There are some extras, including deleted scenes that are snippets of interviews that did not make it into the main film, including an interesting discussion of the rumored direct sequel that would have ignored Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection and would have brought back the characters of Ripley, Newt, and Hicks. There is also a Zoom meeting discussion between the filmmakers where they discuss the process of making the documentary, including the hoops they had to jump through to get in touch with Sigourney Weaver and get her to agree to sit down for an interview, which happened at the very last minute and ended up pushing the release date back. Thankfully, you can resume watching from where you left off if you do stop watching before the end of the film.

Ultimately, this is a very good documentary for die-hard fans of the film. It is not something that a casual fan will likely want to sit through, given that it is about 4 hours and 15 minutes long if you don't watch the credits and 4 hours and 42 minutes if you do. While it is not a scene-by-scene discussion of the movie, it does include a lot of clips from the movie and a lot of behind-the-scenes material from when the movie was made. Again, if you have watched the bonus content from the physical media releases, some of it is repetitive. It does not, however, feature any of the archived interviews that Bill Paxton did for the movie before he died. It does have a few f-bombs in it, so that is something to be aware of, but the movie had a lot of swearing in it, so that should not be too shocking. So, if you love the movie and don't mind watching a very long documentary about it, this is worth watching.    

4K-UHD/Movie Review: Avatar: The Way of Water (Three-Disc Edition)

 

Avatar: The Way of Water is the 2022 sequel to 2009's massive and groundbreaking hit, Avatar. It is again written and directed by James Cameron. In it, Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana reprise their roles as Jake Sully and Neytiri. The rest of the cast includes Kate Winslet, Cliff Curtis, Britain Dalton, Trinity Bliss, Bailey Bass, Jack Champion, Flip Geljo, Jamie Flatters, Scarlett Fernandez, and Edie Falco. Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang, Joel David Moore, Giovanni Ribisi, CCH Pounder, and Dileep Rao, who all appeared in the first movie, also appear in this one. It would give away too much to reveal exactly how their characters appeared. Still, it is not spoiling anything to say that some of the appearances are very short cameos (e.g., through video footage), and others are more substantial.

The movie is set sixteen years after the events of the first movie and sees the return of the "sky people," aka the Resources Development Administration (RDA), to Pandora. Their mission is to colonize Pandora but to do so, they realize they will have to take out Jake. We learn that Jake and Neytiri have a family. When their family is attacked, they flee the forest and take refuge with a Na'vi clan called the Metkayin, who live next to the ocean and have a symbiotic relationship with the sea-dwelling creatures. We also learn that the Metkayin have a different physiology and a completely different way of life than the forest-dwelling clans. Of course, they cannot stay hidden forever, and another epic battle with the sky people ensues.

There are a couple of different versions of the 4K sets. This one is a three-disc version with a UHD disc and two regular Blu-Ray discs. The UHD disc and the first regular Blu-Ray disc contain the movie, while the second regular Blu-Ray disc has all of the bonus features. The most extensive bonus feature is a series of making-of featurettes that can be played together or individually, totaling almost three hours. The behind-the-scenes material covers the new characters, the returning characters, the casting process, the advances made to the motion capture technology, the stunt work, and more. Then, there is a music video and some promotional spots for the movie. So, this set has well over three hours of bonus content. There is a four-disc set that includes a second bonus disc, and that one has over eight hours of bonus features. It sucks that there are two different 4K releases, but if you want all of the bonus content, you need to pay attention to what 4K set you are purchasing. They did a similar 4K release for the first Avatar movie, but the difference is that the upgraded set for the original movie also had the expanded edition of the movie, whereas, for the sequel, both sets just have the theatrical release (which is on its own over three hours long). 

Ultimately, this is a good sequel. It touches on many of the same themes as the original movie and expands the world of Pandora beyond what we saw in the first film. The acting and writing are very good, and the motion capture and CGI technology have advanced so much and look so good that it is almost hard to tell what is practical and what is computer-generated. The A/V quality is top-notch, and the video and sound are reference-quality. If you enjoyed the first movie, this is absolutely worth watching.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: Aliens

 

Aliens is a 1986 Sci-Fi action/adventure/horror film written and directed by James Cameron as a sequel to the 1979 Ridley Scott film Alien. It stars Sigourney Weaver (reprising her role as Ripley from Alien), Carrie Henn, Bill Paxton, Michael Biehn, Lance Henriksen, Jenette Goldstein, Paul Reiser, Al Matthews, Mark Rolston, and William Hope. The movie is set 57 years after the events of Alien. At the beginning of the film, Ripley's spacecraft is discovered with her and Jones the cat still in stasis. We learn that the exomoon LV-426 has been colonized by a terraforming colony with no reports of hostile aliens. When Earth loses contact with the colony, Ripley is asked by a representative of the Weyland Corporation named Carter Burke (played by Reiser) to act as a consultant for a group of Marines sent to investigate the loss of communication. Once they arrive on the moon, they find the colony destroyed and evidence of an attack.

The 4k set is a three-disc set containing a UHD disc and two regular Blu-Rays. The UHD disc and one of the regular Blu-Rays just include the two versions of the movie (the theatrical edition and the 1990 remastered expanded edition). There are commentary tracks on each version of the movie by Cameron and members of the cast and crew. Some of the people providing commentary were recorded together, and some were recorded on their own, so the commentary jumps between conversations. The second regular Blu-Ray disc contains bonus features. The bonus disc has over four hours of extras. The most extensive is a three-hour-long making-of documentary (that can be watched in individual segments or in a play-all mode) that includes interviews with the cast and crew from the time the movie was being made, along with interviews made later on. There is also a discussion with Jim Cameron that was made very recently. Finally, there are some stills galleries, trailers, and TV spots.

Ultimately, the movie is very good, with a lot of action and suspense. The longer version of the film adds about 20 minutes of additional footage, mostly at the beginning of the movie before the team arrives on LV-426, which adds a bit more context for Ripley's motivations. The bonus content and commentary tracks provide a lot of interesting information, including the contentious filming process (Cameron, who has a reputation for being hard to work with anyway, butted heads with much of the initial crew that was forced upon him by Pinewood studio), how Weaver ended up getting a massive payday because she was not signed until after the script (which was centered around the Ripley character) was written, and how Cameron was only allowed to direct the movie after The Terminator was a hit. The A/V quality of the UHD disc is good. This movie looks grainier than many of Cameron's other 4k restorations because of how the movie was shot. Cameron notoriously hates film grain and uses a lot of digital noise reduction to make his older movies look like they were shot digitally with today's cameras, which some people hate. But because of the equipment they used to film Aliens, some of the grain is left in (although it is much less grainy than the VHS or original DVD release). Since CGI was not a thing back in 1986, in the UHD format, you can definitely tell when models or matte paintings were being used to create effects, and some of the effects do look a bit cheesy. Even so, the movie is still very enjoyable and well worth the time to watch.

4K-UHD/Movie Review: The Abyss

 

The Abyss is a 1989 Sci-Fi/Adventure movie written and directed by James Cameron. It stars Ed Harris, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, and Michael Biehn, along with numerous recognizable character actors. The basic plot is that a top-secret nuclear submarine is hit with something akin to an electromagnetic pulse. The Soviets are moving toward the sub as a hurricane enters the area. The Navy sends a team of Seals to a Deep Core underwater oil rig (run by Harris' character Bud Brigman) that is located where the sub went down along with the designer of the oil rig, Lindsey Bergman (played by Mastrantonio), who is also Bud's estranged wife) to launch a mission to find the sub and try to recover the sub and find any survivors. As the movie goes along, the crew discovers that the sub was sunk by a race of aliens that have been living in the oceans, referred to in the movie as NTIs (short for Non-Terrestrial Intelligence). The Seals plan to use a nuke to attack the NTIs, which leads to a confrontation between the Seals and the crew of the rig.

The 4K set is a three-disc set with one UHD disc and two regular Blu-Ray discs. The UHD and the first Blu-Ray disc contain both versions of the movie: the two-hour and twenty-minute theatrical version and the two-hour and fifty-minute extended edition. The extended edition includes more of a US vs. Soviet Union storyline and a threat from the aliens to unleash mega-tsunamis against humans if they humans do not change their ways. Both versions of the movie look and sound great in the UHD format. Cameron's 4K remasters are the subject of much controversy as he prefers to remove the film grain and make the movies look like they were shot on today's digital cameras. Because of that, the movie does look like it could have been shot today, but some of the special effects look a bit cheesy because the limitations of late 1980s CGI are readily apparent in the UHD format. 

The third disc has special features, including a recent interview with Cameron in which he discusses the chaotic filing process that runs about 30 minutes, a featurette on the legacy of the movie that runs about 25 minutes, an hour-long making-of featurette that has archival behind the scenes footage and interviews with members of the cast and crew made in 1993, and a text and stills gallery divided into multiple chapters. The bonus material goes into just how crazy the filming of the movie was (almost the entire movie was shot in a huge water tank), with nearly all the scenes shot underwater. You can tell that most of the cast members hated the process but loved the story they were telling. Harris, who nearly drowned a couple different times filming the movie absolutely seemed to hate the process of making the movie but was proud of what they created.

Ultimately, while the movie is not perfect, it is very good, and the UHD release is wonderful. The movie has a great blend of action, drama, and suspense. You can see elements from many of Cameron's other movies, including Aliens (which was made before this one), Titanic, and Avatar (both of which were made after this one) in this movie. It is absolutely worth the time to watch and add to a physical media collection.  

4k-UHD/Movie Review: Avatar (4-Disc Collector's Edition)

 

This is the second 4K release of 2009's Avatar. The other version (which is misleadingly labeled as the Ultimate Collector's Edition) is a three-disc set that just has the theatrical version of the movie on UHD and regular blu-ray and then a regular blu-ray disc with special features. This set (just labeled Collector's Edition) is a four-disc set that has the theatrical and the two extended editions of the movie on UHD and regular blu-ray and then has two regular blu-ray discs with special features. 

The movie itself is very good. The first extended edition (which adds about 8 additional minutes to the theatrical version) basically just extends a couple of the scenes a bit. The second extended edition (which runs 178 minutes, adding 18 minutes of additional footage) is the best version of the movie (in my opinion). That version adds the most substance and backstory to the theatrical version, which definitely helps flesh out the overall story. You can also watch the additional footage for each extended edition as separate deleted scenes accessible from the menu. Each version of the movie is visually stunning in UHD. The audio track on the theatrical edition is wonderful. The tracks on the two extended editions are not available on Dolby Atmos, so they do not sound as good.

Where this set blows the Ultimate Collector's Edition release away is the extras. It includes all of the extras that were released with that one (including the new extras on that set and a few new ones exclusive to this set) and all of the legacy content included with the 2010 blu-ray release. The only difference between this release and the original blu-ray release (excluding the brand-new content) is a new line of added dialogue from Giovanni Ribisi's character (which is added to each version of the movie).

I have two issues with this set. First, it was not released at the same time as the original 4k release. So, if you bought that one early, you would have to double-dip to get all of the bonus content. Second, the packaging, while great to look at, is awful. It has a wonderful hard slipcover that holds a cardboard book-style case that holds the discs in very tight pockets (If you have the House of Cards individual seasons on blu-ray, it is like those). The discs are very hard to get out of the pocket without ripping the pockets and/or smudging or scratching the discs. So, if you get this, you want to watch it right away in case you get damaged/unplayable discs. I ended up putting the discs in their own individual blu-ray cases (I get extra cases to replace damaged cases if the discs are in otherwise good condition) and did not put them back in the book-style case. 

If you love the movie and love watching the bonus content, this is the version to get. You get hours of bonus material (even more if you redeem the digital code on Movies Anywhere or Vudu). If you stop the movies before the end you can resume where you left off, but that is not the case if you are watching the bonus content. If you stop in the middle of one of the featurettes on discs 3 or 4 and then restart the disc, it will go back to the main menu, and you will have to figure out where you left off. That is a relatively minor point, but worth noting.  Overall, this is absolutely worth the pickup if you are a more than just a casual fan of the movie.

4k-UHD/Movie Review: Avatar

 

Avatar is a visually stunning movie from 2009, directed by James Cameron, starring Zoe Saldana, Sam Worthington, Sigourney Weaver, Michelle Rodriguez, Joel David Moore, Stephen Lang, and Giovanni Ribisi. The movie's premise is that while Earth's natural resources are being depleted, a moon in the Alpha Centauri solar system called Pandora has a valuable mineral called "unobtanium" that a company called the Resources Development Administration wants to mine. The problem is that the native population, which includes a race of 10-foot-tall humanoids called the Na'vi who live in harmony with nature, is in the way. The moon's atmosphere is inhospitable to humans, but the company has built Avatars, Na'vi shell bodies that humans can link their consciousness into. The company hires a group of scientists to act to use the Avatars to interact with the Na'vi and try to get them to move off of their land so that the unobtanium can be mined and uses the military to provide protection against the many threats the moon poses.

This is one of two 4k sets that are available. Even though this is labeled as an ultimate collector's edition, the version that is just labeled "Collector's Edition" has more features. This one is a three-disc set. There is a UHD disc and one regular blu-ray disc that just contains the movie. The A/V quality of the UHD disc is fantastic and can be considered reference quality. The third disc is another blu-ray disc with all the special features. The special features mix new material created for the 4k release with some (but not all) of the legacy material created for the original physical media release. The new content includes a roundtable discussion with one of the producers and the prominent cast members called "Memories of Avatar" and a featurette called "Avatar, a Look Back" with new interviews with the cast and crew members. The legacy carry-over content includes the hour-and-a-half-long documentary titled "Capturing Avatar" and the hour-and-a-half worth of making-of featurettes. This set does not include the extended edition of the movies, the trailers, the stills gallery, the VFX featurettes, etc., contained in the original Extended Collector's Edition blu-ray release. If you own that set, you may want to hang onto it if you get this one.

The movie is very good. The story is based on the concepts of colonialism, imperialism, and the treatment of native populations throughout history. It also hammers the themes of environmental damage and corporate greed. It is well-written and well-acted, but the fantastic special effects are the main appeal. This movie took a leap similar to what The Matrix did back in 1999 in terms of special effects and integrating CGI effects into film, making the CGI characters and sets nearly indistinguishable from what was built practically. Even if you are not a huge fan of Sci-Fi, this is still worth watching.