Ravenous - DVD Review

MOVIE
VIDEO
AUDIO
EXTRAS
OVERALL

One Disc
2.35:1 Non-Anamorphic Widescreen
English Dolby Digital 5.1 & 2.0 Surround
English & Spanish Subtitles
Original Theatrical Trailer and TV Spot
Three Audio Commentary Tracks
Deleted Scenes
Still Gallery
Costume/Set Design Gallery
Run Time: 100 min
Keep Case

MOVIE
Rated R for brief nudity and a heaping helping of gore

I think one of the reasons that this film didn't do so well at the theater is because the support of a friend and I wasn't as passionate as it could've been. We went to see it. Once. Did we not go above and beyond? No. There were other movies to be seen. Had we seen it more times, or brought more people to see it, maybe it would've been more successful. Instead, the two of us sat in an empty theater, thoroughly enjoyed the film, and then proceeded to not bring more people in. I blame myself.
Seriously, though, Ravenous is a hard movie to market because it has several things in its description that either turn you on or definitely turn you off, and usually not all at the same time. It's a period piece, a costume drama, an American colonial drama, about cannibalism, and the supernatural, and it's extremely gory. And I'm sure at this point you're pretty sure about either wanting to watch it or not. Oh, wait. And it's a comedy. A comedy? A cannibalism comedy set in America during colonial times? What the HELL? Yes. I'm not sure how the movie got made either. After being in LA and talking to people, I began to realize that the only movies made by major studios are action movies where someone kills one of Schwarzenegger's loved ones and he goes out on a murderous rampage of revenge and the Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen films. They don't make movies like Ravenous. They don't make movies that aren't cookies punched out by a press, or Oscar contenders. Usually they send those moves down to subsidiaries. They certainly don't make those movies and then continue to support them as they go through two directors and various set troubles in Slovakia where it was filmed to look like California just after the Spanish-American war. But for some reason, Fox supported the film. It could be the brilliant script, that's for sure. But I'll never know what made them think this would possibly be commercial enough to pay for itself.
The story, and it's a humdinger, concerns Captain John Boyd (Guy Pearce just after LA Confidential) a coward that played dead during a vicious battle and only after letting his fellow Americans die, climbs forth for a slaughter. Since he must be commended for his duty, he's sent to a tiny fort on the outskirts of what will become California in the days before the gold rush. At the fort we meat-er-meet Colonel Hart (an enormous Jeffrey Jones) the overseer of the entire place and a host of other characters that, while sharing limited screen time, all make an impression. One night, FW Colqhoun (Robert Carlyle) shows up, caked in dirt, dying of exposure. They nurse him back to health and we learn two stories, one about his trip in a wagon train with murderous Colonel Ives who, when the train got stranded, began to eat the party, one by one with Colqhoun barely escaping. We also learn of Windego, an Indian legend that states when a man eats another man, he gains his strength, and also gains a powerful hunger that cannot be satisfied by anything but eating again, and again, and again. And that's what happens from there on.
So what is it about this film that I enjoy so much? I would have to say that, along with Dawn of the Dead, it takes a horror situation and convention and turns it on its ear, showing it to us in a way we've never thought about it before, and through that makes a sly commentary about the very nature of our society and existence. Both films took established formulas (though Dawn's formula was only set by its predecessor Night of the Living Dead and the host of copies that followed it) the isolated people fending for their lives against an evil that is slowly working its way deeper and deeper inside their environment and inside their friends and enemies and produced subtle satire in the case of Dawn of the Dead and more broad "laugh out loud" satire in this case. The performances are uniformly excellent, especially in the cases of Guy Pearce and Robert Carlyle. But the standout is old favorite Jeffrey Jones of Ferris Bueller and Beetlejuice fame, though nearly unrecognizable as he's gained a lot of weight and wears long white hair and glasses in the film. Also a standout is John Spencer who plays General Slauson with an edge of sinister, as though there's a definite method behind his madness that we're left to ponder as it's never addressed. It also offers strange and hilarious lines of dialogue, and one must look no further than the opening two quotes displayed on the screen to realize the tone of the film. Rarely has a film been more deserving of the description: Delicious.

VIDEO QUALITY
Well, we have another from the early days of the format without an Anamorphic transfer. And it's a shame. The 2.35:1 widescreen imagery is spectacular, showing us sweeping plains and mountains of Slovakia doubling for early America and would've greatly benefited from the extra resolution. The transfer, as it exists, is clean and free of defects, though does pixilate in some of the darker sequences (of which there are a lot.) The film was made on a low budget, though, and the transfer reproduces a lot of the problems that existed in the original theatrical print anyway. Not bad, but not great.

AUDIO QUALITY
The audio is very subtle in Ravenous, but not spectacular save a few impressive sequences. The nicest moments on the audio track are with its delightfully off kilter score that almost cycles around the room. It's disorienting and bizarre. There's also some impressive use of the rear surrounds during the quick flashes from the Spanish American war and during the searching of the cave. Director Antonia Bird plays with the audio during the last half of the film, as almost a descent into madness and makes for a very enjoyable, if not full listening experience.

EXTRAS
So what to make of a film that provides a heaping helping of extras that, in themselves, aren't all they could be. It's certainly not the DVD's fault. First up are three audio commentaries. YES, THREE. The first, with Director Bird and composer Michael Nyman, is interesting at times, but I felt that Bird, in an effort to be all encompassing, kept forcing attention to the music which often speaks for itself, when she should've been addressing the filmmaking more. One would've liked to see her on a commentary with writer Ted Griffin, though he gets the best of the commentary bunch being paired with the delightful Jeffrey Jones. These two don't quit, when Griffin isn't talking about the writing of the script or the script to film transition, Jones is offering quips or stories from the set. The duo has a good relationship and allow themselves to have a lot more fun than the previous or the next commentary. And whose bright idea was it to stick Robert Carlyle by himself on a track. A track that doesn't start until chapter 4, Carlyle's first appearance on screen. Then he doesn't offer more than varying bemused comments on what we're seeing as he watches the film with us. Of the three, only the Griffin/Jones commentary is essential listening. The other extras are fairly run of the mill. Some very slow and talky deleted scenes that you may be advised to simply watch with the Director commentary because she at least gives some insight into the scenes. Then there are two still galleries and a very bad TV Spot making it sound like an action movie, and a pretty good trailer (the one that got me excited initially, yet gives away entirely too much). So, a mixed bag of extras, but multiple commentaries always make me happy.

CLOSING THOUGHTS
Ravenous is, simply put, weird. It's one of those movies that, by association, people will think you weird for liking. Even my fiancée Willow Rosenberg just threw me a look from the couch that said "And I'm marrying this man?" as I laughed when someone got devoured. (Yes, she is) And I'm proud to be weird, if it means I get to enjoy such films. This is one of those love it/hate it films, the people who love it, and I've spoken to a few, love it with as much of a passion as those who hate it ferociously. But to those who haven't seen it, if your passion for gore runs deep, Ravenous offers it in spades, along with subversive and sadistic comedy. How can you go wrong?