On HD-DVD: Shooter

Directed By Antoine Fuqua

Starring Mark Wahlberg

Over the past few years the gritty style of exploitation horror has made a comeback.  Modern filmmakers such as Eli Roth, Rob Zombie and a few others are wearing the influences of those films proudly.  I couldn't be happier as I love those old movies, and I've really enjoyed many of these new films too.  I've often said that I'd love to see the same thing happen with action films of the late 70's through the 80's.  Modern action films have lost the fun of those older films.

The Movie

There used to be a company called The Canon Group that made some of the most fun films of that era such as The Missing in Action films starring Chuck Norris, the infamous ninja trilogy with the best being Revenge of the Ninja starring Sho Kosugi, and many others.  Those films, like the horror films of the 60's and 70's were low budget, melodramatic, and they  bore the era in which they were made not just in the look of the film but also in the social and political commentary within.  They were mega patriotic in post Vietnam era with films like Missing in Action and First Blood and they were anti government in the 80's full of all kinds of radical conspiracies.

The thing I liked the most about Shooter is the influences that it takes from those films.  It features the classic formula of films such as Rambo III or Commando.  In both of those films the hero was patriotic, a special ops soldier that retired from service, usually because of some tragedy or conspiracy, and moved out of society, maybe into the woods.  Then one last job brings them out of retirement.  Mark Wahlberg's character, Bob Swagger was a sniper, one of the best, who lost his spotter and best friend on a mission in Africa.  He has returned to a cabin in the woods with nothing but a laptop to buy stuff and his dog.  Well, as the formula goes, a covert high ranking officer appears on his doorstep, played by Danny Glover, explaining that the country needs him for one last mission.  Appealing to Swagger's patriotism works, because he comes along to help protect the President from an expected assassination attempt but finds himself double crossed and on the run from the law and the group trying to frame him.

The film is based on a book that was set in the Vietnam era that's been updated to the post 9/11 Iraq war modern times.  The problem with the updating is that a character like Rambo or James Braddock from the Missing in Action films had a hatred for the war they were a part of and a hatred for the soldiers themselves to pull from, to give their character some depth.  Both of these characters loved their country even if their country didn't love them, to almost perfectly quote Rambo.  In this modern era both supporters of the Iraq war and those against it uniformly still support the troops.  This time around the country isn't placing blame on the troops.  So, order to give Swagger some depth director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day Tears of the Sun) chooses to focus on the death of Swagger's partner.  That death does play an important part in the final reveal of the conspiracy but Wahlberg never seems to be able to latch on to it and use it to drive his characters extreme actions the way Stallone and Norris did in their day.  That ends up being my biggest complaint about the film.  where's the over the top monologue with Swagger declaring his love for the country and his hate for what has happened to it?  We get one little scene where he shows his innocence and that's it.  Oh, two other small things, the very final coda of the film was disappointing.  I don't mind predictable, hey we're following a well defined pattern here for the character, but the writing set up an opportunity for a really cool finality to the film and then left it behind for something much more simple and there's a bit of humor in the film that feels out of place.  Swagger makes a few jokes which just don't seem to work with a character that's so jaded and damaged.

With that said I have to say I still enjoyed Shooter overall.  I found the retro feel refreshing and the pace of this film stays consistent for it's complete two hour running time.  I was never bored with it.  Shooter is no classic but it's a great bridge between the classic films I've already mentioned and modern action films that we have all grown accustomed too.

7/10

The Video

This anamorphic widescreen HD transfer, like so many of Paramount's current HD-DVD releases, looks fantastic.  Right from the opening credits there's no doubt you're watching a hi-def film.  The water in wider shots looks amazing with every ripple standing out.  The contrast is set a bit high and the color balance makes skin tones appear surreal but this is a stylistic choice not some artifact due to the transfer.  Detail is extremely high, just look at the aforementioned water, the city scapes, or the lines in people's faces.  The biggest complaint I have is in just a few darker scenes there's a bit of noise, it's minor but noticeable.  Other than that this is a near perfect transfer.

9.5/10

The Audio

The film is presented in Dolby Digital Plus and it features many scenes of slam bam surround action.  Explosions and gunshots echo from the rear and ambient sounds rattle the entire sound stage.  The problem is the other scenes in the film, the dialogue heavy ones.  Dialogue, score, and effects are adequately mixed but quieter scenes feel a bit flat as there's virtually no ambient sounds.  Also, I found myself blown out of my chair a few times because I had turned the volume up for a dialogue scene and the subsequent action comes through way to loud.

The film does feature great dynamic range with good base usage and like I said, the action scenes do sound pretty.  I just wish the sound would have been a little more consistent throughout the film.

7/10

Packaging and Bonus Features

The single disc release comes in a standard HD-DVD keep case with artwork of Wahlberg in action for the cover taken from the original DVD release and from the theatrical poster.  I'm glad the art is more attached to the film's feel rather than just being another cover with floating heads.

All of the extras on the disc are taken from the standard def release, no there are no HD-DVD exclusives again!  Let me say one thing about the menus before I get into the specifics of the bonus features.  To access the bonus features I had to leave the movie, also to switch from one featurette to another I had to back out of what I was watching and go into the menu.  This is extremely annoying.  We get spoiled easily and I am spoiled with being able to bring up menus from within a movie or bonus feature rather than having to back out into the menu interface.  HD-DVD's are supposed to be "next gen" in menus as well as in audio/video aren't they?  I can't remember another Paramount review off the top of my head that the HD-DVD was so clumsy.

First up as far as bonus features is Antoine Fuqua's audio commentary.  Fuqua does a fine job with his commentary covering his interest in the original book, the modernizing of the story, and much of the technical work that went into the film.  It's a solid track but not groundbreaking or surprising, much like the film itself.

Surviving the Fittest is a featurette that covers a little bit of the "making of" stuff but focuses most of its running time on all the work that went into making the portrayal of snipers in the film as realistic as possible.  This was very refreshing because the back slapping was kept to a minimum.

Independence Hall is a very brief featurette that covers the creation of one of the film's key scenes.  The featurette is short but considering it's only covering the one scene it's probably long enough.

Finally there are a handful of deleted scenes and a theatrical trailer.  It's interesting to see these deleted sequences and obvious why they were cut.  None of them add much to the story and film is already over two hours so these were smart cuts to make.

7.5/10

Shooter is a modern action mystery with a retro flair, and that's all right by me.

Overall (Not an Average) 8/10

The Movie 7/10

The Video 9.5/10

The Audio 7/10

The Packaging and Bonus Features 7.5/10

Overall (Not an Average) 8/10

-Stephen Lackey