This week’s notable DVD release is Constantine staring Keanu Reeves.  It’s difficult to describe exactly what Constantine is about and what the character John Constantine played by Keanu Reeves, really is.  As a sort of occultist super-hero figure his strength does not lie in his physical body but in his gift/curse of being able to challenge beings of the nether realms of heaven and hell.  John Constantine is an anti-hero suited for the 1990s when the comic book Hellblazer made its mark on DC’s Vertigo line.  Vertigo are DC comics adult line of comics that tried to gain entry into the independent comics market in the 90’s when indies were killing the big two (DC and Marvel).  Alan Moore was the creative genius behind the Hellblazer comics who made it one of Vertigo’s most successful titles. 

Constantine the film is a sort of cross between Exorcist, James Bond, Prophecy (the film with Christopher Walken as the archangel Gabriel) and any superhero film released in the last five years.  If this sounds like a confusing mix it’s because it is, as a result I can’t recommend it unless you’re a fan of any or all of the types of films I just compared it to.  Being a fan of the comic will not be enough to make you want to even see this film, it might just be a bit offencive to the more sensitive comic book purists who will find that Constantine is no longer an Englishman and his hair color has changed.  The story is loosely fitted around an incomprehensible plot involving servants of heaven and hell in a plot to bring the Earth into this struggle.  Exactly what the master plan is why it is and what it’s all about eludes me.  The special effects in this film are many involving CGI images of a post apocalyptic Earth that seems to have merged with hell.  The CGI looks limited in effect and colors to a whole lot of glossy gold looking amputated monsters.  I believe this is because producers attempt to capture the general look and feel of frames from the comics.  The effect is a far cry from the graphical success of Sin City. 

Keanu Reeves is suitable as the deadpan chain smoking hero of the prime material plane in a performance that echoes his Neo character from the Matrix series.  Other quality performances include Tilda Swinton as an androgynous version of the archangel Gabriel and Rachel Weisz as agent Angela Dobson a cop who may have some buried connection to the netherworld (no spoilers here!).  But the real star of the film are the visuals and bombastic window rattling subwoofer effects, it’s the kind of film you have to watch on a 5.1 system.  John Constantine is introduced (as many of these kinds of films do) performing an exorcism with a cig dangling from his mouth he enters the bedroom of a possessed young girl like a rebel without a cross.  In typical brooding anti-hero fashion he even punches the demon in face and calls him a** hole.  I can’t decide if the scene worked for me, I didn’t laugh and I’m not sure if I was supposed to.  One scene that did work for me are the meetings with his old ‘friend’ Pappa Midnite (played by Djimon Hounsou) a character fans of the comic will remember.  Midnite is a voodoo occultist who runs a nightclub for the supernaturally endowed.  Through their snappy dialogue Constantine and Midnite elude to their strained history having read many comics with the two characters I thought these scenes were some of the best character interactions in film next to any scene with Swinson. 

The DVD

There are two opposing aspects to the DVD the audio and video.  I found the video quality to be sub-par for the grade of video we expect on DVD transfers these days.  Even the animated menu that comes up when you insert the disc shows visible compression artifacts.  There is some minor background graininess throughout the film particularly when the background is dark.  I convinced myself they were going for a sort of dark palette in this movie but I think it would have been better served with the bright crispness of the Spiderman films.  By contrast the sound quality is awesome.  There are ample opportunities for the realms of heaven and hell to present us with deep rich subwoofer rumble and John Constantine gets to handle some ear shaking metaphysical hardware in this film that has to be heard to be believed.  The surround effects are suitably aggressive for this type of film.  Everything from echoing voices in a dank corridor to the directional effects of shattered glass moving about the room are done with an acoustical panache.

Special Features

Having purchased the 2 disc deluxe DVD early the BEST special features are the ones I got with the DVD outside of the plastic discs.  If you bought it while supplies last you got a t-shirt and a Hellblazer comic book inserted right into the packaging.  Now this is the kind of special feature I can deal with, did I ever mention the t-shirt is my preferred garment?  The t-shirt is plain black with only the word Constantine in red.  Some might think it’s a bit too plain to be cool, but for me it serves a dual purpose.  You can wear it as a Constantine ‘the movie’ and when that’s not cool anymore it instantly transforms into a t-shirt that shows your support for everybody’s favorite Roman Emperor who banned the persecution of Christianity.

Disc two’s features show much of the typical extras, promotional documentaries, deleted scenes and more documentaries that show talking heads with various titles talk about how tickled they are to be on board such a project.  Surprisingly little is shown of the comics outside the feature Conjuring Constantine a rather short documentary that delves slightly into the character.  Glaringly absent from any special feature is the man, the myth, the legend himself Alan Moore.  I would go out and buy a DVD of just Alan Moore talking about whatever he wanted to talk about.  But I find the special features sub par light weight stuff.  If you’re not interested in the t-shirt and extra comic you might want to pass on the 2 disc set unless you really like that talking head stuff with brimming smiles. 

DVD Features:
o Available subtitles: English, Spanish, French
o Available Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 5.1)
o Disc One: The Movie
o Commentary by director Francis Lawrence, producer Akiva Goldsman, and sreenwriters Kevin Brodbin and Frank Cappello
o A Perfect Circle music video: "Passive"
o Theatrical trailers
o Disc Two: Special Features
o 18 Minutes of deleted scenes, including alternate ending
o Conjuring Constantine
o The Production from Hell documentary gallery: director's confessional, collision with evil, holy relices
o Imagining the Underworld documentary gallery: Hellscape, visualizing vermin, warrior wings, unholy abduction
o Constantine Cosmology
o Foresight: the Power of Previsualization
o Exclusive collectible Hellblazer comic book featuring a reprint of issue #41 Dangerous Habits and a Hellblazer short story
o Number of discs: 2