5.9 | / 10 |
Users | 4.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.6 |
Orin Boyd, a tough cop in an inner-city precinct discovers a web of dirty cops and corruption.
Starring: Steven Seagal, DMX, Isaiah Washington, Anthony Anderson, Bill DukeAction | 100% |
Crime | 97% |
Thriller | 51% |
Comedy | 50% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
Japanese: Dolby Digital 5.1
French: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
German: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
Spanish: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
Portuguese: Dolby Digital 2.0
Japanese options hidden; DD 2.0: 192 kpbs; DD 5.1: 640 kbps;
English SDH, French, German SDH, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 2.5 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.0 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
Released in March 2001 with little competition, Exit Wounds was one of Steven Seagal's more successful films, but that doesn't make it a good movie. In the EPK featurette included in the extras, a producer explains that the film "begins" at the point where Seagal's supercop, having been busted down to traffic duty, hangs up his whistle in his locker and sighs as he realizes he's hit rock bottom. It's an astute observation, but someone should have told the screenwriter, the director and the editor, because that moment doesn't occur until almost half an hour into the film, by which point anyone who expects movies to tell a decent story will have long since tuned out. One of the basic requirements of an effective action picture is efficient exposition. The good guys, the bad guys and the stakes at issue have to be laid out as quickly and clearly as possible. Producer Joel Silver, who is the king of action pictures, and director Andrzej Bartkowiak, who photographed Speed, a model of the genre, should have known better. Then again, Silver may have simply been counting on the novelty of Seagal's return to the screen after a hiatus of several years, following the commercially disappointing Fire Down Below and direct-to-video (in the U.S.) The Patriot. By uniting Seagal with co-star DMX (who was prominently featured in the promotional campaign and on the soundtrack), Silver was targeting an urban demographic (his term, not mine) that could be pre-sold for a big opening weekend and subsequent album sales. Indeed, everything about Exit Wounds, from its nominal Detroit setting (changed from the source book's Long Island locale and doubled by Canada) to its music to its wire-enhanced martial arts (a first for Seagal, but not for Silver, who was simultaneously working on The Matrix sequels) stinks of commercial calculation. Who cared whether the story was told well?
For Exit Wounds, Bartkowiak reunited with cinematographer Glen MacPherson, who shot his debut film, Romeo Must Die. MacPherson once again delivered Bartkowiak's preferred style, with beautiful lighting and rich colors, further undercutting the illusion that the story takes place in Detroit or that the precinct to which Boyd has been assigned as punishment is in any way a hellhole. The image on Warner's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray is sharply detailed, down to the wear-and-tear of aging that was beginning to show in Seagal's face. The brightly lit (and hosed-down) streets at night, the flourescent shades of T.K.'s club and even the interiors of office buildings all look attractive under MacPherson's lighting, and the actors all appear to best advantage. If the screenshots look somewhat soft, that's probably because Bartkowiak's camera is constantly moving, so that individual frames usually suffer from some degree of motion blur. Generally, though, the image in motion remains naturally sharp, without any evidence of electronic enhancement or other digital manipulation. A fine grain pattern can be observed in the background. Warner has once again risked overcompression with an average bitrate of 19.42 Mbps, which really shouldn't be allowed for an action film, but they seem to have gotten away with it, at least at the size at which I watched the film (which is 72").
Consistent with its overall aesthetic, the 5.1 soundtrack for Exit Wounds, presented on Blu-ray in lossless DTS-HD MA, is loud and agressive, with heavy-duty bass extension and every gunshot, tire skid and shattering of glass on audio steroids. The music and effects are mixed at such high volume that it often takes a foghorn voice like Tom Arnold's or Anthony Anderson's to be heard clearly. Seagal's trademark whisper frequently gets buried, and his throwaway quips are genuinely thrown away, because they can't be heard. No loss; viewers don't watch Steven Seagal films for the dialogue. The surrounds are actively employed in the many action scenes and in locales full of ambient noise like T.K.'s overwrought club (which is surely more upscale than anything Detroit has seen in recent years). The surrounds also provide depth to the underscoring by Damon "Grease" Blackman and Jeff Rona (White Squall), as well as the pulsing soundtrack selections by DMX, Drag-On, Ja Rule, Moby and Brian Eno, among others.
The extras have been ported over from Warner's 2006 DVD of Exit Wounds.
From the very beginning of Seagal's film career, the risk of self-parody always lurked around the edge of the frame. To the credit of both the actor and his director, that danger never materializes in Exit Wounds, which is why the film isn't a disaster. But it lacks the narrative clarity of Hard to Kill or either of the Under Siege films, which makes it a second-rate entry by an action star who was, from the outset, never top-tier player. Seagal fans can add this Blu-ray to their collection with confidence that it adequately represents the film. Anyone else should rent first.
1988
2002
2011
2016
Bastille Day
2016
2012
2013
2014
2005
2001
The Dirty Harry Collection
1976
Special Edition
2008
30th Anniversary Edition
1994
1990
2015
Mastered in 4K
2003
2014
1992
2009
35th Anniversary Edition
1987