Redeemer Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		4.0

Redeemer Blu-ray Movie Review

Blood for Blood

Reviewed by Michael Reuben August 31, 2015

MPI Media is marketing its Dark Sky release Redeemer as a "multi-language" film with a soundtrack in both English and Spanish, but in fact there's only one English-speaking character. He's an American who wants to set himself up as a drug lord in Chile but hasn't bothered to learn the language. The film's true language, though, is the international appeal of action and martial arts. Its emotional thrill is the universal appetite for vengeance and the pangs of guilt and remorse. The Chilean team of genre director Ernesto Díaz Espinoza and martial arts star Marko Zaror (Machete Kills), making their third film together, understand the ballet of violence and the opera of extreme emotions, and they manipulate both in a stylized manner that recalls the early partnership between John Woo and Chow Yun-fat. But nothing in Woo's early Hong Kong films ever looked like this. Espinoza has said that he wants to bring something distinctive of his native land into the action genre, and Redeemer displays a visual flair of uncommon originality.

Redeemer was filmed between March and May, 2014, in the scenic coastal region of Chile's Choapa Province. It premiered the following October at Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas, and continued to play at film festivals throughout the world. Genre fans will have to discover it on Blu-ray—and they should.

Do not make the mistake of first watching the film's trailer, which is included among the extras. It reveals too much of the main character's back story, which director Espinoza deliberately (and wisely) withholds until the end. Espinoza co-wrote the script, along with six other co-writers and "contributors" including producer Noah Segan (Looper), who plays the film's token American, and the director is sharp enough to plunge the audience into the middle of his hero's quest, revealing the mysterious crusader's origin in jagged flashbacks.

A mythic, hooded figure, the Redeemer (Zaror) is feared throughout Chile as an indestructible killer. Like some angel of judgment, he appears from nowhere to avenge the weak and helpless with his fists and feet, leaving behind only the mutilated bodies of criminals. No one knows who he is or where he came from, but the film shows us the Redeemer's methods and rituals, which are as compulsive as those of any serial killer. He haunts churches, listening to the prayers of crime victims seeking God's help. Then he answers their entreaties to heaven above, after privately praying at the makeshift altar he carries with him and asking God's blessing for the "work" he is about to perform. The Redeemer receives God's permission in his own unique way: by pointing a pistol with a single round at his head and pulling the trigger in the time-honored tradition of Russian roulette. If he survives, he takes it as a sign that God wants him to forge onward.

A second, equally mythic figure trails the Redeemer like a shadow. Known as the Scorpion (José Luís Mósca), he cruelly undoes the Redeemer's work by murdering the innocents helped by the hero in the most brutal ways imaginable. While it may first appear that the Scorpion must be the devil's counter-agent to the holy messenger represented by the Redeemer, in fact his motivation is different. Fragments are revealed throughout the film, but the full explanation does not appear until the end.

In the coastal town of Pichidangui, the Redeemer intervenes to protect a fisherman named Agustin (Mauricio Diocares) from a gang of thugs, but this time he finds that he cannot simply disappear. The thugs work for Scott Bradock (Segan), a recently arrived American who has decided to reinvent himself as the new drug kingpin of Chile. Segan's performance is nicely balanced on a knife's edge between buffoonery and casual menace; he spends much of the film agonizing over an appropriately cool Spanish nickname under which to conduct business, pausing occasionally to order someone's death. Agustin had the bad fortune to intercept a bag of Bradock's cash while fishing. Then he had the poor judgment to keep the money, which ends up in the hands of Antonia (Loreto Aravena), a maid who works at the hotel where the Redeemer is staying and who is desperate for funds to pay for life-saving medical treatment for her son. With so many conflicting interests, and with Bradock sending a small army to recover what he's lost, the Redeemer cannot simply walk away. Meanwhile, the Scorpion draws near.

Zaror choreographed his own fight sequences, and to his credit they rely more on his skills at kickboxing and taekwondo than on wire work and special effects. The fights are varied in both pacing and style, so that the Redeemer begins with groups of less skillful opponents and gradually works up to challengers who are far more adept in martial arts. The final encounter, of course, is between the Redeemer and the Scorpion, and it is staged and shot like a grudge match long anticipated by both combatants.

Redeemer Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Redeemer was shot digitally by Espinoza's frequent collaborator, cinematographer Nicolás Ibieta Alemparte. Post-production was completed on a digital intermediate, from which MPI Media's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray has presumably been sourced by a direct digital path.

The film has been colored with a deliberately artificial palette that casts a heavy cyan shading and lends Redeemer's world the look of a graphic novel. (Please note: "Cyan" is not "teal", and any attempt to classify Redeemer under the internet meme of "teal and orange" misrepresents the film.) The blues in the frame have been so heavily accentuated that even some of the shadows are tinted blue. This is one of several ways in which the film pulls the viewer out of the real world and into its imaginary realm. The cyan wash cause several contrasting colors to pop, notably reds like the magenta cloth on which the Redeemer spreads his altar. It also establishes a sharp contrast with flashbacks to the Redeemer's former life, which have been tinted yellow.

Within this imaginary and artificially colored world, detail is plentiful and the image is sharp and clear. Blacks, when they appear, are solid and dark. Noise, distortion and interference are not an issue. MPI Media has mastered Redeemer with an average bitrate of 26.74 Mbps, which is very good for digitally acquired material and particularly helpful for a film with so much rapid-fire action. The compression has been carefully performed.

Redeemer Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Redeemer's 5.1 soundtrack, presented in lossless DTS-HD MA, is an aggressive and bass-heavy action film mix, with wide dynamic range for gunshots, explosions and the solid blows of hands, feet and other body parts making contact during the fight scenes. Despite the seaside setting, there is little sense of the wind and water, because Redeemer plays out in a kind of alternate reality, where the sounds of battle trump everything. The energetic action score by composer Claudio Rocco represents a promising feature debut.

As noted in the introduction, the 5.1 track is labeled on the menu as "English/Spanish", but only Noah Segan's character (and his translator) speak English. The majority of the spoken dialogue is in Spanish. As is its custom, MPI has included an alternate version of the same track, also labeled as "English/Spanish", in lossless PCM 2.0. Yet a third track has been added, which is a full English dub, for those who do not want to read the optional English subtitles; this track is Dolby Digital 2.0 (at 192 kbps). Optional English SDH and Spanish SDH subtitles are also available.

Redeemer Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Making Of (1080p; 1.78:1; 5:27): Though brief, this EPK is unusually informative, in part because the interviews with Espinoza and the principal cast often play over the behind-the-scenes footage, so that the running time is utilized to best advantage.



• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 1.78:1; 7:22): The three scenes are not separately labeled or selectable. The third is an extended ending that provides greater finality but was perhaps deemed too neat.



• Trailer (1080p; 1.78:1; 1.36): As noted in the introduction, the trailer reveals too much about the Redeemer's origin.



• Additional Trailers: At startup, the disc plays trailers for We Are Still Here, Para Elisa, The Last Survivors and VANish, which can be skipped with the chapter forward button and are not otherwise available once the disc loads.

Redeemer Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Whether Espinoza continues building his reputation in Chile or is tapped by Hollywood to energize a franchise, he is someone to watch. In the credits to Redeemer, his list of thanks includes David Lynch, Stanley Kubrick (one scene in Redeemer is an obvious reference to A Clockwork Orange), Sergio Leone, Sam Peckinpah, Alfred Hitchcock, Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez and Takeshi Kitano, among others, which gives some idea of the scope of his ambition. Marko Zaror has already found work in Hollywood as a stunt double (e.g., in The Rundown), but if he has to stay home to be recognized for his camera presence, so be it. The Redeemer is a reminder of what genre films can be when they are freed from Hollywood bloat. Highly recommended.