Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		2.0

The First Purge Blu-ray Movie Review

The 'First' shall (hopefully?) be last.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman October 22, 2018

Without punning too horribly, is there anyone out there willing to binge on The Purge “franchise”? The Purge appeared in 2013 and despite less than stellar reviews (including by our own Ken Brown here at Blu-ray.com), went on to such overwhelming box office success (due in part to its miniscule production budget) that at least one sequel was an all but foregone conclusion. It didn’t take long for The Purge: Anarchy to appear, and perhaps surprisingly it was met with at least somewhat more approving comments from the critical class (again including Ken ), and as with the first film, audiences flocked to it. The Purge: Election Year debuted a couple of years later, and went on to score the biggest box office returns of the franchise thus far, again despite some withering critical assessments (along with more favorable reactions, as with Martin Liebman’s The Purge: Election Year Blu-ray review on this very site). The Purge: Election Year’s box office tally was ultimately topped by The First Purge, something which may in and of itself short circuit any unfavorable critical comments. This fourth Purge outing is actually a prequel of sorts, and one which seems designed to help augment USA’s nascent The Purge series, a production which may or may not be a “limited run” affair, one assumes depending on ratings.

As is pretty overtly discussed in some of the supplements included on this release, The First Purge wants to address the roiling sociopolitical climate currently in place in the United States, this despite the film ostensibly being a prequel. My hunch is those leaning toward the right side of the political spectrum may find this film objectionable for any number of reasons, including its implied criticism of an “official” violence support group that has ties to the NRA, while those on the left side of the political spectrum may well find this film just as objectionable for its rampant display of horrifying violence and the perception of a national Id gone completely awry (certainly an implied subtextual criticism of our current state of affairs by some more liberal leaning pundits).

There is in a fact a real life liberal leaning pundit on hand in The First Purge, former Obama administration official Van Jones, who here portrays a version of himself (with his real name), supposedly a hard hitting journalist questioning the motives of Doctor Updale (Marisa Tomei, a long way from Academy Award territory), the “architect” of The Purge. Updale insists she is not a lackey of the New Founding Fathers of America, the ultra-right political movement which has taken over the government. She simply states to Jones that the NFFA had the “courage” to greenlight an “experimental” run at The Purge, confined to Staten Island.

The film has already started introducing potential “participants” in The Purge courtesy of what amount to first person confessionals delivered directly to the camera, but as is perhaps predictable, a lot of the early going of the film sets up the general context of the NFFA, the furor (both pro and con) surrounding the proposal of The Purge, and, finally, a gaggle of characters whom it’s obvious are going to have to “weather the storm”. Had The First Purge actually gotten to a reveal that is unspooled rather well into the tale, my hunch is the film might have attained a little bit more of a subtextual emphasis. That reveal involves the expected influence of elements in the NFFA, but also includes a kind of funny (black humor, but funny nonetheless) “real” motive for the group greenlighting The Purge.

Instead, The First Purge tends to ping pong between attack scenes, survivor stories, and little vignettes involving Updale and various NFFA types. Some of it is admittedly rather interesting, and the film has a near hallucinatory visual aesthetic that makes it a cartwheeling viewing experience, but unfortunately the film fails to connect on any real emotional level with any of the (largely low income) characters perceived to be the folks we should be rooting for.

The whole “Purge” conceit has an unavoidable political underpinning, but perhaps ironically, the attempts to connect that to what is an admittedly unsettled time in our nation (at least for some) doesn’t end up adding anything to the story, and in fact my hunch is it’s going to alienate people both right and left, for different reasons, not necessarily limited to the few I outlined above. There’s an unsettling feeling running rampant throughout The First Purge, something that in and of itself may recommend the film to those who have enjoyed (?) the other Purge films. But this is a “prequel” that seems to be setting things up for the films that have already been made, certainly a kind of odd structural strategy for a perceived franchise.

Note: My colleague Brian Orndorf was even less enthused about The First Purge than I was. You can read Brian's thoughts here, as well as gain a few tidbits about some of the many other characters in the film whom I don't mention in this review.

The First Purge Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The First Purge is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Universal Studios with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. According to the IMDb, this was digitally captured with Arri Alexa cameras and I presume it was finished at a 2K DI (as always with my reviews, if someone has authoritative data to the contrary, message me and I'll happily update things here). As mentioned above in the main body of the review, stylistically this is a near hallucinogenic experience much of the time, with whole sequences just drenched in odd lighting and/or grading, from bizarre, almost alien, greens, to deep reds, to bold blues and occasionally vivid purples. Those choices, combined with an overarching darkness (most of the film takes place at night), and a tendency toward handheld work, can at least occasionally tend to tamp down fine detail, but generally speaking this is a really sharp and precise looking transfer. It's especially impressive in some of the more brightly lit moments, including some of the high contrast "first person confessionals", where fine detail on facial features is commendable. There's what I refer to as "digital murk" in a few extremely dark scenes, where shadow detail is virtually nonexistent, but that actually can tend to up the angst ante considerably, since it's hard to tell what's happening and what terrors might be awaiting in the gloom. I noticed one brief moment of near image instability in an aerial establishing shot of an inner city tenement, but perhaps surprisingly given the film's prevalence of misty environments and things like lights penetrating the night, I noticed no banding.

The First Purge Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The First Purge features an extremely energetic sounding DTS:X track. The film has a kind of odd sound effect or score choice (I'm frankly not sure which) which almost sounds like a thumping drum combined with a helicopter rotor and which can waft through the air at various moments. The film is rife with huge crowd scenes, often with those crowds completely out of control, and the wash of sounds through the surround channels can be quite convincing. Even quieter dialogue scenes frequently have background clatter spilling through the side and rear channels, and expected jolts like explosions, fights and gunfire also populate the surround channels and deliver considerable sonic punch. Dialogue is typically rendered cleanly, though some of the cacophonous crowd scenes understandably sound confused. Fidelity is excellent throughout the presentation, as is dynamic range, which is extremely wide.

The First Purge Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Deleted Scene (1080p; 1:47)


• A Radical Experiment (1080p; 4:57) is a short EPK with various cast and crew members discussing the film's "relevance" to today's sociopolitical climate.


• Bringing the Chaos (1080p; 1:24) is an even shorter EPK concentrating on some of the stunts and set pieces.


• The Masks of The First Purge (1080p; 1:22) is another short piece looking at some of the kind of cool face appurtenances some characters wear in the film.

The First Purge Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

There's actually some provocative material wending its way through The First Purge, but this is kind of a haphazard enterprise that is too vignette driven for its own good, and which fails to connect in any real emotional way with any of the perceived "good guys" (some of whom have some questionable aspects themselves). Fans of the franchise may find enough here to warrant checking this out, and for them the good news is technical merits (especially audio) are excellent.