Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.5

The Hole Blu-ray Movie Review

Didn't You Used to Be Called the Hellmouth?

Reviewed by Michael Reuben October 2, 2012

Joe Dante's The Hole played the New York Film Festival two years ago in October 2010, by which point it had already opened in Europe and the Far East. Avatar had burst the 3D floodgates earlier that year, and it's hard to imagine that some enterprising studio executive didn't pick up a film that was cheap (though it doesn't look it), completed and, most importantly, didn't require a conversion, because The Hole was natively filmed in 3D. After the drubbing handed to shoddy post-production 3D transformations like the one performed by Warner on Clash of the Titans, acquiring The Hole and allocating a modest promotional budget should have been a no-brainer.

But it was not to be, and over the next two years, the film continued to open in additional overseas markets. Only now is it receiving a limited U.S. theatrical release. What's more, if you want to see it in 3D, you'll have to find it in theaters, because the studio that finally acquired the U.S. rights, Big Air Studios, doesn't yet publish 3D Blu-rays. Home 3D remains enough of a niche market that new entrants in the Blu-ray market have enough on their hands managing the hi-def format without the added challenge and investment of 3D.

Dante is talented enough as a filmmaker to ensure that The Hole remains a superior entertainment even in a 2D presentation. A lesser director might have been defeated by the thudding derivativeness of Mark L. Smith's (Vacancy) script, but Dante seems almost to relish the challenge. He has always been a genre buff, from his big splash with the classic but unique werewolf movie The Howling, to his fond parody of Sixties sci-fi in Innerspace, to his increasingly twisted renditions of alien invasion stories with the Gremlins films and Toy Soldiers. The Hole is Dante's variation of that hoary classic that seems to get dusted off at least once a year (the latest is the upcoming Sinister): Don't open that old box (or trunk, door, cabinet, etc.) in the basement (or attic, crawl space, cubby hole, garden shed, or what have you), because something bad will emerge.

Meet the Thompson family. Mom Susan (Teri Polo), seventeen-year-old elder son Dane (Chris Massoglia) and ten-year-old younger son Lucas (Nathan Gamble) have just relocated to the small town of Bensonville, where nothing much ever happens, or so it seems. The family started in Brooklyn, but they've moved to a long list of towns since then, apparently always in a hurry and leaving Dane thoroughly disgruntled with his new surroundings. And what about Mr. Thompson? No one wants to discuss him. Exposition 101 says there's a story being saved for later.

The only thing in Bensonville that interests Dane is his comely next door neighbor, Julie (Haley Bennett), who has many equally good-looking friends and an ex-boyfriend. But Dane is too shy to talk to her, until Lucas wanders over and introduces himself, mostly to annoy his older brother. It's Julie who tells them about "Crazy Carl" (Bruce Dern), the house's former inhabitant and, presumably, the one who put all the locks on the trap door in the basement.

Lucas and Dane found the trap door after they moved in. It's big, and it's secured by multiple heavy padlocks of a special construction that can't be snapped with a bolt cutter. But the boys manage to find the keys in the immense clutter left behind by Crazy Carl, and the trap door opens for them, leading to . . . nothing. Literally, nothing. The blackness beneath the house is bottomless, unresponsive to illumination and swallows up anything they lower into it. When they try a brief survey with a battery-powered video camera, the results are unusual. Think of that quote at the beginning of The Abyss about how when you look into it, it looks back into you.

As soon as the door has been opened, strange things begin happening to Lucas and Dane, and then to Julie. Some of these events are real and leave physical evidence behind. Others are just psychological—or maybe they, too, are physical, but something removes the physical evidence. Who knows? By the end of The Hole, its supernatural metaphysics have emerged in broad outline, but the details are left appropriately vague, as they should be.

Director Dante loves to riff on other movies, and he can be as clever about it as anyone working today. Gremlins 2's takes on Gremlins are some of the best sequel jokes ever made. But The Hole isn't the best use of Dante's talents. The script by Smith pilfers ideas and whole sequences from other, better films, and Dante dutifully energizes them with sufficient directorial technique to keep The Hole watchable, but not enough to make the overall enterprise seem new. Even if you're just trying to forget everything and watch the film, which I always do, you keep feeling the click of recognition. Oh look, there's the evil clown from Poltergeist, but now he's wearing a harlequin costume. There's the normal-looking fellow from The Shining and The Sixth Sense, who turns around to reveal a grievous injury, because he's really a ghost. There's the invisible force that pulls someone down into the water, but leaves behind a visible bruise, from the Nightmare on Elm Street films. There's the weird, waking-dream movement of ghostly figures popularized by Japanese horror films and their American remakes like The Grudge. There's a nightmare cityscape that looks like something Tim Burton imagined for Beetlejuice's afterlife. And there's a battle with a smaller but nasty-tempered creature staged just like the kitchen scene in Gremlins (and it ends roughly the same way too).

I suspect that Dante stuck close to elements that he was confident would work, because for him the major experiment of The Hole was 3D photography, and on a reported production budget of only $12 million, he had no room for error. The results are certainly lively and engaging, with Bruce Dern's scenes a standout, but Dante is capable of so much more. It's time to give him a budget again and let him stretch.

The Hole Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Dutch cinematographer Theo van de Sande is best known for his comedy work, primarily with Adam Sandler, but he also shot the original Blade, as well as the visually sumptuous Cruel Intentions. In The Hole, he lights simply and realistically at the outset, then begins to push the boundaries of reality—a little murkier here, a little glossier there—after the hole is opened and its mysterious forces are let loose in the world.

It seems almost unfair to evaluate The Hole as a 2D image, because that clearly isn't how director Dante wanted it to be seen, but Big Air Studios' 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray offers a clean, sharp, detailed image that is free of any issues. Colors are nicely saturated, flesh tones are accurate and blacks are deep, which is essential once Lucas and Dane begin staring into the depths of the hole. The film was a digital production from start to finish; so it's not surprising that the image showed no sign of the kind of artifacts (artificial sharpening, high-frequency filtering) associated with film-to-digital transfers of pre-DI movies. Although the extras are in HD, their total running time, along with the film is under two hours and the disc has only one soundtrack. As a result, a BD-25 accommodates the material without artifacts.

The Hole Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Hole has a wonderfully active 5.1 surround mix, presented here in lossless DTS-HD MA, that places all sorts of scene-specific noises behind and to the side of the viewer. The Thompsons' basement is a favorite location for such effects, with mysterious presences (worldly and otherworldly) running around in the dark and objects being scattered and displaced as a result of sudden movements. (Some of these sounds probably work even better in 3D, as the image "reaches" in the direction of the sound.) Other locations also benefit from the careful deployment of sounds in all channels, whether it's the swimming pool (both above and below the water, the women's bathroom at a restaurant, or one particular locale where a lot of glass breaks and you feel like you're right in the middle of it. Dialogue is clear, even Creepy Carl's mumbling, and the score by Javier Navarette (Pan's Labyrinth) is nicely balanced with the effects and action.

As noted at IMDb, this is Joe Dante's first feature film without a score by the great Jerry Goldsmith, who died in 2004. Their films together included both Gremlins, Innerspace, Explorers, Matinee and Dante's segment of The Twilight Zone. It's sad to say goodbye to such a fruitful collaboration, but in Navarette, Dante seems to have found the right match for a successor.

The Hole Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Keyholder (Keeper of The Hole) (HD, 1080i; 1.78:1; 3:21): Producer David Lancaster, director Dante and actor Gamble discuss Bruce Dern's portrayal of Creepy Carl. Unfortunately Dern himself is not interviewed, and most of the running time is padded with film footage.



• Relationships (Family Matters) (HD, 1080i; 1.78:1; 4:29): Gamble, Massoglia, Polo and writer Smith speak briefly about the importance of family relationships in the film's story.



• Making of The Hole (HD, 1080i; 1.78:1; 11:39): A superficial and standard EPK that includes interviews with actors Polo, Massoglio, Gamble and Bennett; director Dante, producer Lancaster, writer Smith and, briefly, DP Theo van de Sande and effects expert Robert Skotak



• A Peek Inside The Hole (HD, 1080i; 1.78:1; 4:47): Roy Knyrim, Gamble and Skotak discuss the effects sequences, and van de Sande speaks about the demands of filming in 3D.



• Movie Stills (HD, 1080i; various; 1:51): Stills and production photos, set to music.

The Hole Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The arrival of a new film by Joe Dante is cause for celebration, and The Hole is an enjoyable viewing experience. Still, this is lesser Dante in comparison to either Gremlins film, Innerspace or Matinee. One can still feel the talent beneath the genre cliches, and one can only hope that The Hole will serve as a calling card to get this first-rate director back where he belongs, helming a big-budget production for a major studio. Recommended for at least a rental; see it in 3D if you can.