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In Short: Strong but not spectacular special edition from Artisan .
The Movie:
Although I enjoyed Roland Emmerich's "Independence Day", neither "Godzilla"(their picture afterwards) nor "Stargate"(their picture before) struck the right note with me. I remember first seeing "Stargate" in theaters in 1994 and hating it, finding it slow at points and more than a bit silly. Character development, especially in "Stargate" is at a bare minimum. An additional problem is that although the characters aren't fully-realized, neither is the story.
"Stargate" stars James Spader as Egyptologist Daniel Jackson. When asked to decode symbols recovered from a dig site, he instead finds a "Stargate" to another world across the Universe. When the portal is opened, he enters the gate along with an army commander(Kurt Russell) and his team of troops. They find themselves in an Egypt-like world controlled by the sun god, Ra(Jay Davidson). The travelers are taken in by a small society of inhabitants who seem more like cartoons than characters. The remainder of the film becomes the usual battle of the good guys versus evil to save the world.
Although I do enjoy this film a little more on the small screen, it's still got it's share of flaws. The performances are fine with what little material they're given, but still, the story leaves a lot to be desired.
The DVD
VIDEO: "Stargate" was one of the original DVDs released to the format in a dual-sided edition, so that people had to flip the disc to watch the whole movie. This edition seems to be taken from the special edition laserdisc that was released and although it's not perfect, the image quality on the majority of this non-anamorphic DVD is very good. Colors are deep, rich and quite strong throughout. The desert scenes during the daytime are where this DVD fares best, with bright images that are consistently crisp and pleasantly sharp. It's during some of the darker scenes during inside the pyramid, etc. that the image quality is a little on the hazy side for me, and having these scenes be a little more defined would have been nice.
There are more than a few slight instances of shimmering throughout the picture; some are minor and are hardly noticable, some are more noticable and a little distracting. If you already have the original release and are a fan enough of the movie that you would like a disc that you don't have to flip, buy this new special edition, which contains 9 minutes of footage that I didn't find too interesting. The previously unseen footage is in fine condition and there is only a tiny difference in picture quality during these scenes. Again, if you're a really big fan of the film, you may want to take a look into this disc. Fans of the film may not find the image quality very impressive, but they may be interested in the 9 new minutes and the commentary(which I'll go into greater detail about later in this review). The layer change is at 59 minutes and 50 seconds and I didn't find it very distracting.
SOUND: Very impressive; "Stargate" boasts a frequently entertaining and enveloping sound mix with plenty of well-placed effects and a few sandstorms that feel like you're right in the middle of them. The transport through the "Stargate" sounds great as well. Enemy aircraft also make an appearance later on, providing more in the way of explosions, of which there are plenty of in this picture. Surround use is often and effective, for a viewing experience that's thrilling in terms of sound, even though it's not exactly a movie that I find that entertaining. There's also quite a bit of deep, strong bass as well.Dialogue sounds clear and full throughout, with no problems. The score also sounds fantastic; dynamic and crystal clear. A highly entertaining soundtrack.
MENUS:: I really found "Stargate"'s menus very enjoyable: there's quite a bit of well-done animation that brings you into the main menu, and some of the sub-menus are animated as well. The scene selection menu also directs you to where the added footage is. Very cool.
EXTRAS:: .
Commentary: This is one of the biggest(if not really the main) reason that I was interested in seeing this disc. This is a commentary track by Dean Devlin(producer) and Roland Emmerich(director), the duo that also worked on "Godzilla" and "Independence Day". How is it? It's not a bad commentary and it certainly provides a lot of information about the production. Devlin is the more interesting speaker, providing a lot of information about the film's effects and how a lot of the film was worked on digitally. This commentary track is available while watching the special edition "cut" of this picture only, not the theatrical version.
Emmerich also contributes a lot of information about the work that was done on this picture, but annoyingly, he says the word "like" after every other word. I don't know if any other people mind when others do this, but it's something that I've always found extremely annoying, ever since when I was in high school(where the word "like" is inserted into sentences frequently). A sample comment: "This now was shot like here in like, Los Angeles, uh, it's like a hotel in like, downtown Los Angeles, which is like often used for uh, movies in different ways." You get the idea. I was able to get through the entire commentary but I suspect that a lot of people will find Emmerich extremely tedious to listen to. He's a little less annoying as the film goes on(or maybe I just got used to listening to him), but it's too bad that the two of them didn't record seperate commentary tracks.
Devlin talks quite a bit(thankfully!) and provides details on the film like how the composer visited the actors and talked to them about their characters, giving them finer details about who they were to use for the music. He also provides much of the details about how they went about making the details of the ancient Egyptian language, etc. more realistic. Weirdly, this seems like a new commentary track. They talk about a location where "Jan De Bont's new movie is currently shooting", which I believe would likely mean "The Haunting". The two also talk about the scenes that were not included in the "theatrical version".
There are also some informative moments in the discussion about how the sets were built and the work that went into some of the sets on this film is really remarkable. The details that the two talk about on how some of these sets are partially digital or models are quite fascinating, as well. Furthermore, they also go through the usual commentary details, pointing out where scenes were filmed (most were filmed in Arizona in 120 degree heat), what it was like to work with these actors and general ideas about the story and characters. In terms of general ideas about the story, the commentary does tend to fall back on at times, to simply telling the viewer what's going on on-screen, which isn't informative and isn't the purpose of a commentary.
All in all, this isn't a bad commentary, but it isn't the kind of commentary where it's so good that I'd recommend getting the disc just for the commentary track. There are some pauses on this track, but they aren't too often or terribly noticable.
Also:: Teaser/Full Trailer.
Final Thoughts: Not a favorite movie of mine, but this isn't a bad disc from Artisan. Not the kind of disc where I'd recommend everyone run out and get it, but if you're a fan of the movie and are looking to replace the former disc that was a flipper, this disc is recommended. Otherwise, it's maybe worth a rental. It would have been nice if this disc had at least included a "making-of" documentary, or something like that.
The Film: 68/D+ = (340/500 possible points)
Video 85/B = (340/400 possible points)
Audio: 92/A = (368/400 possible points)
Extras: 83/B = (249/300 possible points)
Menus: 89/B+ = (178/200 possible points)
Value: 86/B = (258/300 possible points)
TOTAL POINTS:1733/2100
Average:82%/B
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