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Pathfinder (2007)
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray A - America - Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Jari Kovalainen (16th December 2007). |
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The Film
 Vikings and Pirates. Not exactly the receipt for success in modern movies. The “Pirates of the Caribbean”-films finally saved that genre after several box office and critical flops, but the Vikings have been an even more difficult subject for filmmakers. Not many have even tried, at least not after the notorious “The 13th Warrior (1999)”. German born director/co-producer Marcus Nispel (e.g. “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” (2003)) was the brave one and had a good plan; Heavily influenced by the Norwegian film “Pathfinder AKA Ofelas (1987)”, Nispel wanted to create a simple, survival story that’s visually and mood-wise almost like a graphic novel. The audience didn’t buy the concept, while “The 13th Warrior” got back 38.5% of his budget in the U.S., “Pathfinder (2007)” only got back 22.7% (info based on Wikipedia). Another Viking-movie, another box office bomb. The historical backdrop is still interesting, since the Vikings have always been surrounded by a violent and dark enigma. Many still know very little about them. Vikings most likely were the first Europeans (600 years before Christopher Columbus) to discover North-America and apparently even settled some areas there. The accurate information is still hard to gather, as so many aspects can be partly considered as mythology. Since debate even among the historians is very common when Vikings are concerned, “Pathfinder” doesn’t even try to be “historically accurate”. And no, real Vikings didn’t have horns on their helmets. The graphic novel by “Dark Horse Comics” was also produced at the same time with the film by the artist Christopher Shy (also concept artist on the film), and it was a collaborative effort with Shy and Nispel. The film tells about the fictional clash between the native Indians and invading Vikings, through the eyes of a man called Ghost (Karl Urban - e.g. “The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers” (2002), “The Return of the King” (2003) and “The Bourne Supremacy” (2004)). As a sole survivor of the Viking-boat on the North-American shore, the outcast Viking boy is found and raised as Wampanoag Indian. During the 15 years among the natives, he has grown to be a fast, accomplished hunter. He’s now also a man, with an eye for the beautiful Starfire (Moon Bloodgood), the daughter of Pathfinder (Russell Means - e.g. “The Last of the Mohicans” (1992)) - the shaman from the near village, jealous hunter Blackwing (Jay Tavare) is not very keen of this flirting, partly because he doesn’t trust, nor respect Ghost. The past still haunts Ghost, since he’ll always have some “dragon people” (like the Indians call Vikings) blood in his veins. Soon Ghost can truly face his childhood demons, when a group of Vikings arrive from foreign land, ready to invade new territory. Led by the ruthless Gunnar (Clancy Brown - e.g. “The Shawshank Redemption” (1994)), Ghost’s village is burned and most of the people there are slaughtered. The next village will soon have the same faith. With revenge on the mind, Ghost starts to fight back, using stealth, cleverness and his knowledge of the land. The spiritual world by the wise Pathfinder will also guide him. “Pathfinder” seems to be one of those movies that many reviewers like to make fun of, ignoring any good values that it might have. It’s clearly a flawed film, but not a truly bad one on its own. One problem is that it pales in comparison of many other films operating in the same areas. While far from perfect, “300” (2006) creates a more effective, violent “graphic novel”-look, “Apocalypto” (2006) keeps the “nature survivor”-story more interesting, and there are several films that are superior in the “epic”-side of the film (granted, “Pathfinder” is not really an “epic”, nor ever aimed to be one). The other main problem is the basic structure of the film, which is rather weak. It doesn’t capture the viewer’s imagination. Director Nispel mentions how he was influenced by the “simple stories” like “First Blood” (1982), but then doesn’t really follow his own, original intuition. The story is tied together with unimaginative action-scenes (from which the “sledding sequence” is just too over-the-top) and during the film you rarely feel any real tension or drama among the characters. The story might be simple and action bloody, but somehow many things just feel repetitive or just clumsy. You’ve seen everything before (just some other “villains” replacing the Vikings) and often better executed. One man fighting against the Vikings was a good idea, but the one that is eventually buried under everything else; action, spiritual aspects, drama, love story… The film loses its focus quite early on and the audience grows weary. To me the Vikings were too comic-like, almost like monsters. This was one of the intentions of the director (keeping the Vikings faceless and menacing), but the decision turns against the film in some ways. When the character of Gunnar and his right hand man Ulfar (Ralf Moeller - e.g. “Gladiator” (2000)) starts to appear more in the film, you lose the mystic side of the Vikings, but don’t really gain much in return. Not much work has been put into the Vikings character-wise. They look scary and kill without mercy, but they still aren’t really “scary”. And while the film has some nice visual moments (and stunning misty and snowy landscapes), the look and the lighting is often “studio like”. The film looks quite dark and rugged, but the filmmaker’s should’ve just gone “all the way” with the style, using more handheld camera and less slow motion. Now the music video and commercial past from Nispel shows in the film and is not always displayed in a good way. It still has to be said, that if you leave your brain outside the room and just crap some popcorn, “Pathfinder” manages to be quite decent action-film (with the word “action” underlined). It’s not that broad cinematic experience that one would’ve liked it to be and the plot has many holes, but it has some sword waving, stunt work, plenty of blood (at least in the “Unrated”-version) and just some mindless macho-feel for the audience. Forget even trying to find some “deeper meanings” and serious “drama” from this film. “Pathfinder” is a mediocre film, but it can offer some good time for the more action-orientated fans. Just don’t take the film too seriously. This is as much a historical film as “300” was.
Video
The film is presented in 2.40:1 widescreen (1080p 24fps) and uses MPEG-2 compression. Fans waiting for the pristine HD-experience are probably going to be slightly disappointed, since the film is intentionally made to look dark, monochromic and grainy (in that sense it has again some similarities to “300”). Black levels are slightly “crushed” - showing less detail, colors have been muted and unsaturated (some night scenes can have blue-ish shades and day scenes sometimes reveal some green tones), many scenes are low lit and the contrast is high. In other words; the film doesn’t look very pretty. The transfer is quite sharp, but not all the scenes look that way. Blu-ray captures this look just fine and I didn’t really spot any severe edge enhancement or compression issues (bit-rate seems to be in a very healthy level and “BD-50” discs is used). There are 24 chapters. The “Unrated”-version runs 107:11 minutes and disc is confirmed to be "Region A" only. Review equipment: Sony Bravia KDL-40W2000 LCD (1080p) + Playstation 3, via HDMI cable.
Audio
The disc includes three audio tracks, English DTS-HD Master 5.1, Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 (448 Kbps), and French Dolby Digital 5.1 (448 Kbps). English HoH, Spanish, Cantonese Chinese, and Korean subtitles are included. French subtitles are listed in the back cover (not listed in the “Set-up” menu on the disc), but they’re not included for some reason. I believe only one player (Samsung BD-P1400) can fully decode DTS-HD Master-track (nor that many of the current receivers) at the moment. This means that like the rest of the current players now, Playstation 3 supports the 1.5 Mbps “core” from the DTS-HD Master-track (full track would use variable bitrates up to 24.5 Mbps on Blu-ray). As most film buffs know, 1.5 Mbps is equal to “full bit rate” DTS from the selected standard DVD’s. The English DTS-HD Master 5.1 track sounds very good and dynamic, with the sounds from the nature and e.g. from the lively Indians village bringing the nice surround atmosphere. You’ll hear the crickets and the crows in the rear speakers. The action scenes can be quite aggressive and there are some selected “spooks” for the audience via music and sound effects. It’s natural sounding, but perhaps a bit basic for a 5.1-track.
Extras
Blu-ray includes almost all the extras from the SD DVD-release (a short “We Shoot Now!: Marcus Nispel On The Set Of Pathfinder"-featurette (2:36 min) and sadly also the original “Concept Trailer” (4:16 min) seems to be missing), with adding one HD exclusive. Extras don’t have any subtitles. -Audio commentary by director/co-producer Marcus Nispel is quite interesting. Nispel reveals that he first wanted to do a film about gladiators or pirates, but since others were ahead of him, he chose Vikings instead. He tells about the main approach to the film (simple story - not “epic”, reality based fantasy, graphic novel movie, survival story) and the birth of the screenplay (first draft had no dialogue). He also mentions something about his background, about “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” (2003) (studio didn’t really interfere with the production and for Nispel it was a great way to get into the business) and his relationship with Fox (“producing studio”, since Fox is quite involved with the production and ready to give guidance - and Fox also recommended actor Clancy Brown). Nispel also focuses to the rough shoot in the hard weather conditions, where many of the crewmembers were hospitalized (e.g. broken legs and angles). The film was still completed under schedule, mostly thanks to the hard work and the passion from the crew (they usually shot 12 hour days, where the last 4 hours was mostly in the darkness). Because of this, they had time to shoot the “ice lake scene” near the end of the film. He tells about the locations in Vancouver, British Columbia (they also shot e.g. in the real cave and finally got the snow during the last days of the production). Like the “heat” in “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” (2003), the rain, snow and cold weather was another “character” in “Pathfinder” also. Interesting anecdote is that “The 13th Warrior” (1999) was apparently shot in the similar locations in Vancouver, but instead of rain and cold the crew got sunny weather that time. Nispel also talks about his actors (he didn’t pick Urban because of the LOTR-films, but jokingly thanks Peter Jackson that Urban could ride and handle the sword so well) and also his inspirations (fellow director Ridley Scott is one the biggest ones). He also reveals something about his shooting style (not much 2nd unit and often using 3 cameras simultaneously in the action scenes to get plenty of footage quickly - and there wasn’t much “green screen” work in “Pathfinder”) and post-production (lot of things change in the editing room). He also tells a funny anecdote of Arnold Schwarzenegger, who called in during the shoot. Nispel had to deliver two different versions for the studio - “PG-13” and “R-rated”. Some scenes added to the Unrated-version include at least the “white horse” at the beginning, Pathfinder’s surreal moral teachings in the cave and under the water, love scene in the cave (Nispel doesn’t like “love scenes”) and the scene where one certain Indian is fighting to the death when Vikings attack. Generally Nispel seems to be quite pleased of his film, which was a dream come true for him and a film that he mainly did “for himself”. I have a feeling that a few critical comments over the Internet doesn’t bother him much. -High Definition Exclusive Bonus feature: “The Path Revealed: Secrets On-Screen” -trivia track runs within the subtitle-stream and it’s best to activate during the audio commentary. Some similar info is included that you can learn from the other extras, but you can read some facts from the movie, its production, actors and also about the themes surrounding the story. The track also gives a good, compact tour of the different areas of filmmaking, so you’ll get info about editing, storyboards, sound effects, music and lighting. You’ll also learn what the gaffer, camera operator and foley artist does and what is the meaning of inserts, cutaway-shots, “bleach bypass” and digital intermediate. Pretty good trivia track. -7 Deleted Scenes (with optional audio commentary by director/co-producer Marcus Nispel) run 10:11 minutes with “Play All”. The naming of these scenes pretty much explains their content; 1 - “Ghost hunt in the forest” (01:21 min) 2 - “Ghost crosses Ice Lake for the first time and realizes the danger” (00:37 sec) 3 - “Starfire tends to Ghost’s wounds” (1:55 min) 4 - “Jester follows Ghost and is chased away” (1:29 min) 5 - “Jester mimics Ghost” (00:55 sec) 6 - “Vikings hold Ghost, Pathfinder, and Starfire hostage” (2:34 min) 7 - “Pathfinder councils Ghost before the quartering” (1:16 min) -6 featurettes run 30:42 minutes with “Play All”; 1 - “The Beginning” (05:12 min) Tells about the “original” “Pathfinder AKA Ofelas (1987)” and the screenplay-process. It also reveals something about the historical side of the film and about the controversies among the historians (e.g. how far south the Vikings actually traveled in North-America). Filmmakers took some licenses when adapting the story, so the film is not a history lesson. The graphic novel is also being discussed. 2 - “The Design” (6:30 min) Focuses on the clothes and the style of the Vikings (again, more mythology than archaeology). They also did some creative decisions with the style of the Indians and their village in some degree. 3 - “The Build” (5:08 min) Helmets, armor, costumes and building the sets - all are discussed here, along with the cold, unforgiving weather. 4 - “The Shoot” (5:39 min) From here we’ll learn how demanding the action-scenes, stunts and the fighting were during the production. There were injuries during the 52-day shoot. Many set-up’s and inventive crane-work (two top of each other) were used. A funny bit is when Nispel is called” mad bastard”, referring to his passionate work ethic. 5 - “The Stunts” (5:34 min) Horse stunts and more stories about people ending in hospital. Karl Urban did many stunts himself, but a bit older Clancy Brown let the stunt men handle most of the rough stuff. 6 - “Clancy Brown: Cult Hero” (2:37 min) A deeper look at the actor. -Theatrical trailer runs 2:26 minutes and Bonus Trailer for “28 Weeks Later (2007)” (2:14 min) runs before the “Main menu” (can be skipped). The disc is packaged in a standard Blu-ray case.
Overall
It’s hard to find one reason why “Pathfinder” doesn’t work, since ultimately it fails in many areas. There are several sections and scenes that work, but the film is not tied very well together, so most of these are going to waste. “Pathfinder” is still a decent action-film, which is the only way to approach it. Just enjoy the blood. Blu-ray-release is very good in both A/V and extras wise, so no real complains on that front. The intended look of the film is just not that fancy in the first place, so you probably don’t demonstrate the “greatness of HD” with this film. For more info, please visit the homepage of Fox Blu-ray.
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