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Category:    Home > Reviews > Thriller > Awake (2007/Weinstein Blu-ray)

Awake (2007/Weinstein Blu-ray)

 

Picture: B-     Sound: B-     Extras: C-     Film: C-

 

 

Joby Harold’s Awake (2007) was sold on the near-torture porn gimmick that people sometimes are not asleep during surgery, no matter the amount of anesthesia they have been given, with a would-be thriller built around it.  The film turns out not to be as gimmicky as the promo would have you believe, but it is especially hard to believe when the film had likable leads like Hayden Christensen, Jessica Alba and Terrence Howard, they hardly showed up in the promotion!

 

Even more disappointing is that, despite the premise of a murder mystery built around this medical conundrum, Harold just can’t seem to make it work and the film starts to unravel early on, as uneven and unoriginal, as it is boring and wastes all this talent.  Too bad, because these leads (along with Lena Olin) have serious potential chemistry and very little of it is realized here.

 

Howard is on his way up despite the strange Iron Man affair where dropping him is a mistake (no matter how much I like Don Cheadle), while Alba is still on top after her Fantastic Four run.  Christensen is the one who is really suffering when he should be building up, but at least this was a choice that made more sense than many other commercial options.  Though Awake didn’t put me to sleep, it is a missed opportunity of a thriller that should not have failed.

 

The 1080p 2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image did not look good at first, but we hoped this was just a stylized lapse, until it turned out every scene looked overstylized and strained, then we realized how bad the picture was all the way through.  Too bad, because the camera likes these actors and some of the locations are good.  The Dolby TrueHD 5.1 is a bit better than the regular Dolby 5.1, but this is quieter than it should be for a new film, let alone a thriller.  The combination disappoints.  Extras include the trailer. storyboard/film comparisons, deleted scenes with optional commentary by Harold, who also does a feature-length audio commentary and a making of featurette.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo


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