The epic Russian fantasy films 'Nightwatch' and 'Daywatch', the first two of a planned trilogy, get the Blu-Ray treatment with unrated feature-laden editions. The films are visually interesting but probably too impenetrable to appeal to casual filmgoers.
Director Timur Bekmambetov, now gaining fame for his hit Hollywood debut 'Wanted' from this summer, has a clear visual sense and frames some great action set-pieces but the convoluted script may leave some scratching their heads.
Based on a series of popular fantasy novels by author Sergei Lukyanenko who helped co-write the scripts, the first film 'Night Watch' became the first blockbuster in Russia to spawn from their own country and out-grossed even 'Titanic' and the 'Lord of the Rings' films.
Not the art-house low-budget film audiences had come to expect from Eastern Europe, Bekmambetov captured these films as well as any Hollywood director with quadruple the budget and the CGI in both 'Night Watch' and 'Day Watch' is exceptional considering it came from home-grown Russian effects houses.
No doubt, Fox saw a great trailer when watching 'Night Watch' and quickly snapped up rights to the trilogy and promptly made a few necessary changes (a rare instance where a studio messing with a film probably helped) and granted the film a worldwide release.
Only moderately successful outside of Russia and Europe, Bekmambetov still plans to complete the trilogy by opening up the story on a global scale.
A little scrutiny is required to keep up with the story which is intentionally thrown at the audience without context. This world exists and can't really be bothered to explain itself. What little exposition we get is covered in the prologue to 'Night Watch' where we learn of the 'Others', separate races that include witches, vampires, etc., and who long ago divided into separate 'light' and 'dark' sanctions.
An ancient battle results in a truce where an 'other' could choose to go light or dark for themselves and to enforce these new laws, the sanctions assigned a policing squad to track the other.
The 'Night Watch' would keep the dark others in check while the 'Day Watch' would make sure the light others stayed on track. Legend has it that a great 'Other' would come whose decision to join light or dark would be the deciding factor in who would rule once and for all.
Moscow, 1992 - We meet a young man, Anton, who desperately visits a witch to rectify his situation with his philandering wife and soon finds out that reality isn't quite what he thought it was. Shades of 'The Matrix' pop up here as Anton's eyes are opened to a world not previously known to exist.
Several years later, we learn Anton has been recruited by the 'Night Watch' and is soon caught up in the mystery of a young woman Svetlana, of whom he receives bizarre visions of an apocalyptic vortex.
Also tracking a young boy, Yegor, who becomes of particular interest to a group of dark others, Anton shares what he knows with Gesar, leader of the Night Watch who fears Svetlana may be the great 'Other' of legend.
So far, so confused? The pic continues on like this with Anton eventually taking on a partner Olga, a stuffed owl with a secret and attempting to find Svetlana to stop the apocalypse. The film reaches the climatic finale with Anton facing off against the head of the dark 'others' Zavulon on a rooftop.
'Day Watch' picks up from the cliffhanger of 'Night Watch' with Anton picking up a new partner and familiar face from the first pic. A central plot line surrounds what would be regarded as spoiler territory for the first but most of the plot threads of 'Night Watch' continue here albeit with the stakes raised.
A new development is Anton's interest in a historical legend involving Tamerlane, a 14th century Mongol warrior, claiming to be a descendent of Genghis Khan where we learn in the prologue that Tamerlane led an assault on a fortress to attain the powers of the mystical Chalk of Fate; the powers being supposedly to rewrite fate.
So the film follows Anton's pursuit of this Chalk of Fate, including a break-in of the Night Watch authorities, as well as Anton's dodging of the 'Day Watch' for Zavulon has framed him for breaches of the truce. This all eventually leads to a fire & brimstone CGI climax spectacle where light vs. dark, Geser vs Zavulon, comes to a head and one wonders where they could possibly go for the third?
I was honestly looking forward to seeing these films again, as the first time I saw them on DVD, I was underwhelmed, befuddled and somewhat annoyed, and thought maybe the high-def visuals would make the epic story at play here come into focus a bit more. Nope.
These are still sloppy and I'm convinced that the narrative would border on incoherence regardless of your native tongue. No doubt, the reading/knowledge of the popular Russian novels may fill in some necessary context which might be why they were so well received in their native homeland.
Specific scenes in both films had a lot of energy by themselves and were acted and shot well but I disconnected from the films as a whole and when you're dealing with some huge themes, say the apocalypse, then that came be the death blow for the viewer. For patient genre fans, there are definitely sequences that will get you to pay attention (a few being clear precursor's to what was seen in 'Wanted') and the mythology is interesting, I just wish some sort of common plot thread was consistent throughout the film, something to grab onto.
'Night Watch' comes to high-def with a 1.85:1 1080p transfer and looks relatively good despite a bit more grain and oversaturation than I would've liked. I had to keep in mind that despite 'Night Watch' looking fairly close to a glossy Hollywood production, I'm sure the pic was still made with only a fraction of those budgets.
As 'Day Watch' opens up the story, so does the framing at 2.35:1. The 1080p transfer for 'Day Watch' is sharper and more detailed but the grain is still an issue. Certainly a clear improvement over the DVDs.
Both pics get dubbed English 5.1 DTS tracks with the original Russian audio getting the lossless 5.1 DTS-HD treatment. The lossless tracks are pounding with the frequent action sequences really surrounding the viewer.
Special Features for 'Night Watch' include a commentary from Bekmambetov, a subtitled commentary from Novelist Sergei Lukyanenko, extended and deleted scenes with optional commentary from Bekmambetov. 'The Making of' runs 40 minutes and includes the usual interviews and behind-the-scenes footage. 'Characters, Story and Subtitles' is the director talking for five more minutes.
A short 'Night Watch Trilogy' featurette explaining plans for the third. A still gallery, trailers and D-Box Motion Control capability finishes out 'Night Watch'.
'Day Watch' includes a 26-minute 'Making of', a commentary Bekmambetov, trailers and also D-Box Motion Control capability for those with D-Box systems (all three of you). The commentaries from Bekmambetov have tons of quiet spots but do help in explaining a few of the more perplexing scenes of the films so if you feel bamboozled by the end of the pics, it might help to go back and watch with the commentaries.
I've actually met a lot of genre fans that have responded well to these films with most of their reasons owed to the admittedly ambitious scope and visual imagery. I myself couldn't really connect to these films and personally can't recommend them but for already established fans, both of these Blu-Rays do what they set out to do with competent 1080p transfers and lossless audio.
Night Watch is now available at Amazon . Visit the DVD database for more information.
Day Watch is now available at Amazon . Visit the DVD database for more information.
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