30 Days of Night – Blu-ray Disc Review
February 1, 2008 – 12:04 PM - Posted by: Justin SlussTags: Ben Foster, David Slade, Josh Hartnett, Mark Rendall, Melissa George, Sam Raimi, Sony
has an average rating of 6.8 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
Dolby TrueHD 5.1
are ALL in High Definition!
– 
– 2007
– 113 minutes
– Sony
Buy it for $14.99 @ Amazon.com
— Review written by Justin Sluss
The Movie Itself first off is based on a graphic novel of the same title. The film was rumored to have originally going to been Directed by Sam Raimi (of “Evil Dead” & “Spider-Man” trilogy fame) but he instead to let David Slade Direct the film and took on the role with friend Rob Tapert as Producer. The story takes place in an Alaskan town called “Barrow” where the sun is about to set and not rise for over thirty days (and nights). Our main character is “Sheriff Eben Oleson” (played by Josh Hartnett) who’s just recently separated from his wife “Stella” (played by Melissa George) and going about his life as normal, that is as normal as being a Sheriff in a town this small can be.
Eben leads a pretty routine and it almost seems at times boring life as the police in the small town, his biggest concern really seems to be trying to work out things with his love interest Stella. She just happens to be in town but is in the process of leaving and ends missing her plane, making her stuck there for the entire month. It would seem this is a set up for a romantic comedy but it’s not. They soon discover (and take down, arrest together) an unknown man we are simply going to call “The Stranger” (played by Ben Foster) who they take the police station to put behind bars. While trying to question him the Sheriff, his wife, brother “Jake” (played by Mark Rendall) and grandmother are all scared when he tells them something bad is about to happen.
It’s with that being said that I tell you what genre of film this is exactly. It’s a horror film (as you’d expect from Producer Sam Raimi) but to put it into more specifics, it’s a vampire movie. The town is about to be invaded by a hoard of vampires that are here to take total advantage of the 30 days of night (where the film and graphic novel get their title). This isn’t your average vampire movie at all, not just because of the elements of an almost abandoned Alaskan town during 30 days of night but also the fact these vampires are pretty damn relentless. They don’t fall down when they take a bullet, it takes an axe to take one down after you severe their heads they’re no longer a problem as our main character Eben soon discovers. I’m personally not that big of a fan of vampire movies (I’m more of a zombie fan) but that this one really is scary as hell. I have to admit this was a lot better than I expected and is definitely worth a watching for any open minded horror fans.
Video Quality on this release is 1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte Dual-Layered) Blu-ray Disc. This barely at times has any film grain or noise present in the transfer but there are a few small exceptions. This transfer comes with a great amount of detail and clarity to the picture. The color palette is vibrant in ways with strong emphasis on the blues and reds. Flesh tones are excellent and the overall black level is extremely solid. Most all of the darker scenes look great and really help keep the horrifying vibe of the film. The cinematography is very nice and makes for a unique High Definition horror experience.
This really is a nice translation from graphic novel to film and it maintains a lot of the same visual style in the film. There are no signs at ALL of any compression problems like artifacts or pixilation. This Hi Def transfer earns a “4 ½ Star Rating” for video quality, almost scoring a perect 5. Very impressive release here in terms of High Def video on Blu-ray Disc from Sony.
Audio Quality on this release is in Dolby TrueHD 5.1 in both English and French. Immediately you’ll notice this has an amazing amount of rear channel presence with the film’s Score (done by Brian Reitzell) and sound effects. This has dialogue being delivered perfectly through the front center channel primarily at all times. There’s a great amount of lifelike sound to the effects as mentioned earlier. Thing’s like the sound of “Eben‘s” S.U.V.’s engine to the sound of a vampire jumping in through a window all sound so real at times it’s enough to really get you immersed into the film. With that being said I’m going to admit here this one made me jump a few times and is probably sure to have the same effect on the rest of you.
This really boasts a nice TrueHD 5.1 mix that gets a whole lot more than the job done. There’s a large amount of bass presence throughout, it really seems the subwoofer is being used a large majority of the film. Overall this easily earns itself a perfect “5 Star Rating” for sound quality. This sounds just as creepy as the film looks and I think that’s a pretty damn good combination. This is almost “reference material” in ways. It’s some of the best sound quality I’ve heard lately in a 5.1 mix and has a very unique feel to it as well.
Bonus Materials are ALL presented in High Definition video and Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo sound.
- Audio Commentary with Stars Josh Hartnett, Melissa George and Producer Rob Tapert
- “30 Images of Night” is an exclusive to Blu-ray Disc. It features High Definition still image comparisons between the original graphic novel and the sets or scenes from the film. You can choose to play this as a slideshow and toggle between original graphic novel and the finished product in the film. This proves interesting for about 4 or 5 minutes and does it’s job of showing how accurately they have portrayed the original style of the graphic novel in the film.
- 8 “Behind-the-Scenes” Featurettes are included and are as follows:
- “Pre-Production” (8 minutes)
- “Building Barrow” (5 minutes)
- “The Look” (6 minutes)
- “Blood, Gusts and the Nasty #@$&!” (7 minutes)
- “Stunts” (7 minutes)
- “The Vampire” (6 minutes)
- “Night Shoots” (6 minutes)
- “Casting” (9 minutes)
Overall this really has a good length of Hi Def bonus materials and even a Blu-ray Disc exclusive feature (“30 Images of Night“) so I have to say this isn’t that bad of an effort here. This proves to be worth watching in it’s entirety if you enjoyed the film. This Blu-ray title earns a “3 Star Rating” for bonus materials.
