Lockout – Blu-ray Disc Review
July 11, 2012 – 11:37 pm - Posted by: Justin SlussTags: Blu-ray, Guy Pearce, Jacky Ido, James Mather, Joseph Gilgun, Lennie James, Luc Besson, Maggie Grace, Mark Tankersley, Peter Stormare, Solenne Hatte, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, Stephen St. Leger, Tim Plester, UltraViolet, Vincent Regan
has an average rating of 6.1 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
include two featurettes & UltraViolet
– 
– 2012
– 95 minutes
– Sony
– A & B
This uses 24.7GB for the movie out of 30.2GB total.
Street Date: July 17th, 2012
Overall Verdict – Recommended
Buy it on Blu-ray for $19.99 @ Amazon.com
— Review written by: Justin Sluss —
The Movie Itself is based on an original idea by Luc Besson, best known for directing the films “La Femme Nikita” (1990), “Léon: The Professional ” (1994) & “The Fifth Element” (1997) as well as writing & producing the TV series “La Femme Nikita” which ran from 1997 through 2001 and films such as “The Transporter” (2002), “Unleashed” (2005), “Revolver” (2005) and “Taken” (2008). Besson also co-wrote the screenplay and served as executive producer on this film. The film was directed by James Mather and Stephen St. Leger who also co-wrote the screenplay.
The story here is set in the future, the year 2079 to be exact. Our main character is a former CIA agent by the name of “Snow” (played by Guy Pearce) who’s been involved in a deal gone bad that has left him in custody of the federal government and considered a traitor. They believe he’s responsible for killing his superior officer in the CIA during this incident when in actuality he did not. As the film starts out we see him being interrogated by Secret Service director “Scott Langral” (played by Peter Stormare). Langral doesn’t believe a word Snow is saying and constantly has one of his fellow Secret Service agents delivering punches to the face to Snow as he refuses to co-operate with the interrogation process. At this point you’ll realize that Snow is a definite smart ass and doesn’t like to play nice, especially when he’s been framed for something he didn’t do. He eventually gets questioned by one of his former co-workers CIA agent “Harry Shaw” (played by Lennie James) who he’s a bit more cooperative with. He reveals who his contact was on the mission that went wrong to Shaw. Still this doesn’t do him any good as they end up convicting him for murder. Snow is set to serve at least 30 years in prison for this. The type of prison he’ll be serving in is where the real plot of our story revolves around. It’s a new maximum security prison based in Outer Space (much like a space station) where they put the prisoners in a state of suspended animation.
Meanwhile the President of the United States is informed about the situation and reveals that his daughter is on a goodwill mission of sorts. The place ironically she’s visiting is that maximum security prison in space. The prison is called “M.S. One” and houses around 500 prisoners and has an extensive amount of security and weaponry protecting it. The president’s daughter “Emilie Warnock” (played by Maggie Grace) as we’re first introduced to her is on a shuttle about to arrive at the facility. Once she and her Secret Service officers escorting her arrive they’re taken through a strict bit of security where they ask all the Secret Service agents to hand over their weapons. One agent decides to hold onto a gun which he keeps around his lower leg. The whole reason Emilie is visiting this facility is that she believes the prisoners are being treated unfairly and used as nothing more than guinea pigs of sorts to see the results of suspended animation for the research regarding deep space travel. She asks to interview one of the inmates to discuss how he’s being treated. The warden of the facility cooperates and has one of the inmates taken out of the suspended animation state. The inmate is named “Hydell“(played by Joseph Gilgun) and he’s brought into a visiting room where he’s behind a thick plate of glass along with the Secret Service agent “Hock” (played by Jacky Ido) mentioned earlier. At this point Emilie is safely on the other side of the glass. She tries to question him but the inmate is very uncooperative and eventually manages to steal the gun from agent Hock who’s standing beside him. He knocks the agent unconscious and kills another agent or two. He then begins to shoot out the glass dividing him from the President’s daughter. He’s successful with that as well as begins to kill off the guards left and right. It’s only a matter of time before he has control of the facility and orders one of the staff to release all 500 (or so) of the prisoners frozen. This is the beginning of the real mess that will soon require some immediate attention from those back on Earth.
Speaking of back on Earth the word comes to the Secret Service director that the M.S. One facility has been taken over by the inmate and his main priority is to inform the President of the situation; considering his daughter is there and now potentially taken hostage. The President gives the order to do anything it takes to get his daughter back safely and regain control of the facility. That’s where CIA agent Harry Shaw interjects and suggests they send one man to do the job. The man he suggests they send is none other than Snow. He’s facing 30 years and about to be sent to the facility anyway so he’s not too reluctant to accept the mission. The fact he’s a total badass makes him very qualified but the fact he’s a total smart ass and uncooperative at times makes the Secret Service director very skeptical about if this will work. After briefing him, giving him some equipment (including a massive gun), they send Snow on a shuttle up and let him board the facility. His goal is to find the President’s daughter and get her to one of the escape pods to be sent back to Earth.
By this time that the government is trying to take action the prisoners have totally overpowered the facility’s guards and taken the entire crew hostage. One prisoner by the name of “Alex” (played by Vincent Regan) decides to make himself the leader of sorts and does the negotiating. At first he is completely unaware that they have the President’s daughter as a hostage and doesn’t even realize what type of situation he’s really in. Eventually though that changes and they (the inmates) try their best to get their hands on her to use as the ultimate negotiating tool. It’s up to Snow to get her to safety from the inmates and as I said eventually to an escape pod and so that sets up the plot to the film.
“Lockout” to me proved to be an entertaining sci-fi / action film. Sure, it wasn’t the most impressive sci-fi or action film I’ve ever seen but it was something new in ways. I loved the performances given by both Guy Pearce and Maggie Grace. Pearce and Grace definitely have some onscreen chemistry as well as play off one another in a comedic sense on a few occasions. There’s some great supporting roles here as well, especially that from Peter Stormare who you just love to hate. I’d definitely recommend this film to anyone who likes a good sci-fi or action film. Critic Edward Douglas (of ComingSoon.net) went as far to compare it to “Die Hard” meets “Blade Runner“, which I can somewhat see being true in ways.
The critics (aside from the one mentioned above) didn’t really seem to give the film too much love as it holds a weak 37% (out of 100%) on the “tomatometer” over at Rotten Tomatoes. The audiences seemed to like it more than critics though, as it holds a 40% there from audience and a somewhat decent 6.1 (out of 10) rating over on IMDb. The film reportedly had a 20 million dollar budget and ended up grossing a total of 25 million dollars at the box office worldwide — according to Box Office Mojo. Since the theatrical run wasn’t quite as successful as I’m sure the filmmakers and backers had hoped it’s probably reassuring for them to know that “Lockout” is more likely to find its target audience now that it’s about to make its debut to home video.
Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 2.40:1 aspect ratio. According to the technical specifications on IMDb this was shot digitally in 4.5K resolution on the Red One MX camera. This makes for one excellent Hi-Def visual presentation with a perfectly solid black level and a sheer abundance of detail in every single shot throughout the film, especially close-ups. The CG effects may not be the most impressive you’ll ever see in a Sci-Fi film but for the film’s budget they come across impressive and hold up pretty well in Hi-Def. The color palette here is obviously subdued to fit the visual style of the film and fleshtones for the most part are accurate under the primarily cool tone used. Speaking of the visual style, the cinematography here by DP (director of photography) James Mather looks stunning. I’m a very avid fan of material shot on any of the Red One cameras, as the material most always translates beautifully to Hi-Def. That being said this earns itself a perfect “5 Star Rating” for overall video quality.
Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. This mix is downright intense with tons of LFE (bass) and rear channel presence throughout thanks to the film’s abundance of action. Just 5 minutes in and you should realize that. The sound effects here be it gunfire or anything else for that matter all sound realistic (as possible) and come across very “over the top” in a good way. The dialogue is delivered distinctly, through the center channel, and never once becomes overpowered by any of the action. No need at all here for volume adjustments. Simply put this mix is excellent and proves to definitely do the film justice. The original Score (music) by Alexandre Azaria sounds great and also gets a good amount of LFE and rear channel presence with the majority being delivered through the front left and right channels. Very impressive mix for a film that had a 20 million dollar budget. You’d think it had a higher budget than that judging from the sound presentation. That said, this mix earns itself a perfect “5 Star Rating” for overall audio quality. It holds some sequences that could almost be considered “demo material” at times.
Bonus Materials on this are ALL presented in full 1080p Hi-Def (HD) video quality with Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo @192kbps sound.
- “Breaking into Lockout – Making Of” (11:07 – HD) includes a bit of concert art in the form of of mostly sketches, storyboards, rough CG animation sequences, on set footage as well as interviews with the co-writer / co-director Stephen Saint Leger, star Guy Pearce and co-star Maggie Grace.
- “A Vision of the Future – Production Design & Special Effects” (10:13 – HD) includes lots of concept art in the form of sketches & paintings, rough CG animations, on set footage of scenes being filmed, footage of the sets themselves as well as interviews with supervising art director Frank Walsh, art director Oliver Hodge and visual effects supervisor Richard Bain discussing the challenges of designing a unique futuristic world.
- An UltraViolet digital copy of the film is also included which can be redeemed online via the URL and code on the paper insert in the packaging.
Overall the bonus materials here prove to be worthwhile but are way too short, as they only total up to 21 minutes 20 seconds. Still, they manage to add enough to the disc in terms of supplemental material to entertain the consumer after they’ve watched the film. It would have been nice, obviously, to have more content included in terms of supplemental material but this works for what it is. The addition of an UltraViolet digital copy of the film is nice to see; which has pretty much become standard on all new releases from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment. This earns itself a “1.5 Star Rating” for overall bonus materials.
Blu-ray Disc packaging:
Screenshots:
NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Please be patient with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.
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