听 Denzel Washington plays a case-hardened bodyguard hired to shadow precocious tyke Dakota Fanning in Tony Scott's Man On Fire. Reviews were mixed for this ultra-violent thriller, which we called "po-faced, dull and sadistic", but Washington's ability to put bums on seats is undeniable. Ultimately the movie grossed close to $80m at the worldwide box office. Now that's hot.
Fanning The Flames
If you only invest in the standard edition of this DVD, you'll have access to five deleted scenes with optional commentary by director Tony Scott. Among them is a nicely played exchange between Fanning and Marc Anthony. It adds a sense of closeness between father and daughter, which was crucially missing in the final cut. There's also more expositional stuff between Anthony and his onscreen wife, played by Radha Mitchell, which Scott regrets cutting because, "I love to see Radha in her underwear". And this is why Tony Scott isn't taken seriously as a director...
His feature commentary is just as cheeky, revealing that he took a meeting with Washington while laid out on a table, undergoing acupuncture. But there are plenty more serious insights too. "I thought the combination of this big black guy and porcelain little white girl would make a great love story," he says, pointing to a handful of neatly improvised moments where the chemistry between Washington and Fanning is most evident.
Burning Ambition
The centrepiece of the special edition package is an engrossing feature-length documentary about the process of updating Man On Fire from the 1987 Italian film on which it is based. Screenwriter Brian Helgeland reveals that the original movie was recommended to him by a certain video store clerk by the name of Quentin Tarantino. Decades later, he only agreed to script the remake because producers gave him the impression that Tony Scott would be taken off the movie and he'd get the chance to direct. Sneaky, but even Scott acknowledges that few in the industry believed he could make this film: "People didn't think I could handle the performances or the emotionality of the story," he says. (We refer you to the above comment about Radha Mitchell's underwear.)
Scott demonstrates the ways in which the camera can translate the right "emotionality" in a featurette dedicated to the big abduction scene. View the action from four different angles, with each camera serving a special function. For instance, as Scott explains in an optional commentary, the jagged movements of a "hand-cranked" camera help to convey the disorientation of Washington's character as he senses that something isn't right. (You can also access storyboards for this sequence, drawn by Scott himself.)
If you enjoyed the film, this special edition package is well worth investing in for its unusually detailed 'making of' documentary. As well as stories from 20 years of development hell, there's an investigation into the high-stakes business of kidnapping, interviews with the stars, discussion about visual effects and behind-the-scenes footage from Mexico. Pretty much the whole enchilada.
EXTRA FEATURES
ONLY AVAILABLE AS PART OF SPECIAL EDITION:
