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Blackout (1997), The
Columbia/Tri-Star // R // June 19, 2001
List Price: $29.95 [Buy now and save at Amazon]
I haven't seen "The King Of New York". If I had, perhaps I'd hold Abel Ferrara in higher regard. To me, he's just the guy who butchered a classic with "Body Snatchers" and directed the insufferably dull "New Rose Hotel". I didn't much care for either of those movies, and "The Blackout" doesn't fare much better, I'm afraid.
Matthew Modine stars as Matty, a flavor-of-the-week actor who moves to Miami Beach after finding himself disillusioned with Tinseltown. His gap-toothed French model girlfriend is in the early stages of pregnancy, and although Matty pushed for an abortion at first, he's come to be genuinely excited at the prospect of fatherhood. Annie has different plans, though, and when Matty learns of the loss of his son-to-be, he and exuberant videographer Mickey Wayne (Dennis Hopper) indulge themselves in all of the decadence South Florida has to offer. While recovering in a diner, Matty learns that there are other fish in the sea and that the daily special also happens to be named Annie. The two of them head back to Mickey's studio, where Matty breaks down and blacks out. Something happened, but he's not entirely sure what. Memories slowly take shape in his mind as Matty discovers sobriety in the Big Apple with his new girlfriend Susan (Claudia Schiffer, in her first moderately-substantial film role), and he's compelled to return to Florida with his French fleur dominating his every thought. When the events of the blackout become a little too clear, Matty turns self-destructive and falls off the wagon in a big way.
"The Blackout" sports some heavy-hitters in its credits, and it's a surprise to see their talent squandered in this way. The dialogue is fairly poor throughout, and I couldn't help but groan after Matty and Mickey appended "...man" to the end of a sentence for the eight hundredth time. Dennis Hopper's dialogue is limited almost entirely to "man" and George Carlin's Seven Dirty Words, and he doesn't even deliver it that well. If his rant at Matty at the end doesn't have you shaking your head in disappointment, you're a far better man than me. I'm hardly the prudish type who's offended by profanity, but the overuse of it here just strikes me as lazy. Perhaps the strongest reason to not recommend "The Blackout" comes in the form of a lengthy scene where Hopper fondles a junkie's bare breasts and spanks her. Despite following one of the better lesbian scenes of recent memory, seeing an old lech like Hopper smack a young woman's bottom repeatedly will scar you for life. Only supporting characters are presented as sympathetic in any way, which is a huge misstep. So much of the film focuses on Matty's anguish and his inability to deal with his losses, yet I really didn't care if he lived or died. He's just not a likeable character. "The Blackout" is little more than an hour-and-a-half bore with one-dimensional characters, lacking anything that might pass for tension or suspense.
Video: "The Blackout" is presented at 1.85:1 and, yes, is enhanced for widescreen televisions. Like many Columbia/Tri-Star DVDs, "The Blackout" looks rather nice but falls short of being truly great. Very light film grain is present for much of "The Blackout", though it rarely stands out, with the outdoor sexual encounter that takes place immediately after Hopper's unspeakably creepy spanking scene as one notable exception. For a film released in 1997, "The Blackout" has a surprising number of dust and specks, and even though they are extremely small individually, they pop up so frequently that they become much more noticeable than usual. Colors are used inventively in "The Blackout", appearing gray and subdued in some scenes but powerful and vibrant when called for. Fleshtones are nice and pink, and blacks are rock solid. The image is clear and free of any nasty print flaws, though detail seems to waver ever-so-slightly in a handful of shots.
Audio: "The Blackout" features music by frequent Ferrara collaborators Joe Delia and controversial Philadelphia has-been-hip-hopper Schooly-D, which is the highlight of the Dolby Surround soundtrack. The bass from the score is a low-end kick in the gut. The volume of the dialogue seems to vary somewhat, and although this seems to be intentional, I hate having to constantly fiddle with my remote while watching a movie. It's fairly decent overall, I suppose.
Supplements: A full-frame trailer for "The Blackout" is presented alongside those for "Mercy", "Eye of the Beholder", "Trois", and "Time Code". The only other extras are filmographies for Abel Ferrara, Matthew Modine, Dennis Hopper, Béatrice Dalle, and Claudia Schiffer.
Conclusion: "The Blackout" didn't grab my interest in the slightest, and I wouldn't recommend it as a purchase to any but Ferrara completists or devoted fans of the other talent involved. A rental would be your best bet.
Useless Trivia: If you couldn't tell from the summary above, "The Blackout" is a film about an actor who gives into the excesses of alcohol and drugs. Béatrice Dalle, who plays Annie I, was arrested twice for cocaine possession during filming, which would later cause her to lose the role of Anna Crowe in "The Sixth Sense" to the lovely Olivia Williams.
Matthew Modine stars as Matty, a flavor-of-the-week actor who moves to Miami Beach after finding himself disillusioned with Tinseltown. His gap-toothed French model girlfriend is in the early stages of pregnancy, and although Matty pushed for an abortion at first, he's come to be genuinely excited at the prospect of fatherhood. Annie has different plans, though, and when Matty learns of the loss of his son-to-be, he and exuberant videographer Mickey Wayne (Dennis Hopper) indulge themselves in all of the decadence South Florida has to offer. While recovering in a diner, Matty learns that there are other fish in the sea and that the daily special also happens to be named Annie. The two of them head back to Mickey's studio, where Matty breaks down and blacks out. Something happened, but he's not entirely sure what. Memories slowly take shape in his mind as Matty discovers sobriety in the Big Apple with his new girlfriend Susan (Claudia Schiffer, in her first moderately-substantial film role), and he's compelled to return to Florida with his French fleur dominating his every thought. When the events of the blackout become a little too clear, Matty turns self-destructive and falls off the wagon in a big way.
"The Blackout" sports some heavy-hitters in its credits, and it's a surprise to see their talent squandered in this way. The dialogue is fairly poor throughout, and I couldn't help but groan after Matty and Mickey appended "...man" to the end of a sentence for the eight hundredth time. Dennis Hopper's dialogue is limited almost entirely to "man" and George Carlin's Seven Dirty Words, and he doesn't even deliver it that well. If his rant at Matty at the end doesn't have you shaking your head in disappointment, you're a far better man than me. I'm hardly the prudish type who's offended by profanity, but the overuse of it here just strikes me as lazy. Perhaps the strongest reason to not recommend "The Blackout" comes in the form of a lengthy scene where Hopper fondles a junkie's bare breasts and spanks her. Despite following one of the better lesbian scenes of recent memory, seeing an old lech like Hopper smack a young woman's bottom repeatedly will scar you for life. Only supporting characters are presented as sympathetic in any way, which is a huge misstep. So much of the film focuses on Matty's anguish and his inability to deal with his losses, yet I really didn't care if he lived or died. He's just not a likeable character. "The Blackout" is little more than an hour-and-a-half bore with one-dimensional characters, lacking anything that might pass for tension or suspense.
Video: "The Blackout" is presented at 1.85:1 and, yes, is enhanced for widescreen televisions. Like many Columbia/Tri-Star DVDs, "The Blackout" looks rather nice but falls short of being truly great. Very light film grain is present for much of "The Blackout", though it rarely stands out, with the outdoor sexual encounter that takes place immediately after Hopper's unspeakably creepy spanking scene as one notable exception. For a film released in 1997, "The Blackout" has a surprising number of dust and specks, and even though they are extremely small individually, they pop up so frequently that they become much more noticeable than usual. Colors are used inventively in "The Blackout", appearing gray and subdued in some scenes but powerful and vibrant when called for. Fleshtones are nice and pink, and blacks are rock solid. The image is clear and free of any nasty print flaws, though detail seems to waver ever-so-slightly in a handful of shots.
Audio: "The Blackout" features music by frequent Ferrara collaborators Joe Delia and controversial Philadelphia has-been-hip-hopper Schooly-D, which is the highlight of the Dolby Surround soundtrack. The bass from the score is a low-end kick in the gut. The volume of the dialogue seems to vary somewhat, and although this seems to be intentional, I hate having to constantly fiddle with my remote while watching a movie. It's fairly decent overall, I suppose.
Supplements: A full-frame trailer for "The Blackout" is presented alongside those for "Mercy", "Eye of the Beholder", "Trois", and "Time Code". The only other extras are filmographies for Abel Ferrara, Matthew Modine, Dennis Hopper, Béatrice Dalle, and Claudia Schiffer.
Conclusion: "The Blackout" didn't grab my interest in the slightest, and I wouldn't recommend it as a purchase to any but Ferrara completists or devoted fans of the other talent involved. A rental would be your best bet.
Useless Trivia: If you couldn't tell from the summary above, "The Blackout" is a film about an actor who gives into the excesses of alcohol and drugs. Béatrice Dalle, who plays Annie I, was arrested twice for cocaine possession during filming, which would later cause her to lose the role of Anna Crowe in "The Sixth Sense" to the lovely Olivia Williams.
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