Saturday, January 21, 2006

Gladiator: Extended Edition DVD Mini-Review

Last weekend I finished going through all the content of interest on the Gladiator: Extended Edition DVD, and I must say that it's quite impressive.

Gladiator is nearly 6 years old, however this past August an Extended Edition was released incorporating many deleted scenes into the film (as well as containing the theatrical release should the viewer prefer). The added scenes ehance the narative nicely, however the strongest ones are centred around Commodus, and were featured as deleted scenes in previous DVD releases. These consist of him hacking a bust of his father, and especially an execution scene.

The main attraction to this DVD, aside from the incorporation of the extra elements and the very nice, fold-out packaging and artwork, is a 3 hour and 20 minute documentary that takes up all of Disc 2. It covers so much, including the story development and scripting of the film, special effects, locations, and completing the final scenes of the film after the death of Oliver Reed. Truly an informative doc for anyone who really enjoyed Gladiator to view, or for anyone interested in film making and the creation of an unlikely epic in the first place.

The third and final disc contains some more generic featurettes, as well as trailers, storyboards, and other such gallaries.

So should you go and purchase Gladiator: Extended Edition? If you loved the film and you enjoy watching all the suplimental materials that are included in DVD's, abosultely. However if you already own the film and really just enjoy watching the films themselves, it'd probably be best to simply rent this one to see how all the added scenes are actually put into the feature.

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