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Paycheck
Special Collector's Edtion
(Paramount Home Entertainment)
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| DVD Release Date:
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May 18, 2004
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| Length:
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118 mins.
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| Rated:
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PG-13
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| Format:
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Anamorphic Widescreen (2.35:1)
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| Audio:
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English Dolby Digital 5.1, English Dolby 2.0, French Dolby Digital 5.1
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| Subtitles:
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Subtitles: English, Captions: English
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| Extras:
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Audio Commentary with Director John Woo, Audio Commentary with Screenwriter Dean Georgaris, "Paycheck: Designing the Future" Featurette, "Tempting Fate: The Stunts of Paycheck" Featurette, Deleted/Extended Scenes, Alternate Ending, Previews
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In Paycheck, Ben Affleck plays Michael Jennings, a brilliant computer engineer who gets paid mucho pesos to complete top secret assignments for big corporations. The only catch to this is Jennings must have his short-term memory erased once he has completed the project. This has not appeared to be a problem for Jennings until he is offered a rather hefty eight-figure payday for a project but in return, he must commit to a three-year work period and three years of his life erased from his mind. Jennings accepts the job but in three years, when he awakes from having his mind zapped, he is being chased by the FBI, his former boss Rethrick (Aaron Eckhart) is trying to have him killed and he has a hot girlfriend named Rachel (Uma Thurman) that he can't remember. Jennings has also left himself with a mysterious envelope filled with seemingly useless trinkets but he soon realizes that this envelope is the key to his future and the only way he will stay alive.
Paycheck is a movie that I would classify as average. The acting is average - no one particularly stood out in my mind. Affleck was okay, Eckhart was okay, Paul Giamatti as 'Shorty' was okay, Uma really seemed to sleepwalk her way through her role. The action was okay. There are a few sequences that weren't too bad (ie. the motorcycle chase) but nothing really stood out. The suspense in the movie was okay as well. It was fun watching Jennings trying to figure out how each article in his envelope would help him survive but other than that, the movie was fairly predictable. Paycheck is really nothing more than your average, run-of-the-mill action movie that is perhaps worth a single viewing on a rainy Sunday afternoon. The movie actually has a pretty good pace to it but once you start to realize there are not many surprises and nothing really innovative going on, you will probably just look forward to the movie's nice, neat, tidy ending.
Besides being able to watch the movie and it's neat, tidy ending, the DVD for Paycheck contains a neat, tidy number of special features. First up, we have two commentaries, one by director John Woo and the second by screenwriter Dean Georgaris. Both commentaries are okay - Woo talks a lot about how different scenes were shot, about the influence of Alfred Hitchcock on how Woo shot the movie (you can see this influence as he speaks), about Ben Affleck being the modern-day Carey Grant, about his wishes to make Paycheck like an old-time movie. He comments on the main actors in the movie - Affleck, Eckhart, Thurman and Giamatti - but has little to say about the supporting cast. Woo's commentary is somewhat interesting, not a ground-breaking commentary, but still can be classified as okay.
The commentary by Georgaris deals more with his influence on the script, changes that were made to the script before and during the filming, how certain scenes were shot by John Woo. Once again, an okay commentary, probably the better of the two commentaries, but not a whole lot going on here.
The next special feature is a featurette called "Paycheck: Designing the Future" and it runs just over 18 minutes. There are comments from most of the major cast, the director and a couple of the movie's other key players, some behind-the-scenes footage, comments on set designs, props, how and why certain scenes were shot, the influence of Hitchcock and other nuances of the movie. It's a decent commentary, nothing too overwhelming. If you're a huge fan of Uma, I would probably avoid this one as she is looking like she didn't sleep for three days when she is speaking.
Next is a featurette called "Tempting Fate: The Stunts of Paycheck". This featurette is just over 17 minutes and as expected, comments on the major stunts that took place in the movie. Once again, there are comments from cast and crew members, discussion on how they had to battle the rainy Vancouver weather, explanations on the filming of the movie's stunts and some decent behind-the-scenes footage.
The DVD also includes six interesting deleted scenes, one alternate ending and four previews.
Overall, I would describe the DVD of Paycheck with a word that I seemed to use way too much in this review - okay. Everything about this movies and its special features is fairly average. It is a movie that merits a single viewing - nothing more and nothing less. Paycheck is not going to leave its mark on movie-making history but it is sure to supply a handful of thrills and spills to anyone who decides to check it out.
| The Movie: |
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5.5/10 |
| The Extras: |
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5/10 |
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Brendan Cullin - Senior Editor
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