Jeremy Clarke reviews

The Arrival

Distributed by
Pioneer LDCE

Cat.no: PLFEB 36611

Cert: 12

Running time: 110 minutes

Sides: 2 (CLV)

Year: 1996

Pressing: 1997

Chapters: 26 (14/12)

Sound: Dolby Surround

Fullscreen: Director-Approved Unmatted Master (not Pan & Scan)

Price: £19.99

Extras : None

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Director:

David Twohy (Timescape)

Producers:

Thomas G. Smith and Jim Steele

Screenplay:

David Twohy

Music:

Arthur Kempel

Cast:

Zane Zaminsky: Charlie Sheen (Hot Shots!, Shadow Conspiracy, Terminal Velocity, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Wall Street, Platoon)
Ilona Green: Lindsay Crouse (Between The Lines, Communion, The Juror, The Verdict, House Of Games)
Char: Teri Polo (Crossfire, Golden Gate, Mystery Date, A Prayer In The Dark)
Gordian: Ron Silver (Timecop, Blue Steel, Girl 6, Fellow Traveller, "Chicago Hope" (TV))

Somewhere in the arctic, wandering ecologist Ilona Green (Lindsay Crouse) is more than a little surprised to find a small area of green and yellow vegetation like a field in the middle of the countryside. Further South in the States, whizz kid astronomer Zane Zaminsky (Charlie Sheen) picks up peak wave forms on his monitor and becomes convinced he's made contact with aliens. Unsympathetic boss Gordian (Ron Silver) gets very angry about Zane's wasting his time over loopy theories and promptly fires him - and since Zane made only one cassette tape recording of the transmission, he doesn't have a lot of proof to convince anyone else otherwise.

Unable to get a job anywhere else on account of Gordian's pulling strings, he sets up shop as a cable TV salesman and connects up a series of satellite dishes so as to pick up the alien signal, recruiting a local black kid who hangs around the house. Sure enough, a further signal appears and can be traced to Mexico, where Zane runs into Green who's having a tough time researching an unlikely conspiracy involving increased greenhouse gases and speeded up global warming. What's actually going on involves a local Mexican police chief who looks remarkably like his boss (Silver again) and has links with a mysterious factory nearby - underneath which, naturally, unearthly aliens are running around perpetrating their nefarious plan.

Writer-director David Twohy pitches the whole thing like an action movie and is unlikely to pick up any extra marks for intelligence. But even though The Arrival ain't 2001 - or even Contact - it is a lot of fun.

To its credit, it eschews the two mainstream Hollywood alien types (glowing fingers, multiple teeth) in favour of the decade's most original aliens yet, beautifully realised by CG effects house Pacific Data Images. It might have been nice to have seen more of them, but the script is cleverly constructed and the real problem would have come if one had seen to much and not come to the end of the disc wanting to see more.

Other nice set pieces include a bathtub falling through several storeys and Crouse turning in for the night blissfully unaware that her hotel room is crawling with scorpions (horrible, glistening, black nasties that look stunning thanks to LD's picture resolution capability).

Widescreen buffs (among whom I number myself) should be warned that the master used here appears identical to the full screen video version losing as it does no significant visual information off picture sides. You don't get the black bars, you do get more picture. But surely LD buyers want to imitate the cinema experience, so aren't black bars and correct theatrical framing preferable to having the screen filled with picture (not to mention, you can centre the picture properly if you own a 16:9 telly)? To be fair, the unmatted compositions work well enough - but a properly matted widescreen version would have proved an even more attractive proposition.

For the rest, picture and transfer appear fine, the side break is okay and the disc has slightly over twenty five chapters which is adequate. Glistening black scorpions aside, the main reason to buy Pioneer's disc is the aliens themselves, a real breakthrough in CGI special effects - and they look great. A worthwhile purchase, then, aspect ratio qualms notwithstanding.

Film: 5/5
Picture: 5/5
Sound: 5/5

Review copyright © Jeremy Clarke, 1997.