Columbia Tristar home video presents the long-awaited version of the film that was promised by Kevin Smith even before the movie-only editoin, the Dogma Special Edition DVD. Clocking in at a jam-packed 2 discs, Dogma: Special Edition marks the biggest and most content-rich View Askew DVD release thus far, topping even the Clerks Animated Series set released earlier this year. News Askew is both proud and excited to present you with the world’s first look at what’s sure to be one of the most successful and talked about DVD releases of the year.

By now, folks, ya gotta know the deal - Stop a couple of angels from entering and thus negating all of human existance. I hate it when I hafta spell it out for you. But seriously, Loki (Matt Damon) & Bartleby (Ben Affleck), a couple of angels punished by God to live out eternity in Wisconsin find a loophole in Catholic dogma that would allow them to disprove God (but also end the world at the same time). So, abortion clinic worker Bethany (Linda Fiorentino) is tapped by the voice of God, Metatron (Alan Rickman) to save the day, with the help of two prophets, Jay & Silent Bob (Jason Mewes & Kevin Smith), and a couple of earthbound figures, Rufus (Chris Rock) and Serendipity (Salma Hayek). The villanious Azrael (Jason Lee) is at the head of things, trying to assist Loki & Bartleby and thwart our heroes along the way. As good and evil plot against each other and eventually converge, Dogma mixes Smith’s clever dialogue with religion, fantasy, horror, and, most of all, comedy, to present an entertaining journey unlike anything seen before.

Okay, so how’s it look? Pretty darn good. In fact, I’m told this is the exact same transfer that was used on the movie only release earlier this year. So, if you’ve watched that one, you already know. If not, here’s the details: Dogma features a beautiful 2.35 anamorphic widescreen transfer (it’s 16:9 enhanced for widescreen televisions like the one being used to review the flick). Columbia Tristar did a fine job with their transfer. Detail and color levels are very good, the brighter daytime scenes didn’t show any sign of shimmer or distortion, and the nighttime scenes are detailed enough so things aren’t washed out or lost in the darkness. Black levels worked very well. There was no evidence of any pixel distortion or film damage. In short, you’re not going to notice any picture problems with this one. It’s a transfer worthy of a special edition for sure.

Dogma is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound, which is the preferred method of screening it. You can also watch a downmixed 2.0 Dolby Surround track with older equipment, or in Spanish or French if that’s your cup of team. Those of you familiar with Smith’s work know that his films are mostly dialogue heavy. Thus, the majority of this film is dialogue driven, and the sound is isolted to the front and center channels. When it comes time for Howard Shore’s score to take over or some surround effects, however, the soundtrack comes alive (especially in several loud sequences where the LFE kicks in and you get the major BASS. One of them’s so loud it’s almost a scare!). Those of you with a good audio setup will get to make use of all channels though, with rain in rear channels in the diner scene, or wind blowing outside of the church. A true audio test takes place in the film’s final half hour when the action kicks in. The intense music, gunshots, and mayhem are fun to crank up.

THE COMMENTARY TRACKS

SMITH, MOSIER, PEREIRA, AFFLECK, LEE, MEWES


This track is the more fun, joking track of the two. However, the price you pay is that you hear a lot less information about the film itself, and VERY little about the controversial stuff that went on during filming and release. In fact, after recording this track, producer Scott Mosier reportedly threw off his headphones in disgust as he felt that it was uninformative, thus, the idea to record the second, more technical track (refernced below).


While this track does feature it’s share of folks talking over one another (you’ll get that when you put six people in a room together), it does bring up some interesting points aobut the film that you might not have known. Damon, for example, was a bit nervous regarding his ability to pull off a comedic performance, and questioned himself throughout. The famous “Shueller Bob” quote of Affleck’s is pointed out and mentioned. Alan Rickman’s idea of Metatron was that of an “aging Ziggy Stardust”, thus the black hair dye and white face makeup throughout. The wings he and Affleck wore caused severe back pain. Azrael is Serendipity’s brother. The external shot of the train moving along is from the Gene Hackman flick “Narrow Margin”. The direction to get Mewes to do that final hilarious rant after God appears (on the 10th take) was “Do it like Daffy Duck”. And, of course, there’s shameless plugs for Jay & Silent Bob’s Secret Stash throughout.


Among all this information, though, there’s the share of confusion and tangents. At one point, the crew begins chatting about television shows that they like and dislike. It’s gotta be moments like this that inspired the second commentary track. Also, the commentary dates itself a bit, as it was recorded just before Affleck’s Reindeer Games hit theaters and Jay & Silent Bob Srike Back wasn’t even in the plan. Finally, as Disney and Miramax are totally washing their hands of the project, any references in this commentary to Disney, Miramax, and the Weinsteins have been BLEEPed. At first, this seems like it’s going to be annyoing, but it doesn’t happen often at all.


There’s a few strange sound dropoffs through the commentary, which I assume were for either breaks, stuff relating to the defunct documentary or other legal issues, or a combination of both. This can be a little distracting, since a thought end abruptly a couple times and sounds confusing. At the chapter break between 12 and 13, after one of the live video sergments, the commentary suddenly stops and film audio comes up for about 10 to 15 seconds. It sounded like the commentary track stopped or switched over, which was a bit of a scare, but hang with it, the guys will come back.





The new feature on this disc, taking a cue from the Matrix’s “Follow the White Rabbit” feature, is “Follow The Buddy Christ”. When you watch the film with the cast & crew commentary, you ALSO have the option to turn on this feature, which presents itself by putting up a small, round buddy christ icon on your TV at various parts of the commentary (I believe this happened about 7 or 8 times throughout the film). At this point, pressing ENTER on your remote takes you to a different track on the DVD (there’s a noticeable jump) which features 2 screens of the live commentary session in the lower left and right hand corners of the TV (see screenshots). This feature first debuted on the Mallrats Special Edition, another JM Kenny production. With Rats, Kenny did it with one camera, this time, he’s got 2 cameras and thus 2 angles on the guys. If you’re into watching the commentary and not so much the film, this certainly is a welcome addition, though the screens do take up a fairly large portion of Real Estate. If you want to see all of the Dogma visuals while listening to the track, you might want to leave this option off. The beauty of DVD is that it’s totally up to you.


I’ve got mixed feelings about this feature. I think it’s something that’s fun to watch once, but probably not something you’d ever use again. Why not have one smaller screen with video throughout that can be turned on and off at will using the player’s “Angle” feature? The space for data on the disc may have been limited, but considering they had room to duplicate 7 tracks of the film, one with the commentary video, one without, you hafta think they might have been able to pull it off. Still, considering this is a feature you can completely ignore if you want to, it’s a nice bonus. I was never a big believer in the “less is more” theory when it came to DVD. More is more, and it’s at least nice to put a visual to the session, even if you only watch one of the many video captures included here.


“Follow The Buddy Christ”, by the way, is only featured in one of the two commentary tracks. The second track, featuring Smith, Mosier, and Pereira only, has no such feature.






TECHNICAL TRACK



(Added 6.14.01) - The second commentary on the disc features three of the six from the last track: Kevin Smith, Scott Mosier, and Vincent Pereira. This track is a much more traditional track in the sense of DVD commentaries, in that the players here keep up with the flick, pointing out technical stuff, background into the actors, and more. Did you know, for example, that Dogma was originally going to shoot in North Carolina (Dawson’s Creek-land) before Pittsburgh came along? How about the fact that the original budget of the film was only 4 million, but that things went WAY over when scheduling got out of whack? Did you know that production designer Ratface worked on The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, and that the train that Willis’s character rides on in that film was pieced together from Dogma’s train set? Joey Lauren Adams as the original Bethany, until Miramax laid down the law? And why DID they shoot the film on Super 35 as opposed to anamorphic? These facts and a LOT more interesting stuff lie inside.



The track moves quite well. Going in, I thought the first track would be my favorite, but I was wrong. Side by side, I actually found this track to move along better and complement the film. I’ll take the technical track over the cast & crew track (though Affleck’s Denzel Washington impression was quite a highlight of the latter). The technical commentary is much more scene-specific and gets off on fewer tangents. Best of all, it’s apparent that the three listened to the other track before recording this one, and filled in the gaps of stuff they missed, being careful not to repeat stuff that WAS already said. Bravo, guys.

THE DELETED SCENES

Having watched the 3:15 cut with Kevin in Red Bank just after the first rough edit was done, it can honestly be said that EVERY piece of footage that got edited together has indeed been included here. They didn’t miss a BEAT. If a scene had a few extra lines of dialogue, it’s back in COMPLETE form. In fact, if one had the right editing equipment, they could probably put together an extended cut of the film. You’ll probably see it laying around the dealer tables at the comic book shows soon. The deleted scenes, however, while letterboxed in 2.35, are of MUCH lower audio and especially video quality. I doubt this was due to space limitations, so this must have been the best quality that they had to use. The sound could be understood, as it was never finished as far as foleywork or music cues, but the video quality can be distracting at times. I’m curious if this was the best quality they had access to, or if it was downsampled to lower quality for some reason. It looked a lot clearer when it was on the AVID editing system.









Anyway, I’m being picky, as the content here is the most important factor. And it’s fantastic. Fans of the flick will be drooling when they see this stuff, that’s for sure. There’s just SO much of it. All of the clips, except for the first, feature introductions by Kevin Smith & Vincent Pereira (Scott Mosier, Harley Quinn, Kevin’s daughter and Jennifer, Kevin’s wife, who you can see in J&SBSB, coincidentally, also show up from time to time. These introductions are very well done, with just the right balance of jokes and information, and provide insight behind why cuts were made. Kudos to Kevin and Vincent for bringing a very personal and laid back tour of the deleted stuff. It gives everything a personality.





The two showpieces here are the action sequences which were COMPLETELY removed and now, restored to their original running time. These are the “Fat Albert” sequence and the extended “Hospital” sequence. The Fat Albert sequence, which once existed in edited form when the movie screened at Cannes, has not been seen anywhere since, and NEVER in this form, which not only includes Jay & Silent Bob’s performance, but a HILARIOUS confrontation between Jay and the gang leader (played by Chasing Amy’s Dwight Ewell) beforehand. Truly a standout.





The “hospital” sequence almost feels like a lost ending, since it’s the last action sequence and would have been placed approximately 5-10 minutes before the finale. [SPOILERS AHEAD] In the Dogma cut you’ve seen, Bethany (Linda Fiorentino) pulls the plug on John Doe Jersey and gets zapped in the stomach by lightning, hence her wound. In this extended cut, a scene Smith himself is very proud of cutting, the Golgathan shows up for a final confrontation between he and Silent Bob. The confrotation itself is pretty hokey, but the scene does involve an onscreen kiss (the first) for Silent Bob and another hilarious line for the character. One of the mutilated Stygian triplets (which we ran an exclusive still of years ago) also returns and is the cause of Bethany’s wound (before he’s handily dispatched by Silent Bob in another humorous way). [END SPOILER]






A final new scene would have taken place very early in the film, and featured a story that Bethany tells a young girl in the clinic regarding her past, and why her husband left her (bringing a bit more meaning to the “I call it being dumped” line of Linda’s when she’s talking to Bartleby on the train). It’s a touching scene, and some nice work from Linda, but just dragged things out too long in Dogma’s opening moments. We’ve got some choice screenshots of all these legendary scenes for ya right here, the first stills released of them anywhere! If the quality is a bit low, that’s only because of the way they look on the disc itself.









In addition to this stuff, the rest of it is mostly expansions of scenes you’ve already seen. TONS of new lines and backstories, especially involving Serendipity (Salma Hayek) and Azrael (Jason Lee), the origin of the Stygian triplets, the Mrs. Doubtfire joke, a Jaws reference, more Star Wars references, a scene of the triplets BEFORE the digital hole ripping effect was added in, and some hilarious jokes. Jay, for example, delivers some gems in the extended campfire scene, including a joke about old the Michael J. Fox series “Family Ties”. Carlin also comes back in a big way, with an extended Buddy Christ scene (He’s especially proud of BC’s teeth), a death scene, and more. It’s all here, folks. ALL of it. Kevin and Vincent did not miss a THING! Thanks, guys, for having the guts to share it all with us.


The one very minor quibble I have with the scenes is that there’s no way to just do a “Play All” or something, kick back and watch everything continuously. Being a lazy bum, I would have rather pushed one button and had each and every intro & scene run (most folks who get the disc will probably naviagate here first and watch them all from start to finish, anyway). So, it’s a bit of a nuisance to push the play button again after every scene, but this way you do get to see all the creative titles, such as “The Four Hour Version of the Campire Scene”, “The Now Legendary ‘Fat Albert’ Sequence in which Jay and Silent Bob find solace in Christ” and more.

This disc just screams presentation. It demands attention. I’d expected a disc that was rich in content, but the fact that so much work went into the navigation and menu design on this disc was an unexpected and welcome surprise. After inserting each disc, and waiting past a brief opening biblical-like animation, you’re greeted with an incredibly colorful and lively menu. Whimsical Mooby-style music plays in the background as you take in all of your choices.






Disc one is mainly film-oriented and features “Dogma” itself, 2 commentary tracks (with the video option), and a strange but enticing choice called “My Opinion: By Mrs. Harriet Wise”, an elderly woman who warns you not to watch the film, etc. After letting the menu sit stagnant for a long enough time, Harriet’s box came to life with even more advice. A very fun surprise. The large “Buddy Christ” statue on the main page gives you the option to “Play Movie” as well as the cryptic choice, “Don’t Play Movie”. I couldn’t resist, so I selected the latter a few times, to find a random screen which popped up and gave me some other options. Neat. Mooby characters such as Surly Duck and Pat Pat The Monkey King are the icons used to lead you to other areas (you’ll hafta point at a selection to see what’s what, though, a very minor annoyance). After jumping to some sub-menus, such as the language and commentary choices, I noticed that Harriet Wise would randomly show up and spout off some more. This use of random animation and video will have you playing around with the menus for a while before even checking out any of the disc’s material. The disc’s authors deserve some kudos for putting this one together.





Disc two’s all about the Mooby. It’s Mooby all over the place in the menu design here. This disc spotlights over 100 minutes of deleted material (as discussed above), as well as all the other extras (discussed below). This menu also looks suspiciously like it might harbor some easter eggs, though I haven’t had much time to search for them just yet. Like disc one, the menu’s colorful, musical, and worth a moment to just take it all in. The Golgathan replaces Harriet Wise as the submenu host here. A video clip of him from the film has been dubbed over so he can present such insight as “Snoogans” or “Poopie” before you move into a submenu. One humorous take even showed the guy screaming and then falling backwards in an outtake from the deleted hospital sequence. Good stuff.


As I touched upon above, one of my favorite surprises of the packaging and menus was the fact that they decided to make use of a TON of production art from View Askew’s own production designer, Robert “Ratface” Holtzman. Ratface’s artwork often gets overlooked or lost in the shuffle, but it’s front and center in this package. The menu screens are jam-packed with the stuff, each of the 2 discs are colorfully labelled, one with “Mooby’s Egg-A-Moofi’n” ad, the other with “Hosties”, a gag from a missing bit of Dogma where Cardinal Glick’s “Catolicism Wow!” campaign was to offer a breakfast cereal modeled after communion wafers. Finally, the booklet itself includes an all new essay from Kevin himself on Dogma, and more colorful artwork. It’s very nice.





The disc arrives in a protective cardboard sleeve, featuring that Indiana-Jonesish style painted artwork on the front, and a full feature list on the back. Sliding the set out of the sleeve reveals a durable, hard plastic, double Amary with a plain Bible-like cover and the word “Dogma” in its familiar title font. Classy.

THE OTHER STUFF

The showpieces of the second disc are obviously the deleted scenes, however there’s still a LOT more to check out. Let’s take a look at what else we’ve got to look at here:


Outtakes:


A 14-minute segment of outtakes is enjoyable, and just the right amount of time. This is not a “gag reel”, but rather just a bunch of quick takes featuring Lee hitting the boom mic, cracking up, Affleck mugging and ad-libbing, Damon spouting off some hilarious Star Wars references, and lots more. This piece ends with a segment introduced as “Why Kevin Smith Doesn’t Like Improvisation”. In it, Affleck and Damon perform their “bus scene”, and it totally drags out for over 3 minutes as they add to Kevin’s dialogue. It truly is a nice example of why Kevin discourages ad-libs. It’s painful!


Storyboards:








Three storyboard sequences are included as part of the second disc. These are all from major scenes in the film. The one sequence we checked out (it was getting late) involved the Mooby boardroom sequence. Arrows can cycle backwards and forwards between the storyboards. Each are clear and labelled with the actions involved and the nature of the scene. Looks like they had some nice work being done on these for the film.



Theatrical Trailer:



Just the trailer with that awful, awful saxophone-heavy music appears on this disc, the identical one to the movie-only disc. Pretty standard stuff. Nice to have, but certainly not the highlight of the set. It would have been nice if the original trailer music could have been restored. Smith & Mosier had also cut a way cool trailer of their own that was shown at View Askew events and on the college circuit for a while. This would have been a cool addition as well. Then again, maybe it’s a hidden easter egg somewhere. Haven’t had a lot of time to dig so far.



Cast Bios:






The producers of the disc have taken a creative approach to the usually drab cast bios pages and turned everyone into a trading card. “Collect ‘Em All!”, the menu urges. Fun stuff. Once you enter the section, you can scroll left and right to view each “card”, and click in further for biography and filography information. Neat.



Secret Stash Spot:






(CLICK PICTURE TO DOWNLOAD)


Whether this was meant as an easter egg or not, I’m not sure. If you look around on the second disc’s main menu, you’ll find a hilarious spot featuring Kevin & Jay doing some blatant bad acting and plugging the Secret Stash (though if you don’t know that it’s in Red Bank, NJ, and have the phone number memorized by the time you finish the first commentary, I’d be surprised). This is a good clip, though, you can tell Kev and Jay had a lot of fun with it.

As you can tell from the length of this review, the Dogma: Special Edition DVD is quite an achievement, and a must-have for your collection. There’s enough material here to keep you occupied for countless hours, and the fun colorful way that it’s all been put together is just perfect. Folks have been anticipating this disc since Kevin first mentioned plans of it when the movie-only edition was released. This is one of the biggest discs of 2001. When they start handing out the DVD awards for this year, look for this one to take home some honors.