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Title:
The Jacket
Region:
One
Genre:
Time Travel Drama/Thriller
Stars:
Adrien Brody, Keira Knightley, Kris Kristofferson, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Kelly
Lynch, Brad Renfro, and Daniel Craig
Writer:
Missy Tadjeon
Based
On A Story By: Tom Bleecker and Marc Rocco
Director:
John Maybury
Feature
length: 103 minutes
Extras:
The Jacket Project History And Deleted Scenes Featurette, “The Look Of The
Jacket” Special Effects Featurette, Theatrical Trailer and Previews
Languages:
English and French (Dubbed In Quebec) Language Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound
Subtitles:
English Closed Captions and English, French, and Spanish Language Subtitles
Packaging:
Keep Case
Chapter
Stops: 25
Sound:
Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound
Year
of Theatrical Release: 2005/DVD Release: 2005
Theatrical
Distributor: Warner Independent Pictures
Home
Video Distributor: Warner Home Video
MPAA
Rating: R
Reviewer:
Mark A. Rivera
Produced
by Peter Guber, George Clooney, and Steven Soderbergh with an eye toward
bringing experienced, but still somewhat obscure filmmaking talent into the
mainstream, “The Jacket” is a dark and moody drama, which stars Adrien Brody
as a Gulf War veteran sentenced into an asylum for the criminally insane for a
murder he did not commit. Brody’s character suffers from a severe form of
amnesia due to a head wound he fell victim to while in the service so he has
little to no recollection of the events he was implicated in let alone who he is
and where he is going. Kris Kristofferson and Jennifer Jason Leigh play
psychiatrists on opposing sides of a radical treatment plan that places the
patient in a straight-jacket while pumped up on hallucinogenic and then the
patient is placed on a morgue draw and left within a cabinet in the dark for
hours. The treatment is presumably supposed to create a womb like environment
for the patient where he alone can face the demons of his past. The unforeseen
side effect is that it thrusts Brody’s character from the year 1992 to the
year 2007 where he comes into contact with a woman (Keira Knightley) who he had
encountered as a little girl shortly before fate placed him in the situation he
is now in. In the future he learns that he died from a blunt blow to the skull
in 1993, which just happens to be 24 or so hours away from where his body is
in1992. Ultimately the story becomes not only a quest to find out the truth to
the events that will lead him to his demise, but whether or not he can have some
positive role in the future of others he has seen down the road.
How
Brody’s character travels through time is never made clear and in fact from
viewing the various alternate endings for the film, I am left with the
impression that he is indeed traveling through time, but like Billy Pilgrim who
finds himself unstuck in time in “Slaughterhouse Five,” our protagonist has
little control when he is forced to return to his body back in 1992. The film is
also reminiscent of “12 Monkeys” though the stakes are more personal in this
film. Viewers may also be reminded a bit of “Altered States” if only for the
manner in which Brody’s character is treated seems like a form of sensory
deprivation. Like most time travel thrillers, “The Jacket” leaves open a few
paradoxes that don’t quite make sense. If his character always got placed into
the jacket then why is it this time that he seems self aware of the loop in
causality that has occurred. In a time travel story you either can or cannot
amend time regardless of whether there are quantum realities or not. There is no
in-between. Thus “The Jacket” like other stories about time travel does
contain some subtle metaphysical implications, but none are adequately explored.
The acting is for the most part quite good though the hyped nude love scene
between Keira Knightley and Adrien Brody will leave admirers of Knightley’s
beauty disappointed since much like “The Matrix Reloaded” you’ll see more
male nudity than one might want unless of course the viewer prefers that.
Presented
in an anamorphic widescreen (2.35:1) aspect ratio, “The Jacket” maintains
it’s stylized gritty feel nicely on DVD and features a well-rounded and
atmospheric English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Soundtrack. A French
(dubbed in Quebec) Language Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Soundtrack is also
encoded onto the DVD as an option along with English Closed Captions for the
hearing impaired and English, French, and Spanish Language Subtitles are also
available as options for the feature film presentation only.
Several
deleted and alternate scenes cut between interview clips with the stars and
filmmakers are among the extra value material (28:14), which includes three
alternate endings that thankfully were never used for the broad theatrical
release since I think the ending as is resolves things in a nice enough way to
keep a dreamy quality to film that I wish was more prevalent throughout. The
ending in the film as is gets the point across without resorting to cheap copout
clichés and without overstating what I think is the obvious. There is another
featurette about the film’s visual effects that is as much a matter of
production design as it is any other form of artistry (9:02). The film’s
theatrical trailer (2:26) and a reel of previews (5:31) that include “House Of
Wax”, “Constantine”, “Eros”, and “A Scanner Darkly” wrap up the
extra value features found on this disc.
The
menus on the DVD are all standard interactive still frames that are easy to
navigate. “The Jacket” is available now on DVD-Video at retailers on and
offline courtesy of Warner Home Video.
©
Copyright 2005 By Mark A. Rivera
All Rights Reserved.
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