Inlägg
av GERO » 17 oktober 2002, 23:07
Här är lite om extramatrialet:
"Most of the supplemental materials are contained on Disc Six of the set, but the episode discs do contain a couple of things. There's a text summary of each episode available with the chapter selections. And the episode discs also contain an interactive Field Guide, that features text-based information that helps you to better appreciate the program. You get a timeline of events, profiles of each of the individual solders, a glossary of terms used in each episode, a breakdown of how the chain of command works, an interactive map that shows the movement of Easy Company through Europe during the war and more. It's a cool feature and there's definitely something everyone will find interesting or useful. One of the tough things about war movies is that it's often hard to keep the characters straight. The soldier profiles proved particularly useful during my viewing.
Disc Six features a terrific 78-minute documentary called We Stand Alone Together: The Men of Easy Company. It's presented in anamorphic widescreen and features interview footage of the actual surviving soldiers recalling their participation in the events. The structure of the program is very similar to the mini-series, starting with stories of the formation of the Company in boot camp moving on to its last days in Europe and what the survivors made of their lives after the war. It features a tremendous amount of archival film footage of the real events to go along with the interviews. It's like seeing the mini-series from the other side of the coin - a more straight factual presentation - and it's a great companion piece.
Next up is a more fluffy, EPK-style featurette, The Making of Band of Brothers, that runs about a half-hour. It's got a typically promotional feel, but it does cover a lot of aspects of the production and so feels more thorough and welcome here than you'd first expect. There's also a brief look at the premiere of the mini-series in Normandy with the surviving soldiers, which featured a memorial service in addition to the screening. And there's a multi-part, interactive featurette that provides clips of each of the characters from the mini-series set to music. Once again, it's nice in that it helps you to tell who's who.
The best of the rest is definitely Ron Livingston's Video Diaries. They run a little under an hour in all, broken into 12 parts. Strangely, however, while the set claims that these give you "a glimpse into the lives of the actors, directors and crew during the 18 months of filming", what they really amount to is a 12-part look at the soldier "boot camp" that the actors went through to prepare for their roles. You see nothing of the set, the filming or the usual behind-the-scenes stuff. That's actually okay, because the boot camp is interesting enough. And Livingston (who plays Captain Lewis Nixon here - you might also remember him from Office Space) is funny, charming and candid throughout. He starts shooting video in the HBO offices and allows you to see his own personal preparation for the role (including a going-away party he held attended by the real Lewis Nixon's widow). You're there on the plane when the cast flies to London and you're there every step of the way through actor boot camp, run by the infamous Captain Dale Dye. There are lots of funny and interesting moments throughout. It's well worth a viewing. The only drawback is that each segment features the same introduction, which gets a little repetitive when you use the "play all" feature.
The rest of the rest includes a photo gallery (broken down by episode), a lame Jeep promotional spot that really could have been left off the set, and a few ROM-based extras (weblinks, etc). I would have liked episode audio commentaries, perhaps with Stephen Ambrose, Tom Hanks and some of the cast, but they're sadly not to be. On the whole, while what you do get isn't the best set of extras you'll ever find on a DVD, it's plenty adequate and the documentary and video diaries are real stand-outs".
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nån som har koll på det föresten.
