Leo Kerr
Screenwriter
- Joined
- May 10, 1999
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[SIZE= 20px]Fallen[/SIZE]
Fallen is a three-part television miniseries originally aired on ABC Family in or around 2007. The program is delivered on a single anamorphic DVD, along with a series trailer. Story content is approximately 247 minutes, or an average of 82 minutes per episode. The standard definition program has an aspect ratio of 16x9, and was likely sourced either in film or HD video for probable HD broadcast. The disc is encoded with Dolby Digital Stereo, and only the ‘foreign language bits’ are subtitled in the video frame. Also in the package is a single-sided advertising insert for both the original book by Thomas E. Sniegoski and its sequel, to be issued this summer. Fallen itself stars Paul Wesley, Tom Skerrit, Bryan Cranston, and Fernanda Andrade, and was directed by Mikael Salomon, and, as previously mentioned, based off of the book by Sniegoski. The disc has a standard but skipable FBI warning, and an Image Entertainment logo before arriving at the main menu.
Fallen was released on sale in North America on May 4, 2010, and has an MSRP of $27.98.
The Program — ½
Paul Wesley is Aaron Corbett, an orphaned soon-to-be high school graduate. Everything is going swimmingly until he turns eighteen, and his half-blooded heritage manifests: daddy was an angel. Thus, he is a Nephilim (or Nefalim.) Fortunately, the story moves along quite nicely, and so we do not spend a lot of time with what is perceived to be typical high-school senior angst, but move rapidly into the whole aspect of, how does one cope with being part-angel? First off, of course, there are the other Fallen Angels wandering around on Earth. Some of whom are willing to help out. Some... well, there’s this weird cult of angels called The Powers who are convinced that they’re doing The Creator’s work by running around, killing off the Abominations (that is, the Nephilim,) and brutalizing those fallen angels who had the audacity to create such an Abomination. Nice people, that.
Once the set-up is established, the existence of The Prophecy is revealed, and suddenly the story evolves into a modern-day American Star Wars. That’s the original pre-1997 trilogy, fortunately. Unfortunately, parts of the show get a little too close to Star Wars. But while a little on the predictable side, the show moves along at a fairly nice clip, and does not present anything too horribly jarring to the story. The only really odd things are the cliff-hangers imposed at the end of the first two segments, but at least on the DVD, well, you can skip ahead fairly easily. All segments start with a brief on the origins of the Fallen, and the second two also have a brief for those who came in late. Origins is shown over dimensional animated artwork, while the catch-up segment is shown over short cuts akin to what might be seen in a trailer.
The book is marketed by the publisher toward the teen market. The film also seems targeted toward that same general market. There is no significant language, nudity, or much in the way of ‘adult situations,’ save for some implied bits that seem to be done more for humor than much else.
The Video — ½
In general, picture quality of the disc is quite good — although one might wonder what the camera operators were focusing on during principal photography. There is some slight edge enhancement, possibly as a side-effect of the MPEG-II compression. There is some macro-blocking and mosquito-noise, but in general, for a four hour program on a single-layer disc, it really is only obvious on the big screen. There seems a nice tonal range, and the color palette is rendered in a fairly plausible fashion: nice colors, saturated colors, and unsaturated colors, without particularly standing out as overly processed colors. The lighting, photography, and post-processing seems to have been handled by gently skilled hands.
The greatest faults lie in the integration of the computer-rendered effects. While one might suggest that a halo is appropriate around an angel, they are also about as subtle as a Las Vegas blinking neon sign saying “look at me! I’m an effect!”
Oh, and as an aside? Speaking of effects, the most critical ‘suspension of disbelief’ involves how angels fly. They need wings to fly, yes, but do not rely upon them except to suggest to the unwary that they are just being held up by the wings. But then, the mechanics of humanoids with wings has always been portrayed in a somewhat dodgy fashion. Just accept it and move on.
The Audio —
Unexceptional but suited to the task. Most of the dialog is delivered cleanly, and the sound effects are generally suited to the task. The biggest fault is the music’s tendency to heavy-handed melodrama. Music is fairly wide across the stereo image. Atmospherics are generally stereo, while Foley sounds are almost all hard-at-center, right with the dialog. Any activity in the surround channel is probably accidental.
Extra
The only extra on the disc is a short series trailer, running 95 seconds.
In The End — ½
It is not great or high art. As a story, it generally does not get bogged down and heavy, but moves fairly lightly through what appears to be a coherent reduction of a fairly substantial book-origin. As a technical work, the disc is clean, clear, and completely watchable. And in its entirety, I found it to be an enjoyable piece of light fantasy.
