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- Real Name
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CQ
Studio: MGM
Year: 2001
Rated: R
Film Length: 88 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 16X9 Enhanced Widescreen (1.85:1)
Subtitles: English, French, Spanish
Every Picture Tells A Story
Over a month now I have been wanting to sit down
to watch and review CQ. The problem is, I
receive so many new titles per week that I had to
constantly keep pushing back this review. While I
understand the DVD has been out in stores for the
past month already, I still didn't want to pass up
the opportunity to review this film.
CQ is the first film directed by Roman
Coppola, the son of Francis Ford Coppola. I had
heard going into this that it was a very uniquely
strange film. What it is in fact, is a well crafted
tribute to the camp classics of the 1960s.
It took me a good 20 minutes to immerse myself
into this film and understand what was going on.
You see, CQ is two films-within-a-film. The
first film takes place in the real life time frame
of Paris, 1969/1970. What we are watching is the
life of Paul (Jeremy Davies), a film editor who is
a complete emotionless individual who documents his
daily boring life on film.
Paul has been given the chance of a lifetime -- to
direct the super spy film Codename Dragonfly,
a Barbarella-type science-fiction thriller in which a
sexy, scantily clad secret agent (Angela Lindvall)
is assigned to infiltrate a band of moon-dwelling
revolutionaries
Outside of the set, however, Paul's life starts
to meld with Dragonfly's in more ways than one.
He sees and experiences events that make him
question where reality begins and the script
emerges.
With a talented cast combined with a unique story,
beautiful sets and a perfect soundtrack (by Mellow),
CQ manages to capture the essence of each
of these movie segments with great costumes and
sets. Most of all, the film has a wonderful
nostalgic 60s feel. Even the music is smartly
crafted to take us back to those hippie days.
How is the transfer?
This is one of the moments when a movie depends
on a good transfer. Fortunately, this is a great
transfer! The picture is bold, vivid and crisp
with absolute clean whites and deep solid blacks.
This is important for the many film's futuristic
scenes that are filmed with a totally white
background. Colors are extremely vivid, with nice
deep reds blues and greens that give the film a
nice throwback look to the 60s era. There are a
few minor film blemishes here and there -- not to
be confused with the intended blemishes that are
thrown in on purpose.
The 5.1 audio mix is as interesting and impressive
as the film itself. This is a very active sound
mix that begins with nice bass-heavy sound across
the front channels, with terrific stereo response.
Every channel across the 5.1 spectrum is used in
a very unique manner. Direction of sound is
obviously the utmost of importance here, as all
the channels are used for unique effect noises
including voice placement. The LFE channel is
also very active here, providing outstanding bass
response. Just wait till you hear the sonic boom
of a concorde jet flyover.
Special Features
It's sort of surprising that MGM decided to release
CQ as a dual-sided DVD that supports both
widescreen and full-frame (placed
on the same side of the DVD). I don't think
this film will be sought by a wide audiance,
and really doesn't benefit as a full frame film.
Besides that, the Special Features get thrown to
second side of the disc so you have to turn the
DVD over to access them.
The supplemental material here is pretty
substantial for this sort of release, and I must
add, very interesting to say the least.
First, there's two alternate versions of the
Codename Dragonfly film as directed by either
Paul or Andrejez.
There are no less than five featurettes
that take a look at the various aspects of the film.
Actors Acting introduces us to Director
Roman Coppola directing Jeremy Davies. Jeremy and
his fellow cast mates, Angela Lindvall and Elodie
Bouchez talk about what it was like to make this
film. We even see some initial screen tests here.
Chronique d'un Cineaste is a personal B&W
diary of Director Roman Coppola as he gets ready
to scout locations for the film. The camera is
taken along as we view many of the locales Roman
was shown. Cinematography takes us
behind-the-camera as we watch how some of the
scenes were originally put together. Music
and sound gives us a nice collage of sight
and sound as we see how the film's intricate sounds
were all pieced together. CQ a cinematic
odyssey is an overseas promotional piece that
profiles the Director and actors while giving us
a look at the actors preparing for their scenes.
The documentaries, in total, run almost 40 minutes
in length.
Mellow Live is a psychedlic look at a
performance from a 2001 concert featuring the
synthesized band.
Personal Documentaries contain 5 different
documentaries from 5 different filmmakers.
Essentially, these are just a collection of
short home movies taken from the film's set.
In addition to the film's original theatrical
trailer there is an extensive stills gallery
featuring dozens of thumbnails that you can click
upon to see a larger full-sized view.
Final Thoughts
This film is a real gem! I absolutely adored
it, and am really happy that a member wrote and
reminded me that this film needed to be reviewed.
I am going to place it as a Highly Recommended
title in hopes that the membership at least gives
this film a rent. It certainly is worth a look!
CQ is positively a groovy cool shindig!
Release Date: Now
