MALLRATS (1995) (Arrow Video Limited Edition Blu-ray Review)

MALLRATS (1995)

Limited Edition 2-Disc Blu-ray 

Label: Arrow Video

Region Code: A
Rating: R (Theatrical), Unrated (Extended, TV Cut)

Duration: 95 Minutes (Theatrical),122 (Extended), 85 Minutes (TV Cut) 

Audio: English PCM 2.0 and DTS-HD MA 5.1 with Optional English Subtitles 

Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1) 

Director: Kevin Smith

Cast: Jeremy London, Jason Lee, Claire Forlani, Shannon Doherty, Ben Affleck, Michael Rooker, Stan Lee

I saw Clerks (1994) in the cinema when I was 21 years old and was an instant Kevin Smith fan for it, I loved his cynical depiction of 20-somethings slaving away for minimum wage at a convenience store with an attitude I could relate to. I was a cynical shit too and I thought customers were annoying, and I was right, especially when your that age and totally self-absorbed. When Smith's sophomore film Mallrats hits the mall movie theater a few years later I was there on day one with a big buttery tub of popcorn in hand, and I loved it, too. A romantic comedy that tells the story of another pair of do-nothings 20-somethings, this time we have Brodie (Jason Lee, TV's My Name Is Earl) and TS (Jeremy London, TV's Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew),  two guys who get dumped by their girlfriends on the same day and end up at the local mall to contemplate life and to win back their girlfriends. At the mall that they attempt to sabotage a live dating show being put on by the controlling father (a bald Michael Rooker, Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer) of TS's ex-girlfriend Brandi, who is cheerfully pimping his newly single daughter on the show, with the original idea of sabotaging the show evolving into the guys hijacking it as wise-cracking participants.

Our self-obsessed protagonists are the comics nerd Brodie (Lee) and best friend TS (London), who have been not-unrightfully dumped by their girlfriends Rene (Shannon 

Doherty, Heathers) and Brandi (Claire Forlani, Mystery Men), who have had quite enough of their boyfriends shenanigans. At the mall the guys ally themselves with stoner miscreants Jay (Jason Mewes, TV's Todd and the Book of Evil) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith, Tusk) who are only to happy to help sabotage the dating show. Along the way Brodie and TS get spiritual advice from a three-nippled fortune teller (Priscilla Barnes, The Devil's Rejects), and irritate the manager of preppie clothing shop the Fashionable Make (Ben Affleck, Chasing Amy), who hates Brodie because he has a "lack of a shopping agenda" and because he wants to screw his ex in a very uncomfortable place, by which I do not mean the back of a Volkswagen. 

Brodie ends up meeting his hero, the legendary comic book creator and pop-culture icon Stan 'The Man' Lee, who arrives at the mall for a signing at a comic shop, and we also meet a host of other strange characters, including a 15 year-old teen girl who is writing a book about the the sex-drive of statutory raping-men, the mall security scourge LeFours (Sven-Ole Thorsen, Conan The Barbarian), Brodie's sassy ex Gwen (Joey Lauren Adams, Dazed and Confused), and Smith's usual troupe of friends including Scott Moser (Clerks), Walt Flanagan (Comic Book Men), Bryan Johnson (Comic Book Men), and Brian O'Halloran (Clerks) in various smaller roles.

The standout here is Jason Lee as the comic nerd Brodie, he is charismatic, sharp-tongued and always ready with a venom-fueled quip, he was sort of my movie hero when I saw this at the cinema, which tells you exactly what a self-absorbed shit I might have been at the time. The film is full of juvenile nerd humor (it is a Kevin Smith movie after all) with extended talk about the sex-lives of superheroes (again... Kevin Smith), but at the time I saw it that's exactly what I was looking for, I too sadly was also having conversation with my friends about the logistics of Superman and Lois Lane having sex. It's was a movie about comic-book nerd culture that was a good ten years ahead of it's time, I'd read comics from a young age but it was never something that was "cool". Anytime I talked about comics outside of a very select group of like-minded friends it was a thing of ridicule, and this was the first film that sort of made comic book collecting and nerd culture cool, which I think has a lot to do with the continuing cult-status of this flick following it's dismal box office when it originally hit the cinema. These days we have Marvel and DC films that cost hundreds of millions of dollars dominating the cinema, back in the mid90's we still only had Superman (1978) and Batman (1989), and absolutely no films about a smart-mouthed comic nerds and fanboys, we only had Mallrats, and the rest of the world had yet to catch up with us, for better or worse. 

Audio/Video: Mallrats arrives on Blu-ray from Arrow Video who present both the theatrical and extended cuts in 1080p HD and framed in the original 1.85:1 widescreen, sourced from a new 4K scan of the original camera negative. The director's cut is an assembly utilizing the new 4K scan alongside inserts from an interpositive, and the TV cuts is comprised of the new 4K scan alongside some video source elements. The new restoration looks fantastic, we get a thin velvety layer of fil grain throughout, and the details are tighter and crisper than we have seen before, the texture of Brodie's brown corduroy jacket comes through like never before. Colors are well-saturated and vibrant, with the brighter colors benefitting from a nice pop, especially the pinks in the final third of it. This is an attractive 4K restoration that presents the film the best it has ever looked ever on home video. 

Audio comes by way of both English 2.0 PCM and 5.1 DTS-HD MA on the theatrical version, the extended cut gets only English DTS-HD MA 5.1 and the TV cuts gets only a English 2.0 Dolby Digital. The uncompressed 2.0 and 5.1 mixes are solid, if not overly dynamic, as with a lot of Kevin Smith flicks it is heavy on dialogue which is what you get upfront, the surround mix expands the score, effects and soundtrack selections from Weezer, Elastica among others, Girls Against Boys and others,  and we get optional English subtitles are provided. 

Spread across the pair of Blu-rays are several comic book long-boxes worth of extras, Arrow carry-over what looks to be most if not all of the extras from the past version of the film on home video, beginning with the audio commentary with director Kevin Smith, producer Scott Mosier, archivist Vincent Pereira, and actors Jason Lee, Ben Affleck, and Jason Mewes. We also get over an hour of deleted scenes and outtakes, the 22-minute 'Erection of an Epic: The making of Mallrats' featurette, the 10-minute 10th Anniversary Q&A with Kevin Smith, the 11-minute Introduction to the Extended Cut by Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier, plus the 4-minute "Build Me Up Buttercup" music video by The Goops, still and artwork galleries, and a 2-minute trailer for the film. 

That's a metric shit-ton of extras already, but Arrow do what they do and give us more of what we're looking for, beginning with a brand new introduction to the theatrical cut from Kevin Smith that runs 13-minutes, a new 30-minute interview with Smith about the making of the film, a 12-minute tribute to the late producer Jim Jacks by Smith, a 10-minute interview with Jason Mewes, a 6-minute interview with cinematographer David Kline, a new 12-minute animated making-of documentary featuring the Minnesota crew members who worked on the film, and a new 4-minute introduction to the TV cut by Smith that explains why Jason Mewes is partially, but hilariously, over-dubbed by someone else on the TV cut. Additionally we almost two hours of VHS-sourced dailies, plus a vintage soundtrack EPK, a brief cast EPK from the set of the film

The two-disc release comes housed in an oversized clear keepcase with a sleeve of reversible artwork featuring a new illustration by Robert Sammelin and the original poster artwork by the legendary Drew Struzan, with the pair of disc featuring separate excerpts of the new illustration. Inside you will find a limited edition 24-page booklet with new writing on the film from film historian Philip Kemp, plus a reversible fold-out poster featuring replica blueprints for ‘Operation Drive-by’ and ‘Operation Dark Knight’ from the film. All of this comes housed in a limited edition slipcase featuring the Robert Sammelin artwork. 

Special Features: (Disc One - Theatrical Version) 

- Brand new restoration by Arrow Films of the Theatrical cut of the film, approved by director Kevin Smith and cinematographer David Klein
- Audio commentary with director Kevin Smith, producer Scott Mosier, archivist Vincent Pereira, and actors Jason Lee, Ben Affleck, and Jason Mewes
- Brand new introduction to the film by Kevin Smith (13 min) HD
- My Mallrat Memories - and all-new interview with Kevin Smith (30 min) HD 
- Mr. Mallrats: A Tribute to Jim Jacks - A newly filmed tribute to producer Jim Jacks by Kevin Smith (12 min) HD 
- Blunt Talk - Brand new interview with actor Jason Mewes (10 min) HD 
- When We Were Punks - Brand new interview with Cinematographer David Klein (6 min) HD 
- Hollywood of the North: A newly produced animated making-of documentary featuring Minnesota crew members who worked on the film (12 min) HD 
- Deleted Scenes - Kevin Smith and Vincent Pereira discuss deleted scenes and sequences originally cut from the film (62 min) 
- Outtakes and behind-the-scenes footage (8 min) 
- Cast interviews from the original set (9 min) 
- Erection of an Epic: The making of Mallrats - archival retrospective with cat and crew looking at the making and release of the film (22 min) 
- Q&A with Kevin Smith - archival Q&A filmed for the 10th anniversary (9 min) 
- The Goops "Build Me Up Buttercup" Music Video (4 min) 
- Theatrical Trailer (2 min) HD 
Special Features: (Disc Two Extended and TV Cuts) 
- Brand new restoration by Arrow Films of the Extended cut of the film, approved by director Kevin Smith and cinematographer David Klein (121 min) 

- Newly assembled TV cut of the film featuring hilarious overdubbing to cover up profanity (89 min) 
- Original Stereo Audio (Dolby Digital) 
- Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
- Brand new introduction to the TV cut by director Kevin Smith (4 min) HD 

- Introduction to the Extended Cut by Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier (11 min) 
-Stills gallery of the comic books featured in the film’s opening sequence Scott Mosier and Kevin Smith (4 min)

- Kevin Smith on how Mallrats is an Easter movie (1 min) )

- Dailies (119 min) 

- Still Gallery: Behind the Scenes Stills (147 images)

- Still Gallery: Comics (14 images) 

- Collector’s booklet featuring new writing by Philip Kemp
- Fold out poster featuring replica blueprints for ‘Operation Drive-by’ and ‘Operation Dark Knight’

Arrow Video have done fantastic work bringing Kevin Smith's seminal nerd culture sophomore effort Mallrats (1994) to Blu-ray, we get a terrific 4K restoration, three versions of the film, hours upon hours of extras and the limited edition packaging is pure eye-candy, top-notch stuff. 

Screenshots from the Arrow Blu-ray (Theatrical Cut):

Extras: