| Only available on vcd in Hong Kong, German label Asian Film Network presents the film in an aspect ratio of 1.66:1 approximately. However a disc authoring error has caused the non-anamorphic letterboxed image to be encoded in anamorphic widescreen, resulting in the transfer appearing squashed. I couldn't make my player settings display the image correctly without re-encoding and re-authoring the dvd myself. As for the transfer quality otherwise, there's minor print damage, colours display nicely and while grain can be spotted, some is no doubt intentional. It's a a transfer that looks very much like film and not artificially boasted at the dvd production stage.
The Cantonese Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo mix (featuring some use of English, Japanese and even French I believe) has clear dialogue for the most part (occasionally music drowns it out), effects and presents a fairly engrossing experience, working with all speakers.
The English subtitles slip a little on the grammar in a few select places but are overall well-written. German subtitles are also available. The first disc of this "special deluxe edition" first offers up trailers for Slow Fade, Junk, Unlucky Monkey, Blues Harp, Score (actually Score 2 - The Big Fight) and Gangsters. Moving onto to more specific Slow Fade extras, the program Behind The Scenes (21 minutes, 27 seconds) has an English speaking interviewer behind the lens that occasionally interacts with the on-going movie shoot but mostly just shoots raw footage of various scenes being created. No subtitles accompany the program but the Chinese set chatter doesn't prevent the intent of the program to come through. It's mostly basic footage however but seeing Ken Wong perform his own stunts as well as injecting a needle into his arm for the opening scene is signs of dedication worth catching from behind the scenes.
Kyle Davison Über Slow Fade (Kyle Davison On Slow Fade) predictably focuses more on the script, shot at the very noisy set in Hong Kong. Kyle goes over character, structure, how his English language screenplay had little fixed dialogue and worked more as a template for the translation into Chinese. Some inane questions about the heroin influence in 90s cinema possibly being taken into Slow Fade doesn't prevent Davison from being an informative interview subject. This program lasts 8 minutes, 58 seconds.
A 6 page colour booklet in English has production notes by composer Daniel Lam on the creation of the score and soundtrack of the film. The challenges, errors and road blocks encountered during post-production across the time zones as well as upon release gives an additional, welcome insight into the film (Daniel Lam's gear list is even included). The track listing for the the soundtrack cd is also printed and suitably that is the second disc of the package!
The booklet explains that some of the score never made it into the final mix of the film due to post-production errors so this is really a 2002/2003 compilation of the music in that regard. I never thought the music distinguished itself while watching Slow Fade but things approve a little when listened to in this form. We do have to bear with overly long tracks of whatever techno genre featured (not my cup of tea, hence not knowing) but the ambient numbers as well as the ones featuring basically a single piano creates fine mood. "Slow Fade Theme" sung by Josie Ho is the sole terrific entry amongst the tracks. |
Technical Notes:
