Following

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Synopsis

Before he became a sensation with the twisty revenge story Memento, Christopher Nolan fashioned this low-budget, 16 mm black-and-white neonoir with comparable precision and cunning. Providing irrefutable evidence of Nolan’s directorial bravura, Following is the fragmented tale of an unemployed young writer who trails strangers through London, hoping that they will provide inspiration for his first novel. He gets more than he bargained for when one of his unwitting subjects leads him down a dark criminal path. With gritty aesthetics and a made-on-the-fly vibe (many shots were simply stolen on the streets, unbeknownst to passersby), Following is a mind- bending psychological journey that shows the remarkable beginnings of one of today’s most acclaimed filmmakers.

Picture 10/10

Christopher Nolan’s Following makes its debut on Blu-ray through Criterion, who present the film with a brand new 1080p/24hz high-definition digital transfer in its original aspect ratio of 1.33:1 on a dual-layer disc.

This may be the best transfer I’ve yet seen for a film shot on 16mm. Supervised by Nolan, the transfer on here comes from a 4k scan of the original 16mm elements. Upon reading that I must admit, at first, I thought that may have been overkill for a 16mm film but it’s obvious that the extra resolution (despite the fact it would ultimately be downscaled for Blu-ray) paid off in spades. This is easily the sharpest, most highly detailed presentation of a 16mm film I’ve yet seen. The image is consistently sharp, never faltering in this area, and the finer details on clothing and the faces of the actors coming out clearly. Contrast is spot-on, with rich black levels, strong whites, distinct gray levels, and great shadow delineation allowing the details to come through even during some of the film’s darker moments. Film grain is left intact and moves naturally and even though it can get a bit heavy, which isn’t too much of a surprise, it’s not distracting and never looks pixilated or noisy.

The print is also in excellent condition. There were some slight vertical scratches in a couple of sequences, and you’ll probably notice a hair in the corner of a frame on a few occasions, more than likely picked up during filming, but these slight imperfections are so easy to overlook considering the transfer itself is such a stunner. I’d even say I was more impressed with this transfer than I was with the transfers Warner Bros. did on Nolan’s Batman films. A lot of hard work was put into this, maybe explaining the delay in this release, and the end result is all the more marvelous because of it.

Audio 8/10

The film comes with the original mono track but the default track is a new lossless DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround track. It’s an effective track and nicely mixed, creating great mood in atmosphere. It works because it’s essentially still a mono track at heart, with dialogue and most effects sticking to the center channel, but then spreading the film’s score beautifully to the rest of the speakers, filling in the environment nicely but never drowning out any of the dialogue, as other remixes seem to have a tendency to do. Bass is low key but effective as well. Overall it’s beautifully done and the overall quality is excellent, with strong fidelity and perfect volume levels.

The original mono track is presented in linear PCM 1.0 mono and also sounds pretty good. Unsurprisingly there’s some of wonderful depth found in the 5.1 track that is missing here, so it does sound a bit flat, but the track is clean, free of distortion, and just generally pleasant to listen to.

Since audio quality really isn’t an issue between the two tracks it will come down to personal preference. But despite my desire to stick with the original tracks in most cases I must admit I thought the surround track was beautifully done and I doubt many will be disappointed with it.

Extras 7/10

If there is one slightly disappointing aspect to this release it’s the supplements, though it has more to do with the fact the supplements are mostly being recycled from the previous Sony DVD (more-or-less,) starting with the audio commentary recorded by Christopher Nolan for the 2001 DVD edition. Comparing it to the newer interview found on this release I’m glad to say Nolan has become a far more engaging speaker since he recorded this track. Here he can come off a little too laid back and can drone on on occasion. Saying that, though, Nolan still covers the many challenges of making this film, which had an incredibly small budget, almost non-existent, and he covers a lot of the ways he got around the more expensive sides of filmmaking. During many scenes he explains how he was able to get the look he wanted, or how he was able to film in a certain location, lacking the resources to properly set it up. He talks about the script and why he set up the non-linear narrative the way he did, playing with how people connect events in their head, how people relate objects to events. Getting past his quiet nature in the commentary he does offer up a lot of information about the turmoil involved in making a low-budget feature, and it is fascinating how he was able to do what he did. The only drawback is that since the commentary is so old Nolan doesn’t talk about how this film possibly played into his work since, specifically his big budget features in Hollywood. Thankfully Criterion included a new feature to somewhat close that gap.

That feature is a new interview with Christopher Nolan, filmed in 2010 by Criterion, and it does work as a sort of addendum to the commentary. Nolan talks again about the film more as a learning experience and gets into the technical details of it, from film stocks, to camera placement and coverage, and then how to get around the fact the sound would probably come off cheap and could possibly work around it. It’s this kind of stuff that proves fascinating in both the interview and the commentary. In the case of the sound he states he only had to make it sound good enough during the opening to pull in the audience, knowing after that the audience would hopefully be hooked enough not to care about the sound during the rest of the film. He notes some of the other tricks he employed to make it less obvious to audiences how cheap the film was, the most surprising of which was the use of props: he purposely avoided guns because cheap replicas just never look right on screen, sticking instead to hammers and other objects for weapons. He also mentions how he’s employed everything he’s learned from this film into big budget films like The Dark Knight, even some of his cheap tricks, and how it has served him when working with a much bigger crew on those bigger films. Some of the technical material is mentioned in the commentary but it’s a wonderfully engaging and informative interview. It runs about 26-minutes.

The linear edit presents the film in chronological order, and was also available on the previous DVD. The film actually starts in the police station like the main edit with the main character talking to the police. The first 19-minutes or so are exactly the same, but after the initial set up the rest of the film is told in order as a flashback. Nolan apparently created it to show people that he didn’t edit the film the way he did to hide anything, and that it would work in order as well. I think he’s right, in that the film does still work. But it has a few drawbacks, specifically the film then loses how certain objects connect certain events in the film, and also the film reveals a plot point (even if it is obvious) too soon. The original, non-chronological edit adds more of an air of mystery that amps up the film a little bit. Interestingly it looks like this edit was made up using material from the same transfer used for the main feature so the picture quality is the same but it only comes with the mono track, not the 5.1 track.

Script-to-film presents somewhat of a downgrade in comparison to a similar feature found on the Sony DVD. The Sony DVD featured an alternate angle with the main feature that displayed the script. Here Criterion simply presents script comparisons for three scenes: The First Break In, The Abandoned Offices, and the Finale. Each part features the finished scene on the right side of the screen and the pages of the script for that scene on the left. The First Break In presents a simple comparison, allowing you to read the script as the scene plays. The scene plays out pretty close to what is written, a bit of dialogue changed here and there. The Abandoned Offices shows how the script was modified during the shoot. Originally the scene was to play out a train station but it was changed to its current setting. Here you can see the original script then the notes Nolan wrote in over it. Finale simply shows dialogue that was cut out. I guess it’s not as cool as the previous DVD’s similar feature, but this feature at least focuses more on the process of developing the script. In total the feature runs just under 10-minutes.

Nolan made a number of short films while in University and his 3-minute Doodlebug is included here. It’s actually a rather impressive little feature, about a man trying to get rid of a small nuisance, with some decent effects despite what I would assume would be a near non-existent budget. It’s presented in 1080i and looks to be upscaled from standard-defintion.

The disc then closes with two theatrical trailers and the included insert provides a short essay by Scott Foundas, who goes over the film and Nolan’s work since then, all of which share similar themes.

It would have been nice if Nolan could have provided a new commentary but the interview does at least somewhat make up for it. Overall supplements do feel a little slim but everything is worth going through.

Closing

The supplements are fine but don’t offer much of an incentive on their own to upgrade from the Sony DVD. What is definitely worth the upgrade, or picking up for the first time, is the high-definition transfer, which looks absolutely wonderful and is easily the most impressive transfer I’ve seen from a 16mm film.

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Directed by: Christopher Nolan
Year: 1999
Time: 70 min.
 
Series: The Criterion Collection
Edition #: 638
Licensor: IFC Films
Release Date: December 11 2012
MSRP: $39.95
 
Blu-ray
1 Disc | BD-50
1.33:1 ratio
English 1.0 PCM Mono
English 5.1 DTS-HD MA Surround
Subtitles: English
Region A
 
 Audio commentary by Christopher Nolan   New interview with Christopher Nolan   Chronological edit of the film   Side-by-side comparison of the shooting script with three scenes from the film   Doodlebug (1997), a three-minute film by Nolan, starring Following’s Jeremy Theobald   Trailers   A new essay by film critic and programmer Scott Foundas