Freerunner

Released by: Image Entertainment
Released on: 10/18/2011
Director: Lawrence Silverstein
Cast: Sean Faris, Danny Dyer, Rebecca Da Costa, Tamer Hassan, Amanda Fuller
Year: 2011
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The Movie:
Often used synonymously with the term “parkour”, freerunning adds acrobatics to the mix, displaying impressive moves that require serious skill to pull off smoothly. The point of both is to move through a course using the most efficient paths through the numerous obstacles along the way. In the film Freerunner, which takes place in Clevelend, the sport has become an underground gambling opportunity. Organized crime runs the show and Reese (Tamer Hassan) is the man who facilitates the races for his boss, with the objective of capturing flags and getting to the finish first. A glorified Capture the Flag really. Ryan (Sean Faris) is a guy working to save up enough to get his grandfather out of the assisted living home he's in, and is one of the best runners in the city. His main competition is Finch (Ryan Doyle, champion in the sport and stunt coordinator for the film). Finch is an arrogant prick who plays dirty and does whatever he has to do in order to win.

The races are broadcast over the internet, and are illegal of course. During the final race of the season all the runners get tricked into an enclosure and get knocked out by some gas, only to wake up in bonds, and an evil new race is forced upon them. Each has a collar that will detonate and remove their heads if they go out side the race zone, or if they are the last one to go through a checkpoint, or if a flag is captured and they fail to pass through the checkpoint within a certain amount of time. The winner of the race is to walk away with a million bucks and the losers…well they just die. Incredibly wealthy men bet absurd amounts of money on the runners and get exclusive access to the race. Ryan, with the help of his sexy girlfriend Chelsea (Rebecca Da Costa), is determined to win and get his grandfather back to his boat instead of being stuck in a hospital bed, and he's also determined to take out the man running the whole thing, Mr. Frank (Danny Dyer).

Although it may sound like it owes a little to The Running Man, other than the exploding head collars and running for your lives it's nothing like it. It's missing the snappy one-liners, the spectacular deaths, the muscle-heads, and of course Richard Dawson. But it does display some pretty impressive stunts and skills by the runners who are not Sean Faris, as the filmmakers employed real competitive runners doing all their own stunts. Ryan Doyle is pretty amazing to watch. Supposedly no wires or CGI were used, and based on what they show in the extras, it seems like a legitimate claim. Tamar Hassan is great in his role, playing the mobster character without going over the top with it, which could have easily been done.

The pacing is mostly good aside from a couple of scenes used for character development, and the running scenes (except for the shaky camera tactics used at some points) are incredibly entertaining to watch. The movie is assembled pretty well overall, and is a solid effort from first-time director Silverstein. It's not a very deep film, the story isn't all that clever, and there's a couple of “huh?” moments, but overall it's a fun time if you want to sit back to some mindless screen watching.

Video/Audio/Extras:
Freerunner is presented here with an AVC encoded 1080p high-definition transfer, with an aspect ratio of 2.35:1. It maintains a nice looking picture throughout with good detail and great colors, along with deep blacks. There's a healthy amount of film grain present (filmed 16mm, blown up to 35mm) and it doesn't look as though noise reduction was applied. A few spots of aliasing were noticed, but they're minor and if you're not looking for them they will probably be missed. Overall a very pleasing picture. The audio is handled by a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track and it delivers on the same level as the video image. The action sequences use loud thumping music and adds to the energy of the film. An excellent balance is maintained throughout and there's plenty of activity with the subwoofer and rear channels.

Lots of extras to watch on the disc, all in 1080p (with 2-channel audio). Three featurettes do a good job of showing what these guys can do and interviews are scattered about. Each of these is about a half an hour in length: “Behind the Scenes: Outtakes and Bloopers”, “Over the Rooftops and Behind the Scenes”, and “Freerunner Stunts, Fights and Effects”. If you like the fluff and fanfare that these behind the scenes features sometimes bring, like how brilliant the director is and how giving the actors were, look elsewhere. They did these the right way. It really could have been one feature length “making of”, but whatever. Another extra is “Playing Ninja” (7:32), where actors and crew play a game to pass the time. Looks kind of fun actually. Next is a five-and-a-half minute spot “Parkour/Freerunning” which gives you a brief overview of what the sports are about. Lastly is a trailer for the film.

The Final Word:
It's a fun movie that won't make you think, but should keep you awake. A solid video/audio presentation and some great supplemental material add to the value of the disc, but you may want to rent it first.