Genre: Action | Comedy | Sci-Fi
Director: Edgar Wright
Writers: Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg
MPAA Rating: R
Run Time: 109 minutes
Summary:
20 years after attempting an epic pub crawl, five childhood friends reunite when one of them becomes hell bent on trying the drinking marathon again. They are convinced to stage an encore by mate Gary King, a 40-year old man trapped at the cigarette end of his teens, who drags his reluctant pals to their home town and once again attempts to reach the fabled pub, The World’s End. As they attempt to reconcile the past and present, they realize the real struggle is for the future, not just theirs but humankind’s. Reaching The World’s End is the least of their worries.
While completely different from Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, The World’s End is the final chapter in what is called The Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy movies directed by Edgar Wright and starring Simon Pegg and Nick Frost as principle characters. The World’s End actually is meant to resolve themes that are in all three films. There’s actually a great featurette on The Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy, but more on the extras later in the post.
The World’s End follows five former high school friends as they reunite later in life to complete a pub crawl that never came to pass in their early days. Not only are they faced with the challenges of dealing with unresolved feelings of the past, and how they’ve changed over the years, but they are also faced with what seems to be a strange mystery in their hometown.
The directing is just as superb as you would expect from Edgar Wright (Scott Pilgram vs. The World) and it is full of surprises and fantastic angles and I’m completely in awe that it was filmed just a few months. And the scope of the acting from the cast can only be appreciated upon viewing the extras.
The extras and special features go on for days (3 hours, if I’m exaggerating less) which is what I want in a home movie. All movies should adhere to this standard practice. The following are a few examples of my favorite of the special features.
This was my first experience with U-Control. If you recall when we posted the publishing of the Shaun of the Dead story boards in an interactive screenplay, that’s what you have here in an interactive movie. You can watch the movie and the story board at the same time. Amazing. You can watch the story boards alone in the Animatics in the extras.
The deleted scene (yes, singular) could have very well been lumped with the alternate edits (which were scenes in the movie but with slightly different lines) and I would have (like so many times before) shrugged my shoulders and said that yes, the movie was better with what was in the movie, rather than these alternates, but the blooper reel is not to be missed. Funny guys being funnier. Need I say more?
The featurettes with interviews go on in great detail and are all worth watching even if some of the edits overlap from featurette to featurette. While I do love hearing each one of the actors talk about their characters and their motivations in the movie, the featurettes that won my heart were the ones on the special effects and stunts. Nick Frost is a beast ya’ll, and if you think he looks like he’s kicking tail in the movie, you should see the behind the scenes. Same goes for Simon Pegg. He may appear a washed up drunkard, but the acting involved in appearing that way while throwing punches is just jaw dropping.
As just a small taste of what is available in the special features, there’s the Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright Flip Book, Rehearsal Footage, Hair and Make-up Tests, Stunt Tapes, TV Spots, Trailers and more.
It’s easy to give The World’s End alone 5 stars because it’s a great combination of amazing comedy, terrifying sci-fi and excellent special effects. The special features just make it a must own.
I give The World’s End: Blu-Ray Combo Pack Five out of Five Stars.
The World’s End: Blu-Ray Combo Pack is available from Amazon! Here’s a link!
[AMAZONPRODUCT=B00BPEJX12]
