Dogma almost became lost media. Due to rights issues, the Blu-ray and DVD went out of print and it wasn’t streaming anywhere. Writer/director Kevin Smith worked it out for a theatrical re-release this year, and the natural evolution of that is the new 4K UHD release, which still includes a Blu-ray pressing.
The film has not lost any of its bite. Religion has spanned all of human history, so it’s always relevant to analyze. Along with the raunchy humor, Smith has real ideas about what God wants of his worshipers, and it’s not all cynical.
The 4K UHD shows the contrast between the road trip during bright days in lush green stops across the country, and on transportation at night. Angels Bartleby (Ben Affleck) and Loki (Matt Damon) ride the bus with the deep night out the windows, and they actually get kicked off the bus and have to walk the night. Bethany (Linda Fiorentino), Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Smith) ride the train which also passes by the pure, deep night.
There’s also a strong campfire scene, which proceeds to the moonlit lake when Metatron (Alan Rickman) walks on water.
Smith remains a huge home video proponent. He once said “F*** DVD” but when that very same movie came to DVD, he apologized. Now this collection has all the archival bonus features from the original Lionsgate DVD and Blu-ray plus new retrospectives.
Revelations: The Making of Dogma is an 83 minute documentary. It has the Showest promo that includes Emma Thompson and Ethan Suplee in the early cast, and that promo is presented in full on the Blu-ray disc.
It covers the basic production story of Dogma but since the filmmakers are looking back over 25 years, it has more context in what came next. Mewes reflects on quitting his day jobs to become an actor full time. Smith invented Mooby because they couldn’t film at McDonald’s but Mooby became a part of several subsequent films. Smith also marks Dogma as a defining moment in the evolution of Jay and Silent Bob.
I was surprised to hear Alanis Morissette first met for the role of Bethany. They do get into Harvey Weinstein nixing Joey Lauren Adams later in the doc. There is also 15 more minutes of interviews taken out of Revelations. They talk about Weinstein more, notably how he was against Smith’s Q&As and blogging.
Cinematographer Robert Yeoman gets a brief five-minute interview, but he was also featured in Revelations. The Q&A is well edited down to 26 minutes to avoid redundant stories, though he still tells the Emma Thompson and George Carlin stories again. But the audience asks him more about the hockey skating teen punks, the musical score including a needle drop he couldn’t afford, and his writing process.
One aspect they do not discuss much now is the religious protests against the movie which made Miramax sell it to Lionsgate in the first place. Perhaps that was well covered in the original commentary and behind-the-scenes, but I do remember the Mrs. Harriet Wise warnings on the DVD condemning you for watching Dogma. It’s fun to see those on a loop now.