Civic Duty (DVD)
APPROX. 98 MINS. - PROD. YEAR: 2006 - MPA RATING: R
" You can see where this is going, and you know it's going to end badly. The only question is, for whom?
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His wife tells him to cool it and the FBI agent he calls tells him to back off, which Allen's mind processes as "keep up with your surveillance." You can see where this is going, and you know it's going to end badly. The only question is for whom, and I won't spoil that for you. But I will say that I found the ending perfectly unsatisfying.
Video:
"Civic Duty" has a lot of graininess that seems to have been a deliberate choice. It's presented in 1.78.1 widescreen and stretches to fill out the entire monitor on a 16x9 television. Because of that graininess, it looks rough as a home movie. Don't expect anything more.
Audio:
The audio is a little better, conventionally speaking, with an English Dolby Digital 5.1 featured soundtrack delivering decent sound and an English 2.0 option as well. The tonal quality is deep and rich, with good treble/bass balance. Subtitles are in English (CC) and Spanish
Extras:
There are no extras.
Bottom Line:
After debuting at Tribeca in April 2006 and hitting 11 other festivals, "Civic Duty" had a limited U.S. release and went pretty much straight to DVD. I'm not saying it deserved that fate, but one reason for its relegation to relative obscurity is certainly the want-it-both-ways nature of the film. On the one hand, it seems made-for-TV facile in its script and one-dimensional characters, playing to the headlines and popular tastes; on the other hand, it tries to be self-consciously artsy. And those two impulses clash more violently than Mr. Allen and his neighbor.
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