Australia has been home to many unique films whether it has been the Mad Max films and the new version of Macbeth, or to productions that shoot there like PITCH BLACK and the AMTRIX films. Now director Shane Abbess has come up with a film of vision done on a small budget. GABRIEL draws from film noir and the imaginations of the crew involved. GABRIEL follows Archangel Gabriel (Andy Whitfield) who is sent to destroy the Fallen angels in a midworld where the Fallen and Archs fight for the unclaimed souls. Gabriel finds a world of darkness where Fallen leader Sammael (Dwaine Stevenson) has beaten all of the Arcs sent before including having one lose her wings and become a hooker named Jade (Samantha Noble). Gabriel must destroy all of the Fallen before he falls to the same things that beat down the other Arcs.

GABRIEL benefits from making a lot with a small budget. It's old school filming techniques and quick thinking on the crew has made a cult classic that remains to be seen by all. GABRIEL is an action drama that benefits from all of the things that could have killed the production. It caused the director and crew to work harder with no money to come up with solutions.

SPECIAL FEATURES:
The two extended scenes and one deleted scene contain some interesting extra bits that were cut from the film for pacing.

The three making-of featurettes total about 89 minutes. They form one of the best making of documentaries on the production of a film.
GABRIEL: GENESIS- the evolution of the script, production design with little money, and the casting including Dwaine Stevenson was originally cast as Gabriel before they thought he would be a better bad guy.
GABRIEL: BATTLEFRONT- the challenges of shooting the film from having to find a new insurance company after the first one dropped them before filming. The new insurance cot three times more and cut the budget down. Many crew members had to be in many roles due to the small budget. Some scenes were filmed quickly due to time. The climatic fight scene was very cold during the first night of filming (with rain effects coming down on the actors) which lead to buying wet suits for the two of them.
GABRIEL: EVOLUTION- a look at the visual effects, sound design, and the music score (by Brain Cachia) on little money. They found cheap office space to rent for the post-production. The sound designer and composer wanted the atmosphere of ALIENS.

Rounding out the extras are previews for SOUTHLAND TALES and ZOMBIE STRIPPERS.

FINAL ANALYSIS: GABRIEL is a unique low budget film of $150,000 that looks like big budget production. The hard work of the cast and crew has paid off in a film that every genre fan should check out.

this DVD review is (c)5-19-2008 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission. send all comments to lord_pragmagtic@hotmail.com  

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