P2 - US Artwork Mediabook [German Import]

It’s Christmas and the office is closing, everyone is going home to families to celebrate the holiday. That is everyone except Angela Bridges (Rachel Nichols). Working late to appease an angry client, Rachel is the last to leave the building, but her car won't start. The parking security guide Thomas (Wes Bentley) does what he can to help but the vehicle just won’t start. As Angela tries to find a way out of the building and get a cab, the lights go out, and her festive Christmas Eve of terror is about to begin. 

Produced by Alexandre Aja and first-time director Franck Khalfoun stepped their toes in the terror film waters with P2, a low-budget horror/thriller about one woman’s fight for survival against an obsessed psychopath. On paper, this is a pretty lean and to-the-point plot. Our villain played by Wes Bentley is a misunderstood everyman who everyone ignores or doesn’t care about. Or at least that’s what he believes. Bentley does a respectable job delivering the creepy guy persona while also being comically aloof of reality.

Where the film stumbles is how the story is initiated. As an audience, we’re just thrown into it and with a small cast, a lot of the horror surprises aren’t all that surprising. At a slim 97-minute runtime, the film could have used a few minutes at the front end to set up more people and establish an alternative normal before the horror actually begins. When Bentley shows up it’s so sudden it’s no surprise he’s our guy. While the payoff for a few suspense sequences may be telegraphed in advance, Khalfoun keeps the tension up long enough to steer the show to a satisfying conclusion.

That said, kudos to the cast for doing well with what they had to work with. Nichols was a little bumpy at first with her imprisoned damsel in distress, but she found her footing and dug into the final girl survivor character nicely. Much of P2 is relatively routine and predictable, but it’s also nice to see some moments where Nichols’ Angela actually does the smart thing a time or two and does not fall into the common trap of smart people making chronically stupid decisions. Again Bentley often steals the show vacillating from comically absurd outbursts to being genuinely terrifying and menacing. And for only a handful of locations, the two actors work well together and sell the show. 

There could have been a little more to the setup, a little more tightening to some plot twists, but overall P2 is a satisfyingly creepy flick. I remember catching it in a rundown second-run theater and that was the perfect viewing conditions for this little horror flick. It's been so long though, that I think the last time I saw this film was when I was working at Hollywood video and needed something on while stacking new releases on the shelves. I remembered most of it but a few bits made me jump. It's not the greatest terror film ever made, but it hits the target more than it misses and it thankfully doesn’t overstay its welcome. 

Vital Disc Stats: The Blu-ray

German label Turbine Medien parks P2 on Blu-ray with a new two-disc Mediabook release. Relatively speaking each Region Free BD-50 disc is the same package, the only difference is one disc houses the Atmos audio while the other offers up the Auro-3D 13.1 track. Each disc loads to a static image main menu with standard navigation options - albeit in German but it’s easy to figure out what is what. The Mediabook offers a 20-page booklet featuring the essay A New Level of Terror by Tobias Hohmann. It’s in German, but using the Google Translate app on my phone I was able to give it run through. It’s worth checking out. 

Note: As of right now, all three Mediabook cover options have sold out, but I understand a standard release is in the pipeline soon.

P2 comes to Blu-ray presented in 1080p 2.35:1. It's my understanding this is the same transfer that Studiocanal had a hand in for past releases, but Turbine has done a new encode for it. I haven’t seen those older releases so I can’t say apples to apples what the improvements are other than I’m pretty impressed with what they offer up here. Details are strong throughout, even during the darkest shadowy scenes there’s an appreciable amount of clean clear detail in facial features, clothing (or lack thereof) and the grungy grime of the parking garage. Film grain is intact and well-rendered. Colors are stong, but again this is a mostly dark and creepy film, so the sparkles of color really pop when present. Primaries are vivid and natural with healthy skin tones. Black levels are deep and inky giving the image a strong sense of three-dimensional depth. All around an impressive transfer.

On the audio side, you have several options here. One disc gets you Atmos (which I’ll discuss in a bit), and the other you get Auro-3D (which I can’t really speak to since I’m not equipped). On top of those options is an impressive in its own right DTS-HD MA 2.0 track. Now for the Atmos mix, I was really impressed with how well this track handled the sense of space and emptiness in the film. Little sound effects have that spooky echo effect that drifts around the surround channels and into the height spaces. Later in the film when Rachel Nichols is trapped in a flooding elevator, those height channels get a nice workout. 

Throughout the film, dialog is clean and clear, scoring by Tomandandy is solid stuff amplifing the creepy factor when and where needed but also blasting out the mix for the big gnarly gory bits with glee. All around an aggressive and immersive track that lets those quiet scenes really creep in while going full-tilt for the big action-packed moments. Now for the Auro-3D track, I’m not equipped to handle it, it does default to its base DTS-HD MA 7.1, and it’s pretty damned effective in its own right. The LFE on the DTS 7.1 doesn’t quite punch as hard as the Atmos, but this is another great way to enjoy the show if you need to go this route.

Bonus features may be as sparse as a parking garage on Christmas Eve, it’s a lot of basic EPK-style stuff, but there is some good material well worth digging into here. The best bonus of the pack is the audio commentary track with Aja, Khalfoun, and co-writer Gregory Levasseur. With the three of them, it’s a pretty lively track as they discuss the ins and outs of the production and some of their story choices. 

• Audio Commentary featuring Alexandre Aja, Frank Khalfoun, and Gregory Levasseur
• Making of (SD 12:06)
• Film Location and Stunts (SD 5:18)
• Interview with Frank Khalfoun (SD 3:00)
• Behind-the-scenes (SD 4:07)
• Trailer 
• Theatrical Trailer (US/German)
• Teaser Trailer (US/German)
• TV Spots

P2 is far from a perfect survival horror thriller, but it’s a pretty good one. It didn’t light the world on fire when it hit theaters and hasn’t had a Blu-ray release in the U.S., but it’s well worth checking out. Wes Bentley is a fun psycho while Rachel Nichols delivers an engaging final girl performance. Plus there are some fun suspense sequences and one damned memorable kill scene! Germany’s Turbine Medien gives fans of P2 an impressive Blu-ray Mediabook worth importing sporting a solid transfer, a great new Atmos audio mix, and a selection of decent bonus features in addition to the essay in the booklet. Recommended

Note: As of right now, all three Mediabook cover options have sold out, but I understand a standard release is in the pipeline soon.