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By now, you're well aware that the film was a legendary, one-of-a-kind collaboration between two very different filmmakers. It began with Stanley Kubrick, who toiled with the project for years before turning it over to his friend Spielberg, who finished it posthumously with the full cooperation of the late auteur's estate. Considered either a stroke of brilliance or a colossal mismatch depending on which side of the fence you sat on, the film marks the merging of two very different sensibilities, the warm and fuzzy Spielberg with the intellectual, unsentimental Kubrick. It worked for some, failed miserably for others. But rare for a mainstream Hollywood film, there was no middle ground. Few films have polarized audiences as much as A.I., but the film achieved a power amid the chaos that even the harshest critic could not easily dismiss.

Though it wasn't quite what I expected, I found myself intrigued and often enthralled by A.I. It was exciting to see a filmmaker of Spielberg's stature turn down an easy jackpot like Harry Potter in favor of such a complex and risky project, and whatever its faults, has there been a more unique film to come out of Hollywood in the past decade or so? The basic premise - robot boy searches for love among the androids - is as reminiscent of Spielberg's past work as it is Kubrick, and isn't as much of a mismatch as it first appears. Perhaps it is the tonal shifts that threw viewers off, for A.I. is not an easy film. Rare for Spielberg, he often sacrifices the emotion for the intellectual, if not altogether successfully. But isn't flexing one's muscles in new directions usually painful?

Since the film is full of left turns, I don't really want to say much about the plot for fear of ruining the surprises, but suffice to say it is fairly well structured into three tight acts. However, like many viewers, I felt the ending went on for far too long, and the climaxes on top of climaxes felt wrong and too much like old-school Spielberg. Harder to argue with is the film's impressive production design. The concepts, sets, effects created for the film are visionary - often bold and audacious, this is a future world well worth exploring, with images new yet oddly familiar. Even those I know who absolutely hated the film found at least something startling to see and hear, and how exciting to see a future world like this back on the big screen! This is no Blade Runner, or even a Star Wars, but borrowing heavily from the world of Philip K. Dick, I was often fascinated by the world Kubrick and Spielberg realized so magnificently.

Finally, you can't talk about A.I. without praising the film's underrated performances. While that little Haley Joel Osment is so good he's scary, he's already being taken for granted as an actor. After his Oscar-nominated turn in The Sixth Sense, he may not be able to live that triumph down, but he's just as good here, if not better. Easily his equal is Jude Law, who manages to make his Gigolo Joe more real than most of the human characters, and his relationship with Osment is the heart of the film. And also impressive is the supporting cast, especially the underrated Frances O'Connor as Osment's conflicted "mother" and, in a smaller role, Sam Robards as David's uncaring dad.

Is A.I. perfect? Hardly. But for a Spielberg film the lack of polish is exciting, and this is a film that I believe will be rediscovered and reevaluated in years to come. So don't let the mixed buzz turn you off. Love it or hate it, A.I. is a trip well worth taking... at least once.

Video: How Does The Disc Look?

Presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen, this is a strong presentation of difficult material. Spielberg, working with director of photography Janusz Kaminski, has created a unique, oddly techno-organic world that is hard to describe. The film is both slick and colorful, yet often hazy and muted, which this transfer conveys very well.

Transfer-wise, this is about as good as it gets. The print is pristine, with only some visible grain in the more low-light, high contrast interiors to distract. Blacks are rock solid and contrast excellent across the entire grayscale, if rather dark on the low end. The image has a very "hard" look at times that some may dislike, but it appears to reflect the stylistic preferences of Kaminski. Colors are often vibrant to the point of oversaturation, but noise-free with accurate fleshtones. Conversely, some scenes appear intentionally and heavily desaturated. Sharpness is very good, although much of the film appears soft due to the use heavy filters, while shadow delineation is generally excellent, for a striking three- dimensional appearance. Edge enhancement is thankfully minimal, and even with all the hazy and smoke-filled interiors, I noticed little in the way of compression artifacts.

A separate pan & scan version is also being released, featuring the exact same features and audio specs. But please, don't buy that one!

Audio: How Does the Disc Sound?

Though not labeled as such, A.I. is presented in both Dolby Digital Surround EX and DTS matrixed 6.1 ES, and this is an excellent, reference quality presentation irrespective of audio format. Like the film itself, this veers wildly in many different directions, so hang on. Aside from John Williams' minimalist score which nicely fills out the front soundstage, the effects can go from a whisper to a scream. Overall balance between the music and effects is excellent across the board, and dynamic range up there with the best of soundtracks. Gary Rydstrom's excellent sound design is often striking, with some passages featuring low, droning tones then quick bursts of starting, loud effects. The rumbling "Flesh Fair" is highly aggressive, with nice use of discrete surrounds and excellent imaging from front to back.

Comparing four scenes, the DTS track feels a bit cleaner, fuller and more natural in realizing the ambient noises, but either track is impressive. Dialogue is also very well-rendered on either mix, though better balanced on the DTS track. I noticed improved rendering of the hushed and low- level spoken tones when comparing two of the early scenes, and stereo separation is improved on the DTS as well. Also a bit more pronounced is the low end; either mix is sure to please, but the DTS had a bit more "kick" to it. But whichever way you go, this is a great presentation.

Also included is a French 5.1 Dolby Digital dub and a matrixed English 2.0 Dolby Surround track, along with English Captions and French and Spanish subtitles. No true English Closed Captioning is provided.

Supplements: What Goodies Are There?

With two whole discs full of fun, aside from the lengthy 12-minute introduction Creating A.I. featuring Steven Spielberg, producer Kathleen Kennedy and longtime Kubrick associate Jan Harlan, the main feature gets a whole platter all to itself. Pop in disc two for all the goodies, which all combined, run almost two hours. And yes, no audio commentary is included, but what's here is comprehensive enough that you're likely to forget...

Given unprecedented access to Spielberg's top secret project, DreamWorks Home Entertainment and DVD supplement producer Laurent Bouzereau have come back with a diary-esque look at the entire experience of making A.I., from conceptualization to post production. To make it easy to access and navigate, Bouzereau and DreamWorks have decided to divide up the material into various segments, each detailing a particular facet of the production. Aside from my one main nitpick, which is the lack of a "Play All" function, this is an overall excellent documentary with a logical, well-thought-out structure. Told primarily with video footage, the high level of access to the set pays off in spades, with plenty of behind-the-scenes footage from almost every department involved. Adding depth and background is a robust archive of still material,included as an appendix to the main documentary.

Normally, I'd go through each bit piece by piece and critique it, but given the approach here, I'm going to diverge from my usual format a bit and offer some overall impressions first. I found Bouzereau's unique perspective refreshing, and it is not as rigid as it first appears. Aside from some funny names for the featurettes ("A Portrait of Gigolo Joe" really made me laugh) and a bit of fluff, these add up to more than the sum of their parts, or what I initially feared, lame EPKs thrown together. Adding context is the added perspective of not only from the main participants being featured, but their fellow cast and crew. And for once, we actually get more than just a how-to on CGI effects, with considerable focus on the non- technical aspects of the film. I suppose I could voice some complaints, such as the usual fawning over Spielberg, or wanting more detail on certain aspects of the film (how the hell did Ministry get in there!?) but you can't include everything, can you? I'm just thankful that for once, a documentarian has attempted to tell a real story, not just create bulletpoints.

That said, here's a brief overview of what you're gonna get. Up first is a rarity for a DVD making-of, a look at the acting process. Acting A.I. includes two segments totaling 18 minutes, "A Portrait of David" and "A Portrait Of Gigolo Joe." Haley Joel Osment and Jude Law are obviously featured here in surprisingly intimate interviews, discussing how they became involved with the project and working with Spielberg. By the way, am I the only one who thinks that Osment is so mature for his age that it's creepy?

Up next are two sections on the more practical aspects of undertaking such a huge production. Designing A.I. includes a pair of 8-minute looks at "From Drawings to Sets" with artist Chris baker (aka "Fangorn") and set designer Rick Carter, and "Dressing A.I.," a visit with costume designer Bob Ringwood. The Baker interview is rather fascinating as he was one of the few artists to work with Kubrick during the early stages of the project, and the Ringwood chat benefits from a closer look at each character's particular costuming requirements. Lighting A.I. is a short 6-minute chat with Spielberg's longtime collaborator Janusz Kaminski, who sometimes warbles unintelligibly but is quite funny, and comes complete with one really ugly scarf!

Moving on to the creation of the film's unique visual effects, let's start with the 8-minute Special effects. Production designer Rick Lantieri gives us a closer look at the "Flesh Fair" sequence and the surprisingly amount of "practical" effects required to pull it off, as well as the meshing CGI with real-world trickery to achieve the final product. The 13-minute Robots Of A.I. was probably my favorite of the effects segments, as I thought the film's "mechas" were way-cool. After Spielberg offers a bit of perspective on what he hoped to achieve with the visuals, Stan Winston and his team at Stan Winston Studios, makeup artist Ve Neill, and "Voice of Teddy" Jack Angel give us a peek at how they realized his vision. The best part for me was the creation and operation of little Teddy, who's my favorite character in the movie and a pretty impressive mix of CGI and old-fashioned puppetry. (Where can I get one?) Rounding out the effects coverage is Special Visual Effects and Animation: ILM, a 22-minute examination of the film's startling visual effects told in five parts - "An Overview," "The Robots," "The Miniatures," "New York City Sequence Shot Progression" and "Animating A.I." Here we build on what came before, with ILM's talented crew of animators and designers taking the pre-shot footage and "plates," then adding the required CGI elements. Once again, Bouzereau's structural skills pay off, as even for a "layman" like me, the technical mumbo jumbo actually made sense! And the initial "Overview" section adds some much- needed and enjoyable perspective on the original gestation of the Kubrick project.

Last but not least we have the The Sound and Music of A.I., Is there any other aspect of the filmmaking process more taken for granted? "Sound Design"' is a 7- minute in-studio chat with Oscar-winning sound designer Gary Rydstrom, and the highlight here is his demonstration of a scene, and how he plays and layers sounds to the movie. Rydstrom also discusses his approach to realizing the film aurally, and the preparation required recording sounds for such a daunting task as A.I. And then we have Spielberg fave John Williams, getting his 6 minutes of fame in "The Music." Okay, let me think, "Williams...Williams...Williams? " Why does that name sound familiar? Didn't he score some other small Spielberg films...?

Finally, in closing out the video-based supplements, we get the 3- minute coda ...In Closing: Steven Spielberg - Our Responsibility to Artificial Intelligence. Over the DVD's rather extensive credits, Spielberg waxes philosophical on the nature of Man versus Machine and the ultimate theme of his film. Don't we all just want a Teddy to call our very own?

Since so much of A.I. was developed and conceptualized before Spielberg even got directly involved with the project, DreamWorks and Bouzereau have wisely not skimped on the still archives. Boasting a more robust gallery than I've seen in quite a while, The Archives features the film's theatrical teaser and trailer (labeled "Trailer 1" and "Trailer 2") in non-anamorphic widescreen, and five sections totaling about 250 stills. "Storyboards" gives us breakdowns of three scenes - "Joe's Good-bye," "David's Leap" and"David and the Blue Fairy" - and it's easy to use, but alas no real descriptive text is included. Cooler is "Chris Baker's Portfolio," which offers 9 sections of Baker's various concepts and designs, as well as the "Production Design Portfolio," offering another 9 sections of more detailed black and white and full color drawings and final designs. More concepts can be found in the "ILM Portfolio," which offers detailed art for five key scenes as well as the film's robot creations. Last up in the archives, we get two galleries of behind-the-scenes and publicity stills taken by David James during and after production, "Portrait Gallery Photographs" of the films cast, and "Steven Spielberg Behind the Scenes Photographs." Although again no text is included, these offer nice insight on the development of the film's visual look and provide nice background for the featurettes.

Rounding out the supplements are the usual text-based items including fairly good filmographies on the cast and filmmakers, and sparse production notes presented both onscreen and printed in the enclosed 4-page foldout.

Alright, now here comes a few obnoxious criticisms. I would have liked for all the supplemental features to have been presented in anamorphic widescreen. I know that sometimes full frame supplements are an aesthetic choice to differentiate them from the main feature, but hopefully the industry as a whole will begin to adopt 16x9 across the board in the future? I was also surprised that all the supplements featured French and Spanish subtitles, but none in English. It was nice of DreamWorks to include the foreign language options, but what about the English- speaking and hearing impaired?

As for the contest itself, I also would have been interested to learn more about the voice talent and the all-star cameos, and perhaps a bit more on Francis O'Connor, who I felt gave an underrated performance. The early stages of the Kubrick project also are not examined that much, nor any initial script drafts. (Hello, DVD-ROM!) But putting such tidbits aside, and even with no "Play All" function, this doc does what the best of them do, tell a story that enhanced my appreciation for the film. So, if you're a fan at all, you should find a great deal here to discover and enjoy.

DVD-ROM Exclusives: What do you get when you pop the disc in your PC?

Unfortunately, no ROM features are included at all. Given the complexity and popularity of the film's original website, which was one-of-a-kind and full of secrets, it is a shame more is not included here. Weird.

Parting Thoughts