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Loop Track (Blu-ray)
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray B - United Kingdom - Arrow Video Review written by and copyright: Paul Lewis (9th October 2024). |
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The Film
  Loop Track (Thomas Sainsbury, 2023)
New to Blu-ray from Arrow Video is Thomas (Tom) Sainsbury’s 2023 horror comedy Loop Track. The directorial debut of New Zealand playwright and comedy actor Tom Sainsbury, who also wrote and stars in the film, Loop Track sees Sainsbury himself playing the lead character, Ian. Ian is an anxiety-ridden urbanite who decides to embark on a hiking trip as a means of fleeing from an unpleasant divorce. During his hike, for which he is woefully unprepared both psychologically and physically, Ian encounters another hiker, Nicky (Hayden J Weal). Despite Ian’s protestations—Ian very much wants to remain alone—Nicky suggests the two hike together. Further along the track, Ian and Nicky meet young couple Austin (Tawanda Manyimo) and Monica (Kate Simmonds). A number of scenarios lead Ian to become suspicious of Nicky’s behaviour, and Ian even accuses Nicky of being a potential serial murderer who stalks his victims along the hiking trail. However, as the narrative progresses it becomes clear that something sinister is indeed stalking the hikers—and it’s not Nicky. When we meet him, Ian is a panic-stricken sad sack. Hiking alone, he hides from other people on the titular “loop track”—a circuitous route around the fictional Eyers Forest. He’s soon exhausted, clearly not used to the exercise, and his lack of preparation results in blisters on his feet. Ian’s anxious behaviour soon contrasts with the ebullience of Nicky. Easygoing, Nicky is regarded with suspicion by Ian. However, the two strike up something of a rapport, and eventually Ian reveals to Nicky that his wife left him and his business collapsed. Ian tells Nicky that he chose to take himself on a hiking holiday to escape from his troubles at home—but his trip into nature has had the opposite effect. “I’m just so tired,” Ian tells Nicky, “And I can’t sleep. I just wanted some quiet, but it’s all so quiet out there that all I can hear is my brain going over everything I’ve done wrong.”  The sense of Ian escaping from his past is represented visually by scenes in which Ian appears to see something on the track. Framed in long shot, this thing is difficult to discern, and for much of the running time we are left to wonder whether or not it is simply a figment of Ian’s imagination. The film is arguably most effective in the sequences that depict Ian’s growing sense of paranoia vis-à-vis exactly who or what is stalking him and the other hikers, and about the motivations of his new companion, Nicky.
However, revelations towards the end of the film reveal that Ian and the other hikers are indeed being stalked by something malevolent. It’s difficult not to see the threatening presence of this creature, pursuing Ian and his cohort through the loop track, as a manifestation of Ian’s anxieties—a literalisation of Ian’s sense of self-doubt that he must overcome in order to move forwards and “escape” the loop track. In this sense, the film has a very Hollywood-esque mythic structure. With an admittedly thin narrative, Loop Track nevertheless manages to hold its audience’s attention thanks to some solid performances and an engaging sense of visual design. The forest setting works well for the film, and is at times idyllic and in other instances purely threatening. There are some particularly memorable moments: Ian glimpsing the thing that is stalking him in the distance, ambiguous enough that the audience questions what they have or have not seen; a scene in which a terrified Ian drops his torch along the trail at night, and is forced by Nicky to dive into the bush to find it; a sequence in which Ian accuses Nicky of being a potential serial killer after discovering, in one of the huts along the trail, what appear to be two abandoned backpacks—one of which contains a digital camera, leading to Ian perusing the photographs stored on the memory card in hope of finding what happened to its owner.
Video
 Filling a little under 30Gb on a dual-layered Blu-ray disc, the feature presentation of Loop Track is in its intended aspect ratio of 2:35:1. The 1080p presentation uses the AVC codec, and has a run time of 95:46 mins.
The digitally-shot colour feature gets a very good presentation on Arrow’s disc. Detail is good. The presentation is a compressed clone of a digitally-captured film, so there are no issues with its relationship with, or interpretation of, an analogue source. Contrast levels are pleasing. There are some lowlight scenes where the camera sensor seems to have struggled to capture a broad spectrum within the exposure, and it appears that in some of these scenes the production team have dialled down the exposure – resulting in “crushed” blacks. This is no doubt a characteristic of the original photography rather than a flaw in this presentation. The interior scenes in the cabins, however, look fantastic – with some excellent use of subtle lighting setups to pinpoint actors faces and ambient textures in the darkness. In daylight scenes, gradation from toe to shoulder of the exposure is handled excellently, with definition and detail present both at top and bottom of the exposure scale. In sum, this is an excellent home video reproduction of a digitally-photographed film. NB. Some full-sized screengrabs are included at the bottom of this review. Please click to enlarge them.
Audio
The disc presents the viewer with two audio options: a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track; and a LPCM 2.0 stereo track. Both audio options are fine, with excellent range. The rich bass in the film’s score is evident in the lossless LPCM track, particularly. On the other hand the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track contains some incredible immersive use of the surround tracks, particularly in scenes that feature characters working their way through the threatening bush. Dialogue is discernible in both tracks, and isn’t buried beneath foley or music. Optional English subtitles for the Hard of Hearing are included, and these are free from errors and easy to read.
Extras
 The disc includes the following extra features:
- Commentary with Tom Sainsbury and producer/editor Gabriel (Gabe) Lunte. - “The Story of Loop Track” (1:13). Tom Sainsbury offers a brief introduction to the film which outlines its story. (Optional English subtitles available.) - “Tom’s Vision” (1:57). Sainsbury discusses how the Loop Track project was inspired by an initial idea and his love of thrillers. (Optional English subtitles available.) - “Origins of Loop Track” (1:33). Sainsbury, producer Jonathan Potton, and producer/editor Gabriel Lunte reflect on the circumstances that led them to collaborate on Loop Track. (Optional English subtitles available.) - “Characters and the Cast” (1:57). Sainsbury talks about the characters in the film and the actors that played them. (Optional English subtitles available.) - “The Creature” (5:01). In this featurette, we see the origins and development of the creature within the film. Contributors include Sainsbury, Potton, Lunte, and creature designer/puppeteer Zac Johnson. Talking head footage is interspersed with behind-the-scenes stills and video showing the creation of the creature and the puppetry involved in bringing it to life. (Optional English subtitles available.) 
- “Production” (3:05). Behind-the-scenes footage of the production is interspersed with interviews with members of the production, including Lunte, Potton, production manager Puteri Raja Ariff, art director Madilyn Davidson, and others. The participants talk about the logistics involved in making Loop Track. (Optional English subtitles available.) - “Cinematography” (2:01). The film’s director of photography, Milon Tesiram, discusses photographing the picture, and responding to Sainsbury’s description of the film as simultaneously “claustrophobic” and “agorophobic.” (Optional English subtitles available.) - “Original Score” (4:50). The score’s composer, Mike Newport, discusses the music he wrote for Loop Track. He suggests the script spoke to him as a metaphor for anxiety and depression within the framework of “a fun film.” Newport wanted to make a score that was quite “sparse” but also incorporated elements of “bush sounds.” (Optional English subtitles available.) - “The Hut” (2:06). Production designer Madilyn Davidson talks about the challenges involved in making the cabin depicted in the film, which was built on/in a sound stage. (Optional English subtitles available.) - “Eyers Forest Park Promo” (1:52). This is a parody promotional film for Eyers Forest Park trails. (Optional English subtitles available.) - “(Time) Travel Centre” (5:06). This is the short film by Sainsbury that won the 48Hours Film Festival in 2016. (Optional English subtitles available.) - Image Gallery (20 images).
Overall
 New Zealand cinema is surprisingly young, and was kickstarted by the production of Roger Donaldson’s 1977 film Sleeping Dogs. Since then, NZ cinema has demonstrated a fascinating localised interpretation of international genres. Thomas Sainsbury’s Loop Track is an entertaining example of the form, anchored by some likeable performances from Sainsbury and Weal, in particular. Sainsbury brings a sad sack-like sensibility to his performance as Ian, and there are a number of scenes in which his pedigree as a comic actor come to the fore, ensuring that Ian is a much more rounded character than he could have been. (Certainly, the script seems to give little to “flesh out” Ian’s character.)
It's difficult not to read the appearance of the prehistoric creature towards the end of the film as symbolic, a manifestation of Ian’s anxieties and his self-doubt. To be honest, the film loses a little steam when the creature appears, and works much better in the sequences that precede it—during which the audience is led to doubt the veracity of Ian’s assertions that some thing is following him and the other hikers. Apparently the original intention was for the creature not to be seen, and arguably this might have worked better. (That said, the design and implementation of the creature is superb, somewhat reminiscent of the monsters in Ray Harryhausen films.) Arrow’s Blu-ray release of Loop Track contains a solid presentation of the film. The contextual material is enlightening, albeit broken into incredibly short segments (which seem to have been recorded with the intention of them being edited together into an EPK). Please click the screengrabs below to enlarge them. 
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