3 gibbles out of 5

Writers: Essentially Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard

Well, you watched the film.  Let’s say that you enjoyed it.  Then you’re probably looking forward to watching it again, to reap the rewards of repeated, detail-soaked viewings.  To your rescue, then, in the limbo before a blu ray, is the Cabin in the Woods Visual Companion, an over-sized collection of production photos, interviews, and the screenplay.  Is it worth the price of admission?  Well, I read it cover to cover, including the screenplay.  It slaked my thirst.  Will it remain on my shelf once I have a physical copy of the movie?  Probably not.

Book-ended by foreword and afterword “why we made this film” blurbs from either Whedon or Goddard, the majority of the book is definitely taken up by the screenplay.  But in its well-bound, glossy page presentation, this isn’t so bad, as the script reads exactly like the film (with the exception of a couple extended scenes which will surely be on the DVD…) and it’s actually interesting to read just how exact script to film was, and how well the principles seemed to nail the characterizations that are obvious even in the typed work.  Plus, there’s a mix of some important stills from the film – the same stills you’ll want to pause on at home – and some interesting production photos showing layouts of the sets and some of the costumes.

Prior to this (but after the foreword…) is an interview with the directors.  If you read any press for the film, this information won’t be new, but assumedly the interview was conducted for the book.  It does feel a little self-congratulatory, as these things often do, but at the same time Whedon and Goddard do seem like nice, normal guys, and it’s interesting to here little blurbs about the minutiae of film life.  By the same token, Whedon and Goddard are so nice and normal and quoted so accurately that sometimes they sound sorta dumb.  Whoops.  Coupled with the sorta simplistic script that follows (conceptually awesome, but pretty simple) it takes away some of the perceived intelligence of what you presumably watched.

After the script (but before the afterword…) are some further production photos, focusing more exclusively on the creatures.  This promises to be awesome because of the insane amount of background creatures in the film, but ends up feeling lacking.  The main focus is on the film’s main creatures, which, sorry, I found to be boring because they’re rather typical, and then the creatures that got notable screen time get a page and a blurb.  Then some sketches.  We wanted to see all the creatures that the sketches represented.  Still, the photos are of high quality and despite the normalcy of the lead creatures, it’s cool to see them up close and lit well.

The book was marketed totally as something to fill the gap between theater viewing and home viewing.  The highlights that it contained were enough to justify my purchase, but there’s a wealth of material that will probably be better covered in an upcoming DVD / bluray release.