Scratch Doug Pray, Director Palm Pictures, 2001 2xDVD For more information, visit www.scratchmovie.com.

Upon its release in late 2001, Scratch scored critical buzz and achieved instant cult status. An intelligent, visually attractive and thoroughly researched documentary about the evolution of DJ music and the culture surrounding it, the film successfully tread the fine line between winning the praise of the community it was depicting and presenting itself in such a manner that those viewers unfamiliar with the subject would be informed and entertained. Director Doug Pray, whose previous film, 1996's stellar Hype!, investigated the disastrous effect the "Grunge explosion" had upon the Pacific Northwest, here takes a less opinionated look at a musical genre of which he had very little knowledge.

It's rare that a documentary filmmaker could seem so unprepared to deal with the subject matter he has chosen for himself, yet Pray regularly admits that he knew nothing about hip-hop and DJ culture prior to jumping head first into the planning and production of Scratch. The fact that traces of this gap in his contemporary music knowledge are wholly invisible, with the exception of Pray's own admission on the DVD's supplemental commentary track, is a testament to the insightful and captivating presentation of DJ music and the culture that produces it. No DJ luminary was ignored, and few were unwilling to collaborate with Pray on this project. Without becoming an insufferable stream of talking head interviews, Scratch incorporates first-hand testimony from dozens of major figures, as well as live performances, within a visual design that is graphic and kinetic. Most interesting is Pray's decision to explore and incorporate his own sort of "scratching" within the film by inviting Mix Master Mike to cut-up and scratch segments of the soundtrack to which Pray then re-edited the images in a fashion that mirrors DJ technique.

This two-disc set contains numerous bonus features that are -- surprise! -- actually worth spending the time to explore. Like many documentary DVDs, the option of viewing additional scenes and uncut interviews is an enormous plus and becomes a quick and easy resource for those interested in hearing exactly what a subject had to say before their words were trimmed and tucked into the overall design of the finished product. Pray draws attention to this during his audio commentary and encourages viewers to spend some time with the unedited conversations. It's always remarkable and encouraging to see so much effort put into the home video version of a film that really didn't receive the audience it rightly deserved upon its theatrical release. Disc two of the set contains scenes from the Battle Sounds documentary, an interesting (although ultimately unrewarding) multi-angle lesson with DJ Qbert from the Thud Rumble Video Do-It-Yourselfs series, and an amazing demonstration of the "scratch notation" briefly discussed in the film with DJ Rob Swift -- it's a simple video piece with a graphic interface, but it's unbelievable. The How To Rock A Party with DJ Z-Trip is an unintentionally hilarious step-by-step approach to... errr... rocking a party. It's silly, and you'll never watch it again, but it's worth sitting through once (and I quote: "If it's St. Patrick's Day, maybe pull out a wacky St. Patrick's Day record that you bought at a thrift store and incorporate it into your set.").

Essential for any fan of DJ music, hip-hop culture or films about music, Scratch will likely remained unrivalled in its presentation of a critical segment of contemporary music history.

-- Mike Baker