Aerial America - Pacific Rim Collection Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		0.0
Overall		3.5

Aerial America - Pacific Rim Collection Blu-ray Movie Review

Go West! Take a Helicopter

Reviewed by Michael Reuben May 17, 2012

The Smithsonian Channel describes its Aerial America series as follows:

Take off on a thrilling flight across America. This epic series offers rare glimpses of our nation's most treasured landmarks, all seen from breathtaking heights. From busy cityscapes to quiet landscapes, we capture the history and the pageantry of our amazing country, which is as diverse as the people who occupy it.

In other words, Aerial America is another entry in the armchair travelogue genre that includes the popular Visions series on PBS. To date, the series has covered just over half the fifty states. The goal, of course, is to cover them all.

This Blu-ray from Inception Media assembles four episodes of Aerial America covering four western states that the disc's producers have dubbed "the Pacific rim". The title is something of a misnomer, since the term is most commonly used to refer to Asian countries such as Korea, Singapore and Thailand. Here, though, it refers to Oregon, Washington, California and Hawaii. (Alaska might well have been included, but its episode hasn't yet been completed.) These four states share more than just the geographical quirk of being west of most of the country. They're also notable for dramatic coastlines, striking mountain ranges and continuous geological activity that may, at any time, escalate into something of which the world will be forced to take notice.

No state can be covered in depth within the running time of an Aerial America episode (either 46 or 51 minutes), but California is especially challenging, given its size, population and diversity. The California episode addresses this issue by focusing on the picturesque thoroughfare known as the Pacific Coast Highway or "PCH" for short, which twists and curves along the often vertiginous heights hugging the edge of the state's land mass. PCH actually begins in Orange County, but the episode picks it up farther north near the famous Hearst estate known as San Simeon (the model for Xanadu in Citizen Kane). From there, the tour moves inland to the Santa Ynez Valley, home to the vineyards and wineries that provided the setting for the the film Sideways. To its credit, and the listener's entertainment, the narration cites these connections and uses them effectively.

Proceeding northward, the tour flies over Big Sur, which was a destination of almost mythic proportions in the Sixties, and looks at the resort town of Carmel, of which Clint Eastwood was once briefly mayor—and they're still bragging about it. The Monterey Peninsula is as famous for its Pebble Beach golf course as for being a home to Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck. Turning inland, the flight surveys the Salinas Valley, sometimes called "the Salad Bowl of America" because of its extensive agricultural fields. (From personal experience, I can assure you that the aerial vista vastly improves on a driving trip, where mile after mile of fields tilled by agribusiness provides a view of numbing uniformity.)

The tour spends substantial time over San Francisco, the Golden Gate, the harbor (including Alcatraz), the Bay Bridge and the Port of Oakland, before turning north again for a look at Point Reyes and a consideration of the tectonic stress point best known as the San Andreas Fault. The narration discusses the 1906 San Francisco earthquake but, surprisingly, fails to mention the 1989 Loma Prieta quake (also known as the "World Series" quake, because it hit during a warm-up practice for the series).

The disc's lack of subtitles makes the Hawaii episode difficult to summarize, unless one is fluent in Hawaiian names, which I am not. The narrator reels off places, people and historical references with the practiced confidence of someone holding a script and assured that another take is always an option. In brief: The tour covers the main island of Hawaii, as well as the islands of Maui, Lanai, Molokai and Oahu. Highlights of the tour include the many varieties of volcanic landscapes, both historic and current (the volcano known as Kilauea—thanks, Wikipedia!—on the island of Hawaii is one of the most active in the world); the extraordinary surfing conditions off Oahu; Pearl Harbor; and the private club on Lanai where Bill and Melinda Gates were married. The island of Molokai has resisted becoming a tourist destination, but it was formerly the site of a leper colony, where a Catholic priest, Father Damien de Veuster, and nun, Mother Marianne Cope, cared for the inhabitants and, after their death, were both canonized as saints.

One of the most sobering historical facts noted in the narration is that most of the indigenous population of the island now known as Hawaii died within a few years after its "discovery" in 1778 by British Captain James Cook. The population had no natural resistance to the various diseases to which contact with Europeans exposed them.

Oregon, we're told at the outset, is home to optimism and innovation. The tour begins in Portland, described as a city of non-conformists. Among other things, it's supposed to have more tattoo shops per capita than any other city. To underscore the city's and state's eccentricity, the episode follows Crooked River to Smith Rock, where sport climbers compete to find new and ever more difficult ways to ascend the steep peak known as "Monkey Face".

As a tribute to the winds and rough seas off the Oregon coast, the remains of the Peter Iredale, a British ship lost in 1906, still remain on the coast. (All aboard were rescued.) Haystock Rock, a huge lava rock where seabirds nest year-round, provided a navigational aid to sailors in the days before GPS, because the bird cries could be heard for miles. The entrance to the Columbia River is known as "the Graveyard of the Pacific", because strong currents and ocean swells below the deceptively calm surface cause unpredictable shifts in the ocean sandbars. For this reason, the area is home to the largest Coast Guard division in the nation.

The Painted Hills of central Oregon offer a geological history of the state. The Big Obsidian Flow near Lava Butte was used by NASA to train astronauts for moon missions. The Google Server Farm is located on the Columbia River, where it's powered by hydroelectric power. In the Willamette Valley, Oregon has developed its own vineyards and distinctive wines. This is only one of the state's unexpected imports (llamas are another). Oregon is also the home of Nike, although most of the manufacturing is done abroad.

The exploration of Washington State begins with an overview of Mt. Rainier, its most challenging peak and, potentially, greatest threat, should it ever erupt. From there we move to the Columbia River, retracing the last portion of the route followed by Lewis and Clark. A detailed overview of the lumber trade leads into a history of Seattle, which started as a lumber town and today, of course, is a capital of high-tech. The state's political capital, Olympia, is the next stop, but the narrator quickly moves on to the more camera-friendly subject of the Boeing Corporation, which has long been one of the state's economic engines.

Shifting to the eastern portion of the state, the aerial view takes in the growing fields and apple orchards of the Yakima Valley. Eastern Washington also contains the former plutonium factory at Hanford, which represents an ongoing clean-up challenge.

The most remote portion of the state is the northeastern Olympic Peninsula, with its mountains, glaciers and forests. It's also home to the town of Forks, setting of the Twilight series. Following the waterways brings the tour to Puget Sound and back to Seattle. The episode provides an account of the 1980 eruption of Mt. St. Helens and its aftermath, followed by the rise of Microsoft and the hi-tech "gold rush". It concludes with a review of the state's sports and leisure industries.

Aerial America - Pacific Rim Collection Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Regular viewers of travelogue series routinely complain about the choice of subjects (why include this sight, but not that one?), but there's little fault to find with the image on Inception Media's 1080i, AVC-encoded Blu-ray. Taken directly from hi-def digital files, the Blu-ray's image is sharp, clean, colorful and detailed, reproducing these breathtaking landscapes with excellent clarity. The screencaptures included with this review, which have been upconverted to 1080p, don't fully do justice to the image in motion, which is free of interlacing artifacts, at least as far I could see. The sole flaw in the image is an occasional instance of aliasing, which almost always occurs in fine detail of cityscapes, when light is reflecting off fine patterns at just the right angle. But it's a rare problem and barely a distraction. In general, this is ideal demo material for those who want their Blu-rays to look pristine, grainless and noiseless.

Aerial America - Pacific Rim Collection Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Dolby Digital 5.1 track is nothing special, nor does it have to be. One does not need lossless audio to reproduce accurately the voice of a professional announcer reciting a program's narration in a well-appointed recording studio. The unobtrusive background music plays softly enough that the audio delivery format is never strained; if the fidelity were improved, it would be difficult to hear the difference without first turning up the volume so loud that the narration would blast you out of your seat. A few elementary sound effects, such as water rushing or wind blowing can be distantly heard in the surrounds, but they contribute little more than generic atmosphere.

Aerial America - Pacific Rim Collection Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

No extras are included. The menu simply provides options to play each episode separately or play all.

Aerial America - Pacific Rim Collection Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

If this type of program appeals to you, then Aerial America is well worth your time. The hi-definition photography is superior, the locations are well-chosen, and the narration contains interesting historical information and anecdotes (and doesn't shy away from some of the more controversial elements in our history). The editing is capable, and the entire product radiates professionalism. Recommended.