6.3 | / 10 |
Users | 4.2 | |
Reviewer | 2.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
An ex-con takes a job driving a truck cross country. What he doesn't know is that the truck is filled with illegal weapons and now he must fight to survive and save his family.
Starring: Patrick Swayze, Meat Loaf, Randy Travis, Gabriel Casseus, Brian VincentAction | 100% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
French: DTS 5.1
English SDH
Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 3.0 | |
Audio | 3.5 | |
Extras | 0.5 | |
Overall | 2.5 |
Trucking can be a lonely business, long trips away from loved ones and home for a hard life on the road. But at the same time, there's almost something glamorous about it, about the freedom, the escape, the opportunity to see and hear the world away from the bubble of home and experience a different side of the same coin. However one sees it, trucking usually isn't fraught with danger. At least not the kind that involves people trying to kill the driver. Director Kevin Hooks' (Fled, Passenger 57) 1998 film Black Dog tells the tale of a down-on-his-luck trucker with an opportunity to cash in, not knowing the dangers to follow on his bumper. As Hooks' Passenger 57 takes action to the skies, his Black Dog brings it back to the ground for a rather exciting and enjoyable, if not narratively simple, story of big rigs, big explosions, and big danger in one of the few pictures to make the world of long distance trucking the center of a relatively big film.
On the road again.
Black Dog rolls onto Blu-ray with a fair, but flawed, 1080p transfer. Beyond the occasional -- more rare, really -- pop, spot, and speckle is what appears to be mild noise reduction. The image, and faces in particular, appear a bit smoother and more plastic-y than they should. Details don't suffer too terribly much, though. Facial pores and lines are still adequately complex, ditto clothing fabrics and seams. The inside of the truck has plenty on tap, including dusty and worn down buttons, knobs, gauges, gears, and displays. Colors fare well. Red's red shirt pushes a little too hard early on, and the shirt appears a bit overpowering as a result. General color balance, however, between attire, natural greens, different color cars, and the like never appear mishandled. Black levels are fine and flesh tones don't appear to stray too far from normal. The apparent noise reduction isn't anywhere as atrocious as it was on some of Universal's early catalogue releases, but it still appears to be an issue here. Outside of that, the transfer is largely good to go for a midlevel movie plopped onto a nuts-and-bolts catalogue release.
Black Dog's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack fares a little better than the video. Action scenes are suitably robust, a little crude, rough around the edges, and lacking truly in-depth clarity, but the rawness of truck crashes, twisted metal, and explosions adds a certain charm to the proceedings. Action scenes represent the bulk of surround and subwoofer usage, at least beyond the opening titles where some zips and zooms and whooshes maneuver all through the stage. Music is clear and well spaced along the front. The back channels chime in on support but don't carry a full load. Dialogue is rather clear, but occasionally shallow, lacking even balance even at reference volume.
All that's included is the Black Dog theatrical trailer (480i, 2:04). No top men is included. The trailer, audio and subtitle options, and scene selections are only available in-film via the pop-up menu.
Black Dog doesn't reinvent the (18) wheel(er), but it does offer a fresh new take on vehicle-based Action. Swayze is excellent, carrying the movie above both its predictable and stale dramatic current and its heavy duty trucking action scenes. It's a fun movie, very fast paced and lean, a joy to watch and one of the better quick-run time killer Action flicks out there. Universal's Blu-ray is practically featureless, and video and audio aren't pristine, but the movie itself is definitely worth owning. Recommended.
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