Chesapeake Bay by Air Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Chesapeake Bay by Air Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman May 5, 2012

There’s a feather-like object decorating the upper east coast of the United States, a billowing, fractal-esque series of waterways that looks to a Google Earth map like it’s one cohesive unit, but which upon closer examination turns out to be an impressive estuary comprised of well over a hundred contributing rivers and which includes a drainage basin of well over 64,000 square miles. Chesapeake Bay gets labeled with that catch all title, but as Chesapeake Bay By Air proves rather easily, it’s a remarkably diverse set of ecosystems that stretches from the Susquehanna River in the north to the Atlantic Ocean in the south, touching the District of Columbia and six states, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, Delaware and, most importantly for this particular documentary, Maryland. Chesapeake Bay By Air was a 2010 production of Maryland Public Television and as such it understandably concentrates mostly on the areas of Chesapeake Bay that involve the so-called Old Line State. This is yet another incredibly scenic tour in the Over series (here somewhat differently titled), featuring a vast array of waterways, villages and even an occasional major metropolis. Chesapeake Bay By Air offers both the usual pluses and minuses of these offerings. These outings are crafted mostly as features for armchair travelers, and as such tend not to provide a wealth of background information, although the narration here does occasionally touch on interesting points of history, even as it tends to skew a bit toward the flowery and poetic side of things (the credits reference a book from which some of the narration was adapted, perhaps the reason for this overly adjectival approach). On the other hand, the fact that this is basically a travelogue means that repeated viewings will be perhaps at least a bit annoying due to the fact that the narration can’t be turned off, meaning those few historical facts and glut of flowery language will need to be revisited every time Chesapeake Bay By Air is viewed.

Soothing flutes and strings accompany the beginning of this hour long journey over various sections of Chesapeake Bay By Air. Unlike several other releases in the Over (or By Air) titles, there doesn’t seem to be any real organizing principal here in terms of proceeding in an orderly fashion through the geography. While some Over titles will move from north to south or vice versa, this release tends to simply jump to and fro, orienting the viewer via the narration and brief superimposed outline maps that quickly show where the helicopter is flying.

The narration (by dulcet toned Lance Lewman) immediately informs us that if the shoreline of Chesapeake Bay were unraveled it would stretch from the east coast of the United States all the way to the west coast and back again. Chesapeake Bay isn’t just an estuary, it’s the largest estuary in the United States, 200 miles long, 3 miles across at its narrowest point and around 30 miles across at its widest. Perhaps most interestingly, for hundreds of square miles it’s only knee deep. This introductory sequence also gives us some indication of the vast forces of geologic time, showing how the flooded Susquehanna Valley came to be waterlogged over 10,000 years ago as glaciers melted at the end of the last ice age.

The bulk of the rest of Chesapeake Bay By Air drifts over a hugely disparate array of territory, covering everything from uninhabited (at least by humans) marshlands to the booming cityscape of Baltimore. Most of the enclaves flown over are charming villages and towns huddled by the waters’ edge where fishing is the main way to make a living. The narration indicates that that particular career has become harder and harder of late, and just to accentuate that point the camera zooms in on a fishing boat whose name is Trying Times. The scenery here is gorgeous, with lush greenery coming up virtually right to where the Bay itself begins, and often insanely small spits of land sport expansive houses and farmlands.

We get a very quick history lesson with regard to the thirteen generations of inhabitants who have made Chesapeake Bay their home since Jamestown was founded in 1607. And Jamestown’s famous settler John Smith is then celebrated for being one of the first white explorers of Chesapeake Bay, a man who first reported on the crazy quilt of nooks and crannies in the area, not to mention the Native American tribes making the shore their home. Several important historical sites are flown over, including Washington College, founded by George Washington in 1783, and the first college established in the United States.

A very brief but fascinating segment deals with Holland Island (which is thankfully covered in at least a little more detail in one of the bonus documentaries included on the DVD). Once a bustling little community that supported hundreds of people, the slow and steady encroachment of the sea, as well as the devastating effects of tropical storms and hurricanes, has decimated the island to a point where it barely a blip of sand in the sea, home to only one dilapidated and crumbling structure. It’s a suitable reminder that for all the beauty of Nature in general, and Chesapeake Bay in particular, there are awesome forces at work which just as often as not spell certain destruction for the people who choose to live there.

Chesapeake Bay by Air Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Chesapeake Bay By Air is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Topics Entertainment with an AVC encoded 1080i transfer in 1.78:1. This is another typically sparkling release from Topics that offers a nicely crisp image with some gorgeously saturated colors. Especially impressive in this outing are the many shades of blue and teal making up the various waterways that help comprise the large drainage basin that is part and parcel of Chesapeake Bay. Since most of this outing is filmed from above, there's not an overwhelming amount of fine object detail visible, simply because virtually everything is so far away. But the image here has only a few transitory moments of aliasing (once again trees are the culprit) and otherwise provides a stable, clear image that really nicely brings the amazing scenery of Chesapeake Bay enjoyably to life.

Chesapeake Bay by Air Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Chesapeake Bay By Air features a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mix that is certainly adequate to render this documentary's narration and appealing score. While the slipcover promotes a "classical music" score, this is really more adult contemporary orchestral music, with flutes, strings and batteries of percussion working a sort of quasi-Coplandesque territory a lot of the time. It's enjoyable, if generic, and was obviously licensed from a stock music provider, as no composer is credited. The narration is always front and center and clearly heard over the music. That's about all there is to this soundtrack, and the DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 track supports it with excellent fidelity if not a lot of variety or even dynamic range.

Chesapeake Bay by Air Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Unlike many Topics Entertainment titles that only include a DVD version of the main feature, the DVD on this release actually includes two supplemental featurettes not found on the Blu-ray:

• The Skipjacks (SD; 27:39) is an interesting look at the unique and iconic boat structure of the Chesapeake Bay. This featurette gets into the history of the form and how it continues to be used today. The main focus of the documentary is a major Skipjack racing festival that takes place annually on Deal Island.


• Outdoors Maryland: Island Crusader (SD; 8:35) is a brief but very interesting look at the efforts of Steve White to save Holland Island, a little slip of land that has been devastated by encroaching erosion. The Island is also briefly featured in the main Chesapeake Bay By Air piece, but this gets into more depth about White's attempts to save Holland Island, which he bought in the early 1990s. At one time the Island was over 225 acres and had around 60 houses. At the time this documentary was made, it was barely even there anymore, and only one badly battered house remained.

Chesapeake Bay by Air Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Chesapeake Bay By Air won't come as any surprise to anyone who's checked out any of Topics previous Over or By Air releases. These outings are invariably scenic and provide a wonderful opportunity to get to know particular regions from the comfort of a home theater environment. Once again Topics has provided a release with really excellent video and some good audio as well, though I keep wishing they would offer a "music only" audio option so that replaying these video travelogues could be done without listening to the same narration over and over. This particular release is notable in that it actually offers some supplements on the accompanying DVD, something fairly unusual in the Topics canon. The even better news is that both of the featurettes are rather interesting and help to further paint a nice portrait of this very varied region. Though this is obviously the very definition of a niche product, for thseo who like this sort of thing, Chesapeake Bay By Air is well crafted and comes Recommended.