6.4 | / 10 |
Users | 3.7 | |
Reviewer | 3.5 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
Various interconnected people struggle to survive when a massive earthquake rips Los Angeles apart. Released in SENSURROUND.
Starring: Charlton Heston, Ava Gardner (I), George Kennedy, Lorne Greene, Genevičve BujoldThriller | Insignificant |
Drama | Insignificant |
Action | Insignificant |
Video codec: VC-1
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: DTS Mono .1 Sensurround
French: DTS 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English DTS 5.1 designated as "2.1 with Sensurround"
English SDH, Spanish
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 3.0 | |
Audio | 3.5 | |
Extras | 0.0 | |
Overall | 3.5 |
Released in the same year as The Towering Inferno, Universal's Earthquake is a continuation of the wave of disaster films that the studio launched in 1970 with Airport. Fox hopped on the trend with The Poseidon Adventure in 1972, then took the unusual step of partnering with Warner to produce the hugely expensive Inferno. Not to be beaten at its own game, Universal developed Earthquake, which would have the advantage—and pose the technical challenge—of depicting catastrophe on a much larger canvas than a single airplane, ship or skyscraper. For its time, Earthquake was a technical marvel, combining miniatures, matte paintings and huge practical sets constructed on the Universal backlot. Legions of stunt people were recruited for key sequences of choreographed mass havoc. The entire production was entrusted to the hand of veteran director Mark Robson, whose career in Hollywood dated back to his work as an assistant editor on Citizen Kane. Robson's experience helming sudsy creations such as Peyton Place and Valley of the Dolls proved useful when it came to the "dramatic" portions of the film—and I put "dramatic" in quotes, because the drama in a classic disaster film is always subservient to the effects. It's conveyed in shorthand, consuming as little screen time as possible. To write Earthquake's script, Universal secured the bragging rights of signing Mario Puzo, red hot from the success of The Godfather. But Puzo was already committed to Paramount for The Godfather, Part II, and he left after finishing a first draft. Writer George Fox was hired to work with Robson on winnowing Puzo's detailed draft into something that would fit within Universal's budget. Even so, the final product featured the large cast typical of the genre and the broad scale that Universal wanted for its second disaster feature.
Cinematographer Philip H. Lathrop was nominated for an Oscar for his beautiful widescreen imagery of Earthquake, a demanding task that required him to harmonize minitatures, opticals and full-scale practical effects into a convincing whole. Universal's 1080p, VC-1/encoded Blu-ray presentation of Lathrop's work is certainly watchable and, in some circles, might even be considered superior—that is, unless you are one of those finicky viewers who happens to like the look of film. Let's start with the positives. The image is generally sharp and detailed, remarkably so for the anamorphic lenses and film stocks of this particular era. (Hold that thought for a moment.) The blacks are solid and deep, which is essential for the night scenes and the extended sequences in tunnels and underground. The colors are vivid, varied and well-saturated, which is crucial to the look of Southern California and the frequently hilarious Seventies fashions. My viewing companion remarked on the darkness of many of the fleshtones, but in this era in California, dark tans were the norm. People worried far less about sun damage than they do today. Some of the characters (e.g., Genevičve Bujold's Denise) are meant to be fair-skinned, and they look the part. Now let's talk about that sharpness. It isn't the natural look of the original cinematography. Rather, it's an electronically induced sharpness of the subtle kind that doesn't create edge halos but does distort the film's grain pattern so that it no longer moves in a smooth and natural fashion. Instead, we get what I call (and this is not a technical term) a "dirty" image, that is, an image with a thin layer of video noise that is most easily observed in light-colored expanses such as the sky. At its most extreme, this phenomenon causes portions of the frame to shimmer in a manner similar to aliasing, but fortunately these occasions are rare. In general, though, the entire Blu-ray looks as if someone had turned up the sharpness control on your TV set. On screencaps, the noise may not be readily evident; it is sometimes even mistaken for grain. In motion, it is unmistakable. It's unfortunate that Universal seems to be continuing their efforts to make film look like video, because they're doing everything else right. They've put Earthquake on a BD-50, allowed it a generous average bitrate of 31.61 Mbps and avoided any compression artifacts. The "dirty" video noise isn't a dealbreaker, but why add it in the first place?
Earthquake was the first of four films released theatrically in "Sensurround", a short-lived venture between Universal and speaker manufacturer Cerwin-Vega that attempted to enhance the theatrical experience by adding low frequency effects that were intended to be felt more than heard. The format was abandoned for a variety of reasons, including the cost to theater owners and the tendency for the Sensurround vibrations to damage ceilings, especially in older structures, and cause fragments of plaster to fall on patrons' heads. Earthquake comes with two English-language tracks. One is a lossless DTS-HD MA 5.1, which is presumably based on the 6-track mix created for the 70mm release. The other is labeled as "DTS 2.1 with Sensurround". I switched back and forth between them while watching the film and ultimately preferred the 2.1 track, because the 5.1 track has the dialogue mixed too low. I never experienced Sensurround in a properly equipped theater, but those who did have been disappointed with the home theater equivalent, which uses the system's low-frequency "control tones" to indicate a deep bass presence but doesn't vibrate the environment as the original system was intended to do. (For that, one would have to install additional equipment, such as a tactile transducer or a d-Box system.) In any case, the bass extension on Earthquake's soundtrack is certainly impressive for a film of this vintage and will make good use of whatever subwoofer you have in your system to intensify the film's major disaster sequences. As I noted in my review of Battlestar Galactica, contemporary viewers are used to such things, so that they are no longer a novelty. Sonically, though, these sequences are still effective. For the rest, the dialogue is clear, and John Williams' score strikes an effective note of urgency. The sounds of chaos are just as effective coming from the front speakers as they would be if they were spread all around.
The disc has no extras.
Disaster films wore out their welcome after a few years, and Airplane! 's parody signaled the end of their run. But they made a comeback in the Nineties with the twin volcano films, Dante's Peak and Volcano, and then the twin meteor films, Deep Impact and Armageddon. Still, once computer graphics took over, nothing was ever the same. As cheesy as some of their effects look now, there was something ineffably authentic about the original crop from the Seventies that later entries have yet to capture. So, in spite of less than perfect video, recommended.
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