Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		3.5
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Extreme Blu-ray Movie Review

Armchair athletes are sure to enjoy this IMAX look at extreme sports.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman September 11, 2009

Adrenaline junkies are a fascinating lot, at least when they’re out getting their heart rates pumping. Strangely, these same folk seem almost preternaturally calm when they’re not scaling the sides of insanely high mountains, or, alternatively, whizzing down a mountain at 80 miles per hour on a snowboard. National Geographic’s Extreme, originally an IMAX release, takes a look at a good assortment of these folks and if that look is somewhat short (coming in at a running time of a mere 44 minutes) and at times quite disjointed and episodic, it does deliver the goods, at least partially, in providing a bird’s eye view of what these people experience in their recreational lives.

Extreme starts with a desaturated shot (a technique that will be repeated throughout several bridging segments) of a mountain that may have you screaming that your new HDTV or Blu-ray player is malfunctioning. But be patient for a moment and you’re soon transported to some extremely colorful and lush scenery of a Hawaii beach. Within moments, you’re actually underwater, watching two deep sea surfers learning to expand their lung capacity by carrying 80 pound rocks across the ocean floor for as long as they can hold their breath. These brave souls need to up their breath holding capability because they don’t just surf—they “big wave” surf, being towed out by Jet-Ski’s to take advantage of waves so large they couldn’t be accessed by simply paddling out to them. Big wave surfer and Hawaiian water patrol member Brian Keaulana waxes philosophic about how the ocean speaks to those who can hear, I guess sort of like Circe’s siren call to Ulysses, and perhaps just as deadly at times.

Well, that's one way of learning to hold your breath longer.

Next up is big wave aficionado Ken Bradshaw, who is seen in some amazing footage as he tells about a legendary day on Oahu where waves bigger than those ever charted before made surfing literally an unprecedented adventure. January 28, 1998, known as “The Biggest Wednesday,” provided waves so mammoth that surfing became almost akin to mountain climbing and snowboarding combined. Ross Clarke-Jones joins Bradshaw in this exciting sequence.

After another “oh, no!” moment of desaturated footage (this time of a giant sea turtle), we switch elements and are greeted with some fantastic views of snowy alpine mountain peaks, across which two intrepid sports nuts, Catherine Mulvihill and Barry Blanchard, are trekking, as Blanchard talks about his need to push his limits, while Mulvihill talks about both recognizing and mastering her own fear. The two then set off on some truly astounding ice climbing, forging their way up the sheer frozen architecture of what, in warmer weather, would be a waterfall. It’s some of the most visually arresting footage in Extreme, and may get some viewers’ hearts palpitating more than a bit.

The next change is a bit more of a natural segue, as we meet Francine Moreillon, World Extreme Ski Champion, who takes us on a whirwind tour of her sport, along with cohort Gordy Peifer. These intrepid souls are literally airlifted in to high altitudes on helicopters, dropped off, and then make their way down sheer cliffsides on skis in footage that has to be seen to be believed. They often set off avalanches which follow them like a boat’s wake and which can prove deadly if they’re not navigated successfully. (There’s actually some heart stopping footage of a bad spill one of them takes after not landing a jump very well).

Brandon Ruff and Victorial Jealouse vary the sport only by preferring a snowboard as their accessory. More footage follows their amazing quicksilver journeys down various steep mountain faces, accompanied by some of the better music utilized in this documentary, a sort of Enya-esque choral piece set to a trippy quasi-techno beat. Watching Ruff carve solitary lines in the snow, with an almost slow motion ballet of ripples following him makes for a very appealing segment. Rounding out this sequence are some great shots of Terje Haakonsen, three time World Snowboard Half Pike Champion.

We’re back to the ocean for windsurfing, a sport that those of us who live close to the Columbia Gorge, one of the world’s prime windsurfing locations, get to see in a sort of “alley” setting, with brief traverses back and forth between the shores of Washington and Oregon. This particular footage is out on the open waters of the ocean, and features Bjorn Dunkerbeck, 11 time overall World Windsurfing Champion. Dunkerbeck literally flies at times, doing somersaults and other feats that show why he’s at the top of his sport. Also along for the ride in this sequence is Robby Naish, five time overall World Windsurfing Champion.

The last sequence offers the mountain climbing exploits of Lynn Hill and Nancy Feagin, who ascend the sheer face of one of the amazing red sandstone columns that populate the American Southwest. They manage to utilize a tiny crevasse to make their way up a basically perpendicular rock face in a sequence that will have those with acrophobia checking their pulse rates. The aerial footage in this segment is amazing.

Like most IMAX visual feasts, Extreme both benefits from and is hampered by the format itself. This is basically a hodgepodge of admittedly amazing footage, but, aside from the voiceovers where the individual athletes over articulate their “deep thoughts” about their various sports, there’s really no through line here. With that caveat taken into account, Extreme is, well, extremely enjoyable. Visually, even with a large screen, nothing can approach the mammoth dimensions of what IMAX can offer, so some of the panoramas, while stupendous, hide the humans within them, making the filmmakers’ putative point a little harder to discern.

Extreme does present gorgeous photography and an appealing soundtrack. It would have been nice to have been able to turn off the voice over elements and let this become more an example of what I’ve been terming “ambient television.” At 44 minutes, it’s awfully brief, but is certainly worth a rental for those interested in any or all of these extreme athletic pursuits.

Extreme Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Extreme arrives from its IMAX version with a 1.78:1 AVC encoded image that is remarkably sharp and artifact free. You can actually see individual snowflakes and water droplets in the various segments, bringing an often breathtaking level of detail to the excellent photography. Colors are beautifully saturated, sometimes amazingly so, as in the ocean sequences, where the gorgeous aquamarine and teal of various waters will delight most viewers. The only drawback, as noted above, is the fact that this was originally projected on a screen of immense proportions, meaning that some of the wide shots (and there are many, as might be expected) simply swallow up the human element whole.

Extreme Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Two decent enough soundtracks are offered, a DD 5.1 at 48 kHz streaming at 640 Kbps, and a DD 2.0, also at 48 kHz, streaming at 192 Kbps. While certainly not up to lossless Blu-ray standards for your basic summer blockbuster, these certainly suffice well enough for these proceedings. A generally amiable score by Soulfood (along with occasional source cues by such groups as The Cure) is well mixed into the proceedings. Everything here is clear, though surround channels are largely forgotten except for occasionally ambient moments like water sounds and the like. There's nothing here that is going to knock your high def socks off, but there's certainly nothing to complain about per se--these are two completely acceptable DD soundtracks for what is, after all, a documentary built mostly around visuals.

Extreme Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The only real extra (apart from trailers for other National Geographic product) is The Making of Extreme a 23 minute standard def documentary that spends way too much time with the filmmakers doing the talking head routine and way too little time actually showing us how stuff was filmed. In fact a lot of the actual behind the scenes footage showing the documentary being shot is included in the credits sequence for the documentary itself.

Extreme Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Extreme offers some excitingly visceral footage (although it might have been fun to have had a "first person" view at least for the downhill skiiers), but no real through line or cohesion. The IMAX format offers crystal clear imagery, but vistas that are sometimes so wide you need to put your player on pause to spot the actual human. All in all, though, this makes for a worthwhile rental for anyone who enjoys seeing someone else risk their life.