6.3 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
The dynamic duo of Chon Wang and Roy O'Bannon return another crazy adventure in this sequel to Shanghai Noon. This time, they're in London to avenge the murder of Chon's father, but end up on an even bigger case. Chon's sister is there to do the same, but instead unearths a plot to kill the royal family. No one believes her, though, and it's up to Chon and Roy (who has romance on his mind) to prove her right.
Starring: Jackie Chan, Owen Wilson, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Tom Fisher, Aidan GillenComedy | 100% |
Action | 52% |
Martial arts | 35% |
Adventure | 32% |
Western | 14% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
French: Dolby Digital 5.1 (640 kbps)
Spanish: Dolby Digital 2.0
English SDH, French, Portuguese, Spanish
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 3.5 | |
Video | 2.0 | |
Audio | 3.5 | |
Extras | 2.5 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
In the wasteland of promising trilogies that never came to fruition stands the Shanghai franchise. While too far removed from the side-splittingly riotous genre send-ups Shanghai Noon and Shanghai Knights devotees insist the films represent, each action-comedy is a flawed but wildly entertaining blast of East-meets-West fun. Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson are a surprisingly strong pairing, the action is fast and funny, and there's enough fan service paid to kung fu junkies, slapstick-stunt fanatics and deadpan-comedy connoisseurs to hold the rickety 19th century Western (mis)adventures together to their bitter, all too conventional ends. So never mind the would-be trilogy that died a lonely early-noughts death. Even judged on their own merit, Shanghai Noon and Shanghai Knights still have plenty to offer, particularly as a rainy day double feature.
Shanghai Knights isn't so lucky, mainly because the contrast inconsistencies that haunt Shanghai Noon have been promoted to full-fledged nightmare. In one scene, stark black levels consume detail, hot whites add even more crush to the proceedings, skintones are oversaturated... then woefully undersaturated, and the image itself, having been subjected to invasive tweaking, no longer resembles film. In the next scene, colors are muddy and murky, with a flatness and indistinctness that inches closer and closer to a DVD upscale. Halos are everywhere too, as are the damaging fingerprints of a DVD-era master, complete with outmoded techniques used to sharpen and "improve" the already soft, dingy, terribly imperfect presentation for its Blu-ray debut. It's all still a slight -- slight -- improvement over its DVD cousins, making it an upgrade in the loosest sense. Alas, any clarity comes at the expense of ungainly enhancements, any color strength comes at the cost of unnatural, tanned and reddish hues, and its technical proficiency has its share of problems.
Rather than sacrifice special features or *gasp* grant each film its own disc, Shanghai Noon and Shanghai Knights have been wedged onto a single BD-50 disc, sans lossless audio. Instead, Noon and Knights are presented via lossy 640kbps Dolby Digital 5.1 surround tracks, which have their share of good, bad and ugly. Thankfully, though, the good outweighs its companions. Neither mix is what I would ever consider poor, or even mediocre for that matter, and it's important to remember than 640kbps is still an upgrade over DVD audio, and one that pays off noticeably. The films lack the crispness, raw power and exacting dynamics of lossless presentations, of course, but both tracks prove more satisfying than the faulty video transfers they accompany. Dialogue is clean and clear, without any major prioritization mishaps, and effects are given the freedom to graze and roam relatively open soundfields. The rear speakers aren't always reliable, but they do have their directional fun, and the LFE channel isn't always a force to be reckoned with, although it certainly lends its support to the films' robust action sequences. Ultimately, neither mix actually disappoints, despite the fact that disappointment is inevitable. Could they be better? Absolutely. Do they hold their own? Do they do the best they can? I'd say so. Here's hoping Disney stops this single-disc nonsense. Consumers appreciate 2-Movie Collections for the most part, but first-class quality demands higher standards -- and more discs -- than this.
Shanghai Noon and Shanghai Knights are joined at the BD-50 hip for the foreseeable future, making Disney's 2-Movie Collection release something of a letdown. The films will still delight fans as much as ever, but the video transfers suffer (the second more than the first), the dependence on lossy audio tracks isn't ideal by any means, and the recycled special features, while appreciated, aren't all that extensive or spectacular (and are presented in squint-and-you-might-figure-out-what's-going-on standard definition). Otherwise, Shanghai Noon and Shanghai Knights are a blast. Their Blu-ray debut isn't going to win much praise, but if you have any love of the films, the upgrade is at least notable enough to warrant a (reasonably priced) purchase.
(Still not reliable for this title)
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