Extras: Two trailers, Behind-the-scenes, Making Of, Interviews, Photo
Gallery
Director:
Renny Harlin
(Cutthroat Island, Cliffhanger, Die Hard 2, The Long Kiss Goodnight, Nightmare on Elm Street 4)
Producer:
Alan Marshall and Renny Harlin
Screenplay:
Michael France and Sylvester Stallone
Music:
Trevor Jones
Cast:
Gabe Walker: Sylvester Stallone
Qualen: John Lithgow
Hal Tucker: Michael Rooker
Jessie Deighan: Janine Turner
Travers: Rex Linn
Kristel: Caroline Goodall
Kynette: Leon
Delmar: Craig Fairbrass
Sarah: Michelle Joyner
"Ow, that's gotta hurt!",
must be the words going through Gabe Walker's (Sylvester Stallone)
mind when a freak accident in the mountains leads to the death of his friend
Hal's (Michael Rooker) girlfriend Sarah (Michelle Joyner) as
she plummets to a rocky end, surprisingly to the delight of their pilot
(watch in amazement how he never stops grinning!)
Eight months later, Gabe and Hal are back amongst the heights with a new
pilot, Jessie (Northern Exposure's Janine Turner), just as their
peace is to be shattered once again with the devilish Qualen (John
Lithgow) and accomplices including Kristel (Caroline Goodall),
police turncoat Travers (Rex Linn) and a star from Eastenders,
Delmar (Craig Fairbrass). Their paths cross since an aeroplane accident
leaves three suitcases stuffed with cash - $100m to be exact - being dropped
into the perilous mountain range and two entire planes going down with them,
leading them to using our heroes to search for it on their behalf.
Hugely enjoyable upon its release and just as much so now, director Renny
Harlin, once married to Geena Davis, presses all the right action
buttons he managed with Die Hard 2 and
The Long Kiss Goodnight
and provides a real non-stop near-two hours of entertainment.
Also, it may be that the UK DVD release is finally uncut. The previous versions
in the cinema and on video and laserdisc were chopped to a 15-certificate.
Scenes that were edited included a grisly end for a baddie in a cave, getting
informed of the difference between stalactites and stalagmites. The disc I
received for review, though, was printed with German text on the disc itself
so I am gladly watching the fully uncut version.
I have absolutely no complaints with the picture. Artifact-free, it's in
the original 2.35:1 widescreen ratio - always fully employed by Harlin -
and is anamorphic.
The average bitrate is 5.93Mb/s, briefly peaking over to 9Mb/s.
A remastered Dolby Digital soundtrack is available in English only (Germans
get surround sound) and it rocks aplenty such as with avalanches, explosions,
a plane crash, gunfire and more explosions. Dialogue is clear too, except
for Stallone :)
In the extras dept., the first trailer, in non-anamorphic 1.66:1, lasts two
minutes and is the dialogue-free cinema trailer with clips from the film
mixed in with a piece of classical music, the name of which escapes me at the
moment, while the second, running for 90 seconds, is a not dissimilar but uses
Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries, the classical piece used in
Apocalypse Now
when the choppers move in.
Behind-the-scenes shows the film's rushes for 4½ minutes and
the Making Of spends seven minutes mixing film clips in with interview
footage, leading us onto the Interviews - another 7½ minutes of
raw interview footage with Stallone, Michael Rooker, John Lithgow, Janine
Turner and director Renny Harlin. Finally, the Photo Gallery contains
24 still shots from the film.
There are 24 chapters, which is fine and subtitles are available in
English, German, Dutch and Turkish. The main menu is animated and scored
with a clip from the film and there are animated swipes between the menus.
The English subtitles have a lot to answer for at times in the translation.
When things go wrong for the bad guys and one says "Kill the pig" to
the cop, 'pig' between 'swine', to which he replies, "Kill the pig, my ass!",
which is translated as "Lick my ass!". Oh well, whatever turns him on!
:)
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
