Like
Red Corner, the
picture is almost flawless. Any few artefacts won't be spotted from the usual viewing
distance so it gets no complaints from me. The average bitrate is a very good
6.94Mb/s, briefly peaking over 9Mb/s and the disc is anamorphically-enhanced for
widescreen televisions allowing 33% extra resolution. The film is presented
in its original widescreen ratio of 2.35:1. Occasionally, it looks as if we've lost
a little of the width with this transfer as some text gets noticeably cropped from the
side of the screen. However, this must be intentional as the ratio is clearly correct
and looks well-framed throughout the rest of it.
The sound quality is excellent. Dolby Digital 5.1 sound in five languages and plenty of
dance and techno tunes from Orbital, Massive Attack, Prodigy, Leftfield, Underworld,
Stereo MC's and less-dancey, a love theme from Squeeze in Heaven Knows.
If the neighbours aren't banging on your walls, they're probably dead.
Extras :
Chapters :
There are 32 chapters covering the 101-minute film which serves it very well indeed.
A theatrical trailer is also included in
anamorphic 2.35:1 widescreen.
Languages & Subtitles :
Five languages in Dolby Digital 5.1: English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. Plus,
ten subtitled languages: English, German, Dutch, French, Spanish, Swedish, Danish,
Norwegian, Finnish and Polish, plus the first two languages are also available in a
"hard of hearing" option, which gives info about sound effects that are happening.
Booklet :
An 8-page booklet which puts in print what would normally appear as production notes
on the disc, as well as the usual explanation from MGM as to why widescreen is much better
than a standard pan-and-scan version, depending on the way a film is shot. I wonder if this
piece of information found its way onto the pan-and-scan release of Chitty Chitty Bang
Bang ? :)
Menu :
The menu is silent but starts off with some animation as the main menu options head
towards you, but there's no movement after that.
Hackers is perfect after-pub entertainment with even more cans to down.
However, its longevity will be determined by how much you buy into the world of
"Zero Cool" and "Acid Burn" and want to sit through a well-worn love theme.
If you do like it, then it's worth getting if you can find it second-hand as £20
for a film and a trailer don't add up to a hill of beans in the days when DVDs can contain
stacks of extras, even for back-catalogue titles such as this.
Trivia Note: After this film, new lovers Jonny Lee Miller and Angelina Jolie tied
the knot.
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
