Dante's Peak / Daylight Double Feature

Summaries of the plot lines and and opinions on the acting for either of these movies can be found everywhere else. I will just concentrate this review upon the actual video and audio quality of the transfer of these films from Standard Def to Blu Ray. The good thing is that each film comes on its own Blu Ray disc and that each BluRay disc is no different than if you had bought each film separately. I had forgotten that I already owned the single Blu Ray of Dantes Peak so now I have two of them. I did compare the printing on the 2 discs and they are the exact same thing. Remember that what you see and hear often is determined by the quality of your home theater speakers, monitor and surround processor. My system consists of pretty high end, esoteric gear and I might see and hear things that some folk do not. DANTES PEAK REVIEW VIDEO QUALITY.... The video has far more pluses than minus'. The colors are, for the most part, bright and well contrasted. I am sure they popped the colors a touch in post production. No artifacts that I could see, however, and especially early on, I did notice a bit of motion blur in the first chapter of the film that was to have been a volcanic eruption in a Columbian town. That did seem to settle down and I really can't say that I noticed it further into the movie. The Mbps rate seemed to average in the high teens to low 20s which means that they really didn't do any real remastering. There is a function where, if you missed some of the dialogue, you hit the remote's yellow button. I did at one point and a subtitle of the dialogue came up but would not go away. It actually crashed the Blu Ray player. This is the first time I have ever seen that or had that happen. I will stay away from that function for the future. I repowered the Blu Ray player and all was well from then on. Overall, the video transfer rates a 4 from me. AUDIO QUALITY The audio will also be a 4 or 4.5. It was a lossless DTS MA 5.1 The dialogue was clear and easy to hear and understand....in most places. There were a couple of scenes where the soundtrack overpowered the dialogue and this brings down its rating from me. However, there was some really fine tracking of foley effects and discreet directionality making use of the entire sound system, especially so during the final volcano eruption and all that ensued afterwoods. Some excellent panning of audio between the front and rear stages as well as from left to right. For sure, your LFE sub channel will be put to great use. Extras included in this Universal disc include commentary, trailer and a few short docs on casting, the science of vulcanology, some interviews et al. Lots of wasted disc space from Universal's Blu Ray gimmick interactive nonsense that I doubt many will use as well as previews/ads for other movies. This could have been devoted to a higher mbps rate for a cleaner video transfer. DAYLIGHT REVIEW Stallone's film, Daylight, went largely unnoticed and yet is one of his better films. It came out soon after DVDs were first introduced to the public and, for the Standard Definition films of the day, was one of the very first to have a DTS soundtrack. At that time, I would buy the films with a DTS soundtrack directly from DTS as they were considered of greater quality because of a lesser amount of audio compression, and they were so I didn't mind paying a little extra. VIDEO QUALITY.. In the first few minutes of the film where there are wide angle pans and overview shots of the sky and the river, I noticed a significant amount of filmic grain which was disappointing. However, we are talking about only a few set up shots as the noticeable grain pretty much dissappears after those short clips. Coloration is generally warm and slightly desaturated and contrast is pretty darn good. At no point did I notice any artifacting, color unevenness or aliasing anywhere. The Mbps rate was surprisingly high for such an old film averaging in the mid thirties. While I doubt that the film has been remastered, the transfer to blu ray is really very good in all aspects. AUDIO QUALITY.... No question about it, the Audio is the star of the Blu Ray. It's lossless DTS HD MA 5.1 sound track allows for some really sweet pannings from the front audio stage to the rears and back. Great use of directionality towards the surrounds i.e. helicopter blades coming from the left rear while a siren pans from right rear to front surround. And that is only an example. There are a heck of a lot of foley fx that do not get buried in a music mix but come out perfectly and appropriately in your home theater. I had not watched this film for a long time and was surprised at how good the audio editing was. Many parts are completely demo worthy to show off a system. Dialogue is easy to understand, even that said by Sly, and audio levels stayed both consistent and transparent. And that's all she wrote folks. Hope this review was helpful to you in deciding upon your purchase. For me, it was worth the money. Thanks for reading.

I watched these on Tubi I think as Amazon prime has decided to make you have to buy a new HDMI cable and or TV every other month to keep up with their HDCP protection requirements… why does every other app stream with an apple HDMI adapter but your movies Amazon??? It started off with Freevee movies and now prime videos do the same thing. Anyway… I liked them enough to add to my collection. These are decent movies. Not too heavy. Good suspense and plot. Decent acting. Dante’s is the better of the two IMO. Nice additions to my Blu-ray collection. Sometimes you just don’t want to stream. Keep it old school! Plus there is something nice about putting a disk in a player vs using awkward cables and iPhones/iPads.

These are fun for a rainy Saturday. It's great to have the extras you wouldn't get it you could find them streaming.

Good value. Each flick on its own disc, with features. Dante's Peak: Getting Close to the Show (multipart 4:3 making-of); commentary; trailer. 2.35:1. Nice A/V upgrade. Includes uHear Blu-ray "enhancement": Yellow button does a short rewind and with subtitles on; use Subtitles button to turn off again. Daylight has most of the same features as the old Collector's Edition DVD: Multipart 4:3 making-of, music video, commentary, featurette, archives, trailers; no cast & crew listings. 1.85:1. A bit grainy in the dark chapel. The Universal apps are mostly expired, no longer available, and a lamentable waste of space. For example, BD Live is "coming soon" on both discs. The flicks and features are still good value.

Package arrived on time and undamaged.

Great

Being a geologist (though not a volcanologist), I naturally went to see Dante's Peak when is first came to cinemas. I thoroughly enjoyed it, both for the plot and for the convincing images of a volcanic eruption and its results. Except, that is, for the lava flow, which was quite inappropriate for a volcano of Dante's Peak type - I didn't quite scream in indignation when I saw it. Additionally, I'm not sure about the lake being so acidic as to dissolve the boat and flesh (near the end of the film). Apart from these two objections, I consider it a very good exposition of the dangers of a volcanologist's work and the problems arising when an eruption appears to be imminent. The story - strange events begin occurring, alerting the volcanologist and leading him to believe that an eruption, which with that type of volcano would be dangerously explosive, was imminent. A large town lies close to the volcano. The people must be warned - but how forcefully and with how much urgency? Anyone forecasting a volcanic eruption or an earthquake has to fear giving a false alarm or leading people to think that the danger is closer than it turns out to be - or, of course, that it is further away. Panic must be avoided but so too must giving a sense of false security. Daylight, another disaster movie, I didn't see until I bought the DVD. Disaster in a vehicular tunnel, with all the bad things that can happen and the bravery of people overcoming the dangers. Also very enjoyable; I'm very glad that I bought the pair.

Dante's Peak is a 'fun' disaster movie with Pierce Brosnan and Linda Hamilton. Reasonably well-thought out, it delivers a solid movie for a Sunday afternoon.