Das Boot: The Director's Cut

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General		Extras
Category	War	Theatrical Trailer(s)	Yes, 1 - 1.33:1, Non-16x9, Dolby Digital 2.0
Rating		Other Trailer(s)	Yes, 1 - Dolby Digital City
Year Released	1981	Commentary Tracks	Yes, 1 - Wolfgang Petersen (Director), Jürgen Prochnow (Lead Actor), and Ortwin Freyermuth (Director's Cut Producer)
Running Time	199:40 Minutes (Not 216 Minutes as per packaging)	Other Extras	Featurette - The Making Of Das Boot (5:59)
RSDL/Flipper	RSDL (97:04)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region	4	Director	Wolfgang Petersen
Studio Distributor	Columbia Tristar	Starring	Jürgen Prochnow  Herbert Grönemeyer  Klaus Wennemann
Case	Brackley
RRP	$34.95	Music	Klaus Doldinger

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	No	MPEG	None
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1	Dolby Digital	5.1
16x9 Enhancement		Soundtrack Languages	English (Dolby Digital 5.1)  French (Dolby Digital 5.1)  German (Dolby Digital 2.0 )  Commentary Track - English (Dolby Digital 2.0 )
Theatrical Aspect Ratio	1.66:1	Miscellaneous
Macrovision	Yes	Smoking	Yes
Subtitles	English German French Danish Swedish Finnish Norwegian Dutch Arabic English Audio Commentary German Audio Commentary French Audio Commentary Dutch Audio Commentary	Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Of course, all the technical miracles in the world are meaningless without a good story, and Das Boot has one of the most interesting stories ever used in a war movie. If one examines the history of the previous century, they will find that each war that took place during those times brought on a new technology with the express purpose of killing the enemy. In the first World War, the new weapons were combat airplanes and tanks. In the Korean War, the technology of combat airplanes was taken to a whole new level when air-to-air missiles suddenly became a frightening reality rather than an amusement. In the Vietnam War, combat helicopters were the new thing (and a single stray bullet often disabled them). In the Gulf War, we got so creative that we developed a way to bomb the enemy by remote control. For the purposes of this film, it is important to know that for the second World War, the Germans pioneered the technology of U-boats, or submarines as they are called today. During the year of 1941, the tide of the battles on the sea started to turn against the Germans, with the British Navy churning out purpose-built Destroyers that were sinking the U-boats faster than Germany could produce them. As a result, younger and younger crews were being sent into battle under conditions that would be deemed ridiculous today. As the credits state, seventy-five percent of the sailors sent out in submarines never saw land again.

    During the commentary, director Wolfgang Petersen states quite explicitly that his epic film is not so much about the Germans against the Allies as it is about human beings. If the idea of a submarine film from the perspective of German naval officers fills your head with visions of young soldiers extolling the virtues of the Hitlerian version of Christianity that formed the bulk of Nazi doctrine, then get those visions out of your head before you begin watching. This is a film about the tragic face of war, and what war does to ordinary human beings. It is a film about the claustrophobic situation of a submarine, and the tension of living in a situation where your ears must act as your eyes, lest you find yourself falling into a watery grave. Films about war impress me very rarely, but Das Boot is one of the most impressive ever shot.

Video

    Because this film was shot in the early 1980s, all of the submarine shots were accomplished with models in tanks of water. The problems this caused with the finished result are still evident on this DVD, with the opening tank shot in particular showing a fair amount of grain in the green background. The shots involving models submerged in tanks of water all show grain to one degree or another, but you could be forgiven for thinking you were viewing a film that was shot last year when viewing the rest of the presentation. Because blue-screen technology was hardly in use at the time (the only films that used blue-screens for more than a handful of shots in 1981 were episodes in the Star Wars saga), a lot of the surface and conning-tower shots look somewhat fake. However, this is very mild compared to some other films I could mention, and it did not detract from the film in any way.

    Colour saturation was spot-on, although the interior shots look very dull compared to the few outdoor locations. This is because of the set designs, which were intended to accurately reflect the tightly militaristic feel of a German submarine. In this aim, the crew have succeeded quite admirably. MPEG artefacts were totally absent from the transfer, which is astounding given how hard the compression would have had to have worked in order to fit so much footage onto this disc. It is a credit to whomever is in charge of video compression at Columbia Tristar that MPEG compression artefacts do not occur in this film. Film-to-video artefacts were also more or less completely non-existent, which again is a credit to the DVD authors. Film artefacts were few and far between, and this is especially good given how much footage there was to be taken care of in the restoration process. For a film of this sort of length, this is the best transfer I have seen so far.

    The disc is presented in the RSDL format, with the layer change coming in at 97:04, between chapters 33 and 34. This is a very well-placed layer change, and does not disrupt the flow of the film at all.

Audio

    I have also mentioned that we miss out on a German Dolby Digital 5.1 mix, which is rather annoying given that this is the language the film was recorded in. In my view, this is even more irritating than having French put on a DVD as the default soundtrack when the film was originally recorded in English. Why the French soundtrack was included at all is beyond me, as German soldiers speaking French is somewhat like the Khmer Rouge singing that John Lennon song about giving peace a chance. The Region 1 version of this disc has a German Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, but it is a flipper. The UK (Region 2) version of this disc also has a German Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, and RSDL formatting, so it should be considered the version to go for.

    Dialogue was usually quite clear in both German and English, although the heavily-accented English dub is somewhat difficult to understand because the original cast of the film recorded it, and they make it clear at times that English is not their native language. However, the film does not sound as bad with the English dub because of this, but it still sounds a lot better in the original German. Audio sync was never a problem on either of my players during the original German dialogue, but the English dialogue only coincides with the movements of the actors' lips every now and then. This is as much the fault of the German language as anything else, so audio sync is not an issue here.

    The music score by Klaus Doldinger (don't laugh, I dare you) was mostly comprised of simplistic military anthems and even a traditional German folk song (read: beer drinking music). Nonetheless, it creates the appropriate atmosphere for this film, accentuating the tension, the triumphs, the revelry, and, possibly the most important part of all, the irony. Klaus was quite involved in the restoration process, with the score music being digitally remixed by him with wonderful results. Indeed, much of the soundtrack benefits quite well from being re-recorded or remixed using techniques that were not available during the original production of the film.

    The surround channels are heavily used during this film with both the English and the German soundtracks. A great deal of sound comes from the rear channels, and their presence is felt quite often. This is definitely one of the best surround mixes of a film I've heard on DVD so far, and I expect it to only be bettered when Lucasfilm come to their senses and bring the Star Wars saga to our beloved format. The creaks and bursts are just some of the noises that help envelop the viewer in this film, and there are some moments when the combination of the claustrophobic picture and the sound of waves crashing into metal honestly made me feel seasick. The main difference between the German matrix mix and the English discrete mix is the precise placement of sounds within the field. The difference between these two mixes is surprisingly minimal. The subwoofer was worked quite hard, supporting the plethora of bass-heavy sound effects within the film that you would expect from a submarine setting.

Menu

Audio Commentary - Wolfgang Petersen (Director), Jürgen Prochnow (Lead Actor), and Ortwin Freyermuth (Director's Cut Producer)

Featurette - The Making Of Das Boot

Theatrical Trailer

• Flipper formatting
• German Dolby Digital 5.1 sound

• RSDL formatting

    The video quality is nearly perfect, and truly amazing given the conditions the film was shot under.

    The audio quality is highly immersive, but the absence of a German Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack is somewhat disappointing. If not for this glaring omission, this disc would be a Hall Of Fame shoo-in.

    The extras are limited, but their quality is mostly limitless.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall