Luis Miguel

Vivo

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Details At A Glance

General
Extras
Category Music Main Menu Audio and Animation
DTS Trailer - Piano
Rating
Year Released 2000
Running Time 96:35 minutes
RSDL/Flipper No/No
Cast & Crew
Start Up Movie
Region 2,3,4,5,6 Director David Mallet
Studio
Distributor
Warner Vision
Warner Vision Australia
Starring Luis Miguel
Case Transparent Amaray
RPI $39.95 Music Various

 
Video
Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame No Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1, 448 Kb/s)
Spanish (Dolby Digital 2.0, 192 Kb/s)
Spanish (DTS 5.1)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio 1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Original Aspect Ratio 1.78:1
Miscellaneous
Macrovision Yes Smoking No
Subtitles None Annoying Product Placement No
Action In or After Credits No

Plot Synopsis

    If you ever needed any confirmation that DVD had arrived as a mainstream video format, then this DVD might just provide it. From my limited knowledge of the gentleman, Luis Miguel is apparently a big artist in Spanish-speaking markets, as evidenced by him singing in Spanish and all the songs being in Spanish. Now I would not have thought that there would have been much of a market for this gentleman in Australia, but obviously Warner Vision Australia has enough confidence in the format to release the DVD locally. This is despite the fact that there are no English subtitles on the DVD and there are no English translations to the song titles either. Further confining the market for the DVD is the fact that Luis Miguel's target audience is quite clearly the 18-35 year old female demographic. How do I know this? Simply because about 90% of the audience at this live performance are in that age group with the bulk of the remaining 10% being men who have clearly been dragged along for the evening. You can easily spot them - they are the ones not jumping up and down screaming.

    The songs on offer on the DVD are as follows:
 
 

1. Intro   8. Segundo Romance:
2. Quiero     El Dia Que Me Quieras
3. Tu Solo Tu     Solamente Una Vez
4. J.C. Calderon Medley:      Somos Novios
  Entrégate     Todo y Nada
  Tengo Todo Excepto A Ti     Nosotros
  La Incondicional   9. O Tu O Ninguna
5. Up-Tempo Medley:   10. Sol, Arena y Mar
  Un Hombre Busca A Una Mujer   11. Romances:
  Cuestion De Piel     Voy A Apagar La Luz/Contigo Aprendi
  Oro De Ley     Por Debajo De La Mesa
6. Romance:     El Reloj
  No Me Platiques Más     Sabor A Mi
  No Sé Tu     La Gloria Eres Tu
  La Puerta     Bésame Mucho
  La Barca   12. Y
  Inolvidable   13. La Bikina
7. Suave   14. Como Es Posible Que A Mi Lado
      15. Sera Que No Me Amas
      16. Te Propongo Esta Noche

    Okay, the song titles may mean very little to anyone other than our Spanish-speaking friends, but music is a universal language and so you don't need to speak the lingo in order to enjoy the music. Whilst it is true there is stuff here that is eminently avoidable, it is equally true that there is some stuff here to enjoy. Mind you, if you happen to fall within the target demographic, this is far more likely to appeal! Certainly there is little here to deter our Spanish-speaking friends from indulging in this little effort.

    Heck, this release may bring Luis Miguel to the attention of a larger, non-Spanish, audience! It certainly worked for Ricky Martin, so there is no reason why it cannot work for Luis Miguel, except perhaps that Ricky Martin is better-looking than Luis Miguel (at least that is what I am told).

Transfer Quality

Video

    This is a live recording, presumably taken during his 2000 Tour (that gleaned from the little amount of understandable language in the credits), but beyond that there is nothing on the DVD to indicate the origin of the source material. Since it is a live recording, it suffers all the usual problems associated with such source material. However, contrary to the impression created by the packaging, this is not a Full Frame format transfer. It is in fact a 16x9 enhanced 1.78:1 aspect ratio transfer, and a reasonably decent one at that.

    Whatever problems are in this transfer are clearly source-related and as such this is an excellent transfer of that material. Sharpness leaves a little to be desired, especially when those intense stage lights really start going. As a result, definition is not exactly what you would call great, but that is certainly nothing unexpected in a live recording. This is a generally clear transfer with little in the way of grain affecting the video. Shadow detail is of course a non-issue since the intense stage lighting pretty well ensures that there are no shadows. There did not appear to be any low level noise in the transfer.

    Since we have those ever-present intense stage lights, the colours here are as usual all over the place. When the lighting permits it, the colours appear to be quite decent and quite vibrant. In general, though, everything is washed out by the intense stage lighting. There is some degree of variance in the skin tones, with the gentleman suffering from a whole range of skin tones from pale to looking like he has gone twelve continuous hours in a sun bed. The black tones seemed in general to lack depth. There are some issues with oversaturation in the transfer as a result of the intense blue stage lights as well as some indication of colour flare and bleed for the same reason. Overall though, this is a fairly typical sort of transfer for a live concert.

    There did not appear to be any significant MPEG artefacts in the transfer. There did not seem to be any real problems with film-to-video artefacts. There were a few instances of shimmer in the transfer but these were effectively hidden to some extent by the intense lighting. It should be noted that the intense stage lighting does create something of a ghostly aura at times around the players. There are no problems with film artefacts in the transfer.

    As mentioned, there are no subtitles on the DVD and this seems a curious omission - especially when considering that other DVDs from this source have English subtitle/lyric options even though the songs are in English. I certainly missed the subtitles as I have no idea what the song titles really mean (a few educated guesses really do not suffice) and this would have been nice to know.
 
 

Video Ratings Summary
Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain
Film-to-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    This DVD has three soundtracks on offer, all in Spanish: Dolby Digital 5.1, Dolby Digital 2.0 and DTS 5.1. Basically, I stuck with the Spanish soundtracks!

    The vocals come up well in the transfer and there should be no problems understanding them if you speak Spanish. For all I know he was singing in an Icelandic/Swahili mix - I could not understand a word of it! There did not appear to be any problems with audio sync in the transfer.

    As usual, the Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack is so wimpish in sound it might as well not even be included on the DVD! Whilst there is nothing really wrong with it per se, the format simply lacks any sort of body to the sound with the result that there is absolutely no emotion conveyed in the music. It really is a very, very wimpish soundtrack. If this is the only soundtrack you can play, I really feel sorry for you as it in no way conveys the sound of Luis Miguel - not even when cranked all the way up. This lack of body is immediately apparent when you switch to the Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack (which I might add you cannot do on the fly - you have to return to the menu to do so, a serious problem in my view). The soundtrack is a good example of the 5.1 sound format except in one respect - there is almost no action through the rear channels other than weakish sounding audience noises after songs. This is highlighted by the fact that the channels go very silent, very quickly after the start of each song. I really feel that there should have been more ambient sound coming through the rear channels. The bass channel gets a fair workout, but nothing too over-the-top other than in the first couple of songs. Not demonstration standard, but if you like to crank your music DVDs up loud, this will surely please. Funnily enough, the DTS soundtrack is extremely similar to the Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack in form - little action out of the rear channels and plenty of action out of the front surround and centre channels. The funny thing here though is the fact that most of the bass action seems to come form those three channels - there does not seem to be much out of the bass channel itself. Whilst the sound is still broadly-speaking that encompassing sound we expect from a DTS soundtrack, it does lack a degree of body that is a tad unusual. Overall, I would stick with the Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack here.
 
 

Audio Ratings Summary
Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Extras

    Considering that it is only a single layer, single sided DVD and that there are the three soundtracks on the DVD, I suppose expecting much in the way of extras was being just a tad extravagant. But, it is a great shame as I would think most people would have appreciated at least a biography and a discography for the man.

Menu

    Nothing special and carry minor audio and animation enhancement to go with the 16x9 enhancement.

DTS Trailer - Piano

    I have not seen it before so in that respect it is welcome, but really are these things extras or merely advertising?

R4 vs R1

    Whilst tracking done definitive information regarding the Region 1 release is a little difficult, both Amazon and DVD Empire suggest that the Region 1 release is a Full Frame format and has only Dolby Digital stereo sound. If this is indeed correct, then we have a Region 4 winner on grounds of aspect ratio and soundtracks. However, since the Region 4 release does suffer a packaging error on the aspect ratio, it is not outside the realm of possibility that so too does the Region 1 release.

Summary

    Luis Miguel - Vivo is a pretty decent live recording on a well-handled DVD transfer. If you like a little variety in your music, then this is possibly worthwhile seeking out. I cannot say that I enjoyed it all (it certainly started off looking like being a total disaster) but some of the later stuff in the show certainly was enjoyable. A pity however that the video concentrated on the man himself for it looks like there was some talent in his backing singers.
 
 

Ratings (out of 5)

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

© Ian Morris (have a laugh, check out the bio)
7th March, 2001.

Review Equipment
DVD Pioneer DV-515; S-video output
Display Sony Trinitron Wega 80cm. Calibrated with the NTSC DVD version of Video Essentials.
Audio Decoder Built in
Amplification Yamaha RXV-795. Calibrated with the NTSC DVD version of Video Essentials.
Speakers Energy Speakers: centre EXLC; left and right C-2; rears EXLR; and subwoofer ES-12XL