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Lots of stuff is still broken, but at least reviews can now be looked up and read.
PLEASE NOTE: Michael D's is currently in READ ONLY MODE. Anything submitted will simply not be written to the database.
Lots of stuff is still broken, but at least reviews can now be looked up and read.
Overboard (1987)

Overboard (1987)

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Released 14-Mar-2001

Cover Art

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Details At A Glance

General Extras
Category Comedy Theatrical Trailer
Rating Rated PG
Year Of Production 1987
Running Time 107:31 (Case: 112)
RSDL / Flipper RSDL (58:11) Cast & Crew
Start Up Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding 2,4 Directed By Garry Marshall
Studio
Distributor

Twentieth Century Fox
Starring Goldie Hawn
Kurt Russell
Edward Herrmann
Katherine Helmond
Roddy McDowall
Case Amaray-Transparent
RPI $31.95 Music Alan Silvestri


Video Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame None English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
German Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
French Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Italian Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio 1.85:1
16x9 Enhancement
Not 16x9 Enhanced
Video Format 576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio 1.85:1 Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures No
Subtitles English
English for the Hearing Impaired
German
German for the Hearing Impaired
French
Italian
Spanish
Dutch
Swedish
Finnish
Norwegian
Danish
Portuguese
Polish
Smoking No
Annoying Product Placement No
Action In or After Credits No

NOTE: The Profanity Filter is ON. Turn it off here.

Plot Synopsis

    Joanne Stayton the Third (Goldie Hawn) lives on a big white boat, and boy is she a b****. If you were to look up the word "b****" in a dictionary of Hollywood characters, it would read "see Joanne Stayton the Third". Joanne and her husband (Edward Herrmann) come into Elk Cove port for some engine repairs. To pass the time, Joanne decides that she needs more wardrobe space, so she calls for a cabinet maker - enter Dean Proffitt (Kurt Russell), who is a single father raising four young unruly boys.

    After the job is completed, Joanne finds fault with the job and says she won’t pay for it and kicks, err... make that pushes, Dean and his tools overboard.

    As fate would have it, later that evening Joanne falls Overboard and is picked up by another passing boat, which just happens to be a garbage scow (how fitting!). Joanne is taken to the local hospital with amnesia. Dean gets to hear about a mysterious woman found out at sea who has amnesia and when he finds out who it is, he spots an opportunity to get some payback and recoup some of the money she owes him - by putting her to work around his house. So, Dean goes to the hospital and pretends Joanne is his wife, Annie Profitt.

    As you can imagine, Dean isn’t very kind to her and basically treats her like a slave (which is not very PC). But, as time goes by they start acting more and more like a family...but will it last?

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Transfer Quality

Video

    Poor and average are words that immediately spring to mind when describing the image quality of this DVD. The cause is excessive grain - it plagues the picture from start to finish.

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and is not 16x9 enhanced.

    Picture sharpness varies from acceptable to good. There would have been a lot more detail in the picture if it weren't for the grain. Shadow detail is good. No low level noise, edge enhancement or edge bleeding was noticed.

    The colour is good, but is lacking sparkle, so it comes across as unremarkable and flat for most of the film. The colour looks quite decent in a couple of the night-time sequences, but unfortunately most of this movie takes place during the daytime.

    Grain is terrible. From the very opening scene to the end of the film it is everywhere. It strongly affects both the foreground and background picture for almost the entire film and is really noticeable, which ruins this transfer. There are a couple of scenes that escape the grain, but they don't last very long.

    No MPEG artefacts were noticed. There are many instances of aliasing and moire artefacts, but generally these aren't too strong. Examples can be found at 4:00 - 4:12, 6:40, 8:12, 8:23, 8:50, 41:10, 88:27 and 95:05. The lack of 16x9 enhancement certainly added to this problem. Interlacing artefacts are another bothersome area for this transfer, and even though there aren't too many instances, they are distracting when they occur.

    Overall the film artefacts aren’t too bad, but they could have been much better. There is a generous sprinkling of minor non-disruptive film artefacts, but there is also a goodly number of distracting medium-sized artefacts too, especially towards the end of the film.

    This disc is an RSDL disc, with the layer change occurring in Chapter 19, at 58:11. The only real indication of the layer change is a short pause in the light background music, which is very easy to miss. Thus I must say that the layer change is very well placed and is not disruptive to the flow of the movie at all.

Video Ratings Summary
Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    There are five audio tracks on this DVD, four of which are 192Kb/s Dolby Digital 2.0 surround-encoded soundtracks. These are; English, German, French and Spanish. The fifth audio track is an Italian 192Kb/s Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack. I listened to the default English soundtrack.

    Dialogue was clear and easy to understand throughout with only one minor instance where the dialogue was out of sync due to an instance of dialogue replacement (at 53:53).

    The musical score is by Alan Silvestri.

    For most of the movie the sound comes from the centre channel, with only limited and light surround channel use - pretty normal for the genre and age of film. There are a couple of scenes where the rear speakers are used effectively and noticeably, such as at 70:03, but these instances were rare.

    The subwoofer is only lightly used throughout the movie, adding a nice bottom end to the sound, but there are no instances of deep floor-rattling bass, which again should not be expected from this genre of film.

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

Extras

    The extras are extremely limited, consisting of just one theatrical trailer.

Menu

    The main menu is simple and quite nicely presented. The Main Menu selections are; Play, Scene Selections (32 with Index), Language Selection and Original Theatrical Trailer.

Theatrical Trailer (1:52 minutes)

    The theatrical trailer is of good quality and ironically is of better quality than the movie itself. It is presented in the non-16x9 enhanced aspect ratio of 1.85:1, with a Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack.

R4 vs R1

NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.

    The Region 4 version of this disc misses out on;     The Region 1 version of this disc misses out on;     From the reviews of the R1 version that I read, it doesn't sound much better. So, I think we should all say no thanks to MGM and maybe they will get the message that we, the consumers, won't buy any old rubbishy transfer that they deign to put out on DVD.

Summary

    Overboard seemed like a great laugh when I was but a wee lad, but now it has dated and isn't nearly as funny.

    The video quality is poor, the main cause being excessive grain which plagues the picture from start to finish.

    The audio quality is good, with no transfer-induced faults. There isn't a lot of good surround channel use, but this is hardly surprising from this type of film.

    The extras are extremely limited.

Ratings (out of 5)

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

© Paul Williams (read Paul's biography)
Saturday, March 18, 2000
Review Equipment
DVDSony DVP-725, using Component output
DisplaySony Projector VPH-G70 (No Line Doubler), Technics Da-Lite matt screen with gain of 1.0 (229cm). Calibrated with Video Essentials. This display device is 16x9 capable.
Audio DecoderBuilt in to amplifier/receiver. Calibrated with Video Essentials.
AmplificationOnkyo TX-DS989
SpeakersFronts: Energy RVS-1 (3), Rears: Energy RVSS-1 (2), Subwoofer: Energy EPS-150 (1)

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