Driver (1978)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	None
Rating
Year Of Production	1978
Running Time	87:32
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Walter Hill
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Ryan O'Neal Bruce Dern Isabelle Adjani Ronee Blakley Matt Clark Felice Orlandi Joseph Walsh Rudy Ramos Denny Macko Frank Bruno Will Walker Sandy Brown Wyeth Tara King
Case	Amaray-Transparent
RPI	$9.95	Music	Michael Small

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	None	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Ryan O'Neal stars in this gritty, violent depiction of a highly skilled driver for hire. Our driver is a loner who lives a simple life void of luxuries, aside from a small radio that plays twangy cowboy music. His talent behind the wheel earns him a good living as a getaway driver for shady crims in need of a quick escape, making him equally well known to the police. Bruce Dern is the detective who has wasted a considerable amount of his career trying to catch him in the act and is reaching the end of his tether, the frustration compounded even more so when an eyewitness to a recent casino robbery (Isabelle Adjani) is bribed and conveniently fails to spot the driver in a line-up. When a trio of unprofessional low-lifes are caught holding up a supermarket, the furious detective offers them freedom in exchange for assisting in the capture of the mysterious driver, arranging a lucrative setup that no right-minded man would refuse.

    A criminal that's never been caught, dogged by the crooked detective that's spent the majority of his career pursuing him. Sure, The Driver isn't exactly out to break any cinematic moulds but it does contain some excellent car chase sequences and several tense confrontations. This film was written and directed by Walter Hill (48 Hours, Last Man Standing) and despite its age it has managed to retain enough thrills and twists to make it better than the average Hollywood fare. I believe this could easily be attributed to the minimal amount of dialogue in the film, preventing it from appearing too dated.

    If you enjoyed Bullitt or more recent films such as The Transporter or The Fast and the Furious, this film is in a similar vein and may impress.

Video

    This video transfer is fair, given the film's age. Most of the issues here relate to the condition of the source material.

    The transfer is presented in an aspect of 1.78:1, complete with 16x9 enhancement. This film was originally screened theatrically in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1.

    The sharpness level is consistent throughout and some scenes exhibit a good amount of fine detail. Much of the film is set in the night time and the resulting shadow detail is acceptable, while many scenes contain solid, realistic blacks. Aside from some visible distortion during the opening logos there was no low level noise evident in the transfer.

    Most colours appear true and realistic, however I noted a number of scenes that seemed to have overly red skin tones. There was no bleeding or oversaturation present.

    The transfer is free of MPEG compression artefacting. Film artefacts are visible throughout, usually in the form of specks of dust and dirt. There are a number of more extreme cases of damage to the source, such as a number of damaged frames at 29:23 and a persistent scratch down the length of the frame from 31:35 until 33:00. A large negative artefact dominates the centre of the frame at 26:46. An acceptable amount of film grain is also present in the transfer.

    There are no subtitle streams provided.

    This disc is DVD5 formatted (single layered).

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    Only one soundtrack is provided; the film's original English mono presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s).

    The English dialogue is always distinct and easy to understand among the many other noises and effects. The film's ADR is completely natural, while the audio sync is similarly spot-on.

    There aren't any dropouts or damage evident in the soundtrack and the degree of depth is quite good. The roaring of engines and screeching of tyres comes across well.

    The film's score is credited to Michael Small and suits the pace of the film well.

    There is obviously no surround or subwoofer activity to be found in this mono soundtrack.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    None.

    There is censorship information available for this title. Click here to read it (a new window will open). WARNING: Often these entries contain MAJOR plot spoilers.

    The video transfer is good, but is limited by the source material.

    The audio transfer is a faithful reproduction of the film's original mono soundtrack.

    There are no extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall