Duma (2005)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	Main Menu Introduction Main Menu Audio & Animation Additional Footage-Extended Scenes Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	2005
Running Time	96:29 (Case: 95)
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4,5	Directed By	Carroll Ballard
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	Alex Michaeletos Campbell Scott Mary Makhatho Nthabiseng Kenoshi Hope Davis Jennifer Steyn Nicky Rebello Garth Renecle Andre Stolz Charlotte Savage Ronald Shange Eamonn Walker Nadia Kretschmer
Case	?
RPI	$19.95	Music	John Debney

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	Unknown	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English Arabic Dutch Hebrew Icelandic English for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Duma presents us with a story that revolves around a young boy's rite of passage from that of a young lad living a comfortable life with his father and mother to that of a young man who honours his father's memory by keeping to his word.

    This is a very enjoyable movie that should be high on the family movie list. It deals with the death of a parent and what it means to be a child. It also covers aspects of growing up like responsibility, loyalty, respect, courage and what it means to keep a promise.

    It opens with Xan, a 12 year old boy, and his father who come across a cheetah cub and adopt it. We follow the progress of raising the cub who Xan names Duma. Unfortunately, Xan's father dies of cancer and Xan and his mother are forced to leave their home in the African countryside to stay with a relative in the city. They take Duma with them but arrangements are made by Xan's mother to place Duma in a zoo. This does not bode well with Xan as he had promised to take Duma back, with his father, to where they had found him years before.

    Xan and Duma soon abscond and make their way back to the family homestead where Xan takes his father's motorbike and with Duma in the sidecar they head off on a once-in-a-lifetime adventure. This culminates in the return of Duma to the place that was agreed upon by Xan and his father before Xan's father died.

    There are some very nice African wildlife scenes in this movie and it reminded me of the way the old Disney movies were made years ago.

Video

    This is a nice transfer with no problems watching it on a large screen display.

    The movie is presented at an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 and it is 16x9 enhanced.

     I found the video transfer to be quite sharp with good shadow detail. I did however find that there was an inherent level of graininess throughout some of the African vista scenes and in most of the low lit scenes.

    Colours were nicely rendered and there was no hint of any colour bleeding. Sometimes there was a harsh feel to the picture but this was more due to the actual harshness of the scenery than for any technical reason. Some of the scenes in the movie are shot in some pretty bleak environments which is what gives rise to the harsh look of the scenes.

     There is not much in the way of MPEG artefacts to mention, nor were there any noticeable film to video artefacts or film artefacts. There was also no aliasing present. In general, as I have stated above, this is a nice video transfer.

    There are subtitles in a number of different languages as you can see from the listing at the top of this review but I only checked out the English for the hearing impaired which followed the spoken word very accurately.

   The layer change occurs at 32:14. It is concealed within a scene change and is not readily detectable.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    Some nice use of African tribal music throughout this movie adds nicely to the overall quality of the audio track.

    There is only one audio soundtrack on this DVD and that is English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s).

    At first I had a little difficulty understanding some of the dialogue. The main reason for this was that the dialogue is predominately spoken in a broad South African accent. Once you get accustomed to this the dialogue becomes easier to understand. There were no clicks, pops or hisses.

    The musical score for this movie was very nicely arranged and it is a real credit to John Debney, probably better known for his work in The Passion Of The Christ which earned him an Academy Award Nomination for Best Original Score. He has rightly used a lot of African tribal music to instil a sense of the mystical. I found the music to be almost mesmerising at times but then I think most people react this way to the rhythmical sounds of African music.

    There was good use of the surround speakers and there was an appropriate amount of use of the subwoofer, although do not expect earth-shuddering sonic booms as this movie is not about explosive special effects.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Main Menu

    The Main Menu is presented at 1.78:1 16x9 enhanced. It is actually quite a nicely animated menu which starts with CGI of a cheetah running across an open field which then progresses into displaying the title Duma with the available selections at the bottom of the screen whilst scenes from the movie play above it. During all of this tribal African music underscores proceedings.

Additional Footage

    The additional footage is presented as two extended scenes from the movie. The first is titled Xan and Ripkuna At The Airplane while the second is titled Ripkuna Teaching Xan To Use The Spear. After watching both of these extended scenes I am a little bewildered as to why they were left out of the actual movie as they are not exceptionally long and I think they would have added to the overall relationship between Xan and Ripkuna. Unfortunately both are in a 4x3 aspect ratio and both show timecode displays superimposed on the video.

Theatrical Trailer

    This was the original trailer as seen in the cinemas. It is designed to not give too much of the story away but still pique the interest of the audience.

    The film is currently unavailable in Region 1 but there are plans to release both widescreen and full screen versions of this movie there. So for the time being at least the Region 4 version is the winner.

    A very family friendly movie that will particularly have young boys dreaming of going on an African adventure. While the story can be a little predictable at times for the adults it is still well worth watching and I am sure the children will be suitably enthralled.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall