The Gumball Rally (1976)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	Main Menu Audio Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	1976
Running Time	102:22
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Ads Then Menu
Region Coding	2,4,5	Directed By	Charles Bail
Studio Distributor	Warner Home Video	Starring	Michael Sarrazin Norman Burton Gary Busey John Durren Susan Flannery Harvey Jason Steven Keats Tim McIntire Joanne Nail J. Pat O'Malley Tricia O'Neil Lázaro Pérez Nicholas Pryor
Case	?
RPI	$9.95	Music	Dominic Frontiere David Pomeranz

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 1.0 (192Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 1.0 (192Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 1.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English Czech Dutch French Italian Norwegian English for the Hearing Impaired Italian for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Based (loosely) on an actual coast-to-coast illegal race, and born out of the mid-seventies fuel crisis and a US national 55MPH speed limit, The Gumball Rally celebrates freedom and cheekily pokes its tongue out at over-strict government legislation and lowest common denominator laws.

    Michael Bannon (Michael Sarrazin) is a bored executive. During a long meeting he makes a phone call, gives the code-word "gumball", and so begins the organisation of the annual "Gumball Rally". Telegrams and phone calls containing just the word "gumball" go out and people from all walks of life make their way to New York to participate in this illegal rally from New York to Long Beach, California. The prize is merely a gumball machine but the real lure is the chance to have a good time in exotic machinery.

    What follows is a cross country motorised Road-Runner and Coyote chase as the participants race each other and elude speed traps all the while pursued by Lieutenant Roscoe (Norman Burton), a Californian cop determined to stop the race and arrest the organisers.

    This is a film best described as "fun". The actors are clearly enjoying themselves, in particular Raul Julia, who plays his role as the lecherous Italian racing champion brought in as a ringer with obvious relish. The crashes are cartoon-like, and the cars look great. That's not to say you have to be a car nut to enjoy this movie. The list of entries - Ferrari Daytona, Mercedes-Benz 300SLR, Porsche 911 Targa, 427 Shelby Cobra and Chevrolet Camaro Z28 - will probably make this movie a must-see for lovers of classic cars, but even those who express no interest in cars should enjoy this harmless romp. It is, after all, a chase movie. The racers chase each other and the police chase the racers, and it's all done tongue firmly planted in cheek.

    The Gumball Rally was released in the same year as a similar film, Cannonball, and these were remade some 5 years later as the Burt Reynolds film Cannonball Run, which also spawned a couple of sequels. While the Cannonball Run series were essentially Burt Reynold's home movies with a host of his star mates in various cameo appearances, the cast of  The Gumball Rally were, at the time, relatively unknown. Perhaps because of this, The Gumball Rally is the best of this bunch.

Video

    Delivered in its original 2.35:1 aspect ratio and 16x9 enhanced, this is a transfer not without flaws.

    A number of the earlier scenes are marred by film artefacts in the form of white specks flicking throughout scenes. Not bad to the point of unwatchable, but they are very distracting. These vanish as the movie progresses leaving a pretty clean second half of the film.

    Aliasing is present throughout the film and is particularly noticeable on car grilles and around windscreens.

    Aside from these, the transfer is sharp with well saturated colours and good shadow detail. An average transfer with some very noticeable flaws.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    Dolby Digital 1.0. Hardly an audio track to get excited about but, hey, it was 1976 and stereo wasn't all that common in movies.

    Clear dialogue, well mixed and, given the limitations of the technology in 1976, an excellent soundtrack with nothing to complain about. While some may complain that it was not remixed into surround sound, I am glad they didn't and gave, instead, the original soundtrack. It fits with the look and feel of the movie and gives a more authentic back-to-the-seventies experience that is more than just the - for want of a better phrase - dress sense.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    Not much in the way of extras to be found here. The menu is static with audio behind it, and a 2:18 theatrical trailer is the only extra.

    The Region 1 and Region 4 releases are essentially the same, with the differences limited to language and subtitle choices. Region 1 misses out on an Italian soundtrack and Czech, Dutch, French, Italian, Norwegian, English for the Hearing Impaired and Italian for the Hearing Impaired subtitles. Region 4 misses out on French and Spanish subtitles.

    A good, fun movie that is great for a lazy veg-out in front of the TV. It won't over-tax your thinking but nicely wiles away 102 minutes. While not to everyone's taste, those that like this genre will find it entertaining, and isn't that what it's all about?

    Reasonable video that suffers from some artefacts.

    Basic, but clear, audio.

    No real extras to speak of.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall