Die Another Day: Ultimate Edition (2002)

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General		Extras
Category	Action	Main Menu Audio & Animation Audio Commentary Credits Featurette-Behind The Scenes-Just Another Day Featurette-Behind The Scenes-A British Touch; Bond Returns To London Featurette-Behind The Scenes-Location Scouting With Peter Lamont Featurette-007,Women, Allies, Mission Combat Manual, Q Branch Featurette-Exotic Locations Featurette-Behind The Scenes-Shaken And Stirred On Ice Script To Screen Comparison Web Links Gallery-Photo-Experience The World Of Bond In 2002
Rating	?
Year Of Production	2002
Running Time	127:00
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Ads Then Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Lee Tamahori
Studio Distributor	Sony Pictures Home Entertain	Starring	Pierce Brosnan Halle Berry Toby Stephens Rosamund Pike Rick Yune Judi Dench John Cleese Michael Madsen Will Yun Lee Kenneth Tsang Emilio Echevarría Mikhail Gorevoy Lawrence Makoare
Case	?
RPI	$19.95	Music	Mirwais Ahmadzaï David Arnold Madonna

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English dts 5.1 (768Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/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 English for the Hearing Impaired Dutch Swedish Finnish Norwegian Danish Greek Hindi English Text Commentary Dutch Text Commentary	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	Yes
		Action In or After Credits	Yes

    Die Another Day marked quite a few milestones in the history of the James Bond film franchise.

    It's the 20th Bond film in the Saltzman/Broccoli/Wilson produced series. It marked the 40th anniversary of the theatrical release of Dr No and the first Bond film of the 21st century. Sadly, it also marked the fourth and ultimately final appearance of Pierce Brosnan as the super spy James Bond 007 Licensed to Kill.

    Being such a momentous time for Bond, it's no wonder the producers and studio went out of their way to make this Bond a new hero for the 21st century. Prior to the theatrical release of Die Another Day, commentators were wondering of the relevance of the Cold War icon in a new post 9/11 world.

    That same year, xXx was getting a lot of pre-release hype and was prematurely assuming the 21st century super spy mantle. Bond 20 blew fans, critics and the box-office away, while xXx was a critical dud and made $170 million less than Die Another Day did. Somehow the next big thing seemed dated and clichéd, while a 40 year old, greying British film icon seemed  fresh, reinvigorated and ready for saving the world again in the 21st century.

    The film wonderfully and somewhat nostalgically pays homage to its predecessors; Jinx emerging from the surf like Honey Ryder, the Aston Martin ejector seat, The Union Jack parachute, a megalomaniac obsessed with diamonds, the scene with Q and all the old tricks.

    There were, however, a few aspects of this film that broke from Bond tradition and caught the attention of filmgoers;

• Bond gets captured, tortured and looks like the bush tucker man, all beard and woolly hair.
• Bond loses his 00 status and goes rogue. For most of the film Bond is working not as an agent, but is motivated by revenge. Even once he is approached by M, he is still not on official Mi6 business and is 'off the books'. Several of Fleming's books showed 007 working outside of Mi6 - I liked how this film showed that different element.
• In a bold move that breaks the traditional Bond mould, a strong, ballsy female counterpart NSA agent (Jinx) was introduced. Halle Berry did a fantastic job and brought a new dimension to the film. She is a strong female character who is on Bond's side and, let's face it, there haven't been too many of them in the previous 19 films.

    Another Bond babe worth mentioning is the stunningly cool Rosamund Pike who plays the well-named Miranda Frost; the right hand woman to Toby Stephens' megalomaniac Gustav Graves. It's here (for me at least) that things come a little unstuck. Stephens never seems more dangerous than a schoolyard prat - a spoilt kid who should be blowing his inheritance instead of trying to take over the world. Rick Yune does a good job as the diamond encrusted evil side-kick. The usual suspects of Dame Judi Dench and John Cleese reprise their roles as M and Q respectively and do excellent jobs. On a disappointing note, Madonna  makes one of the worst soft-lighting cameos in the history of film and also chips in a pretty weak (if somewhat catchy) theme song.

    What exactly is Bond saving the world from this time? Gustav Graves has smuggled illegal African diamonds and is claiming that they have been mined in Iceland. This is bankrolling his pet project, a powerful satellite that harnesses the power of the sun to be used as a massive weapon. Gustav is not who he seems and has an agenda that includes revenge on 007. The action goes from North Korea to Hong Kong to the UK to Iceland and back to Korea! Highlights include a great car chase and battle on ice in the Aston Martin and an extreme surfing incursion into North Korea.

   Brosnan is arguably the best Bond since Connery, and I for one am sad to see him go. At least Brosnan (unlike some of his predecessors) goes out on a theatrical high-note. Here, as he has done in his previous films, he plays a very strong, determined and stylish Bond. He's suave, a lady killer and has a charismatic film presence that I'm yet to see from his thuggish, blue collar and too rough around the edges replacement. Hh well. I'm sure the franchise will thrive and continue to be a film force to be reckoned with in another 40 years!

    James Bond will return in Casino Royale.

Video

    I owned the previous R4 release of this film and it was a lacklustre transfer. Lowry cleaned up this transfer frame by frame and remastered it in high definition. It shows - this transfer is markedly better than the original DVD release. Unfortunately, though, it's not as good as it should be.

    The film is presented in 2.35:1 and the disc is 16x9 enhanced.

    The image is undeniably softer than what it should be. Close shots tend to look decent enough but as soon as there is a wide shot, especially when outdoors, there is a marked decrease in clarity. Like some of the other new releases the culprit seems to be the bit rate, probably a 'bit' lower than it should be hovering around the low to mid 4 range.

    The previous release had serious edge enhancement issues. This is not as bad this time round but it's still annoying and it generally rears its head in wider shots.

    The colour is good. Being shot in various locations all around the world, Tamahori had an extensive colour palette to work with. Filters were used extensively as this Bond outing was plagued with a lot of inclement weather through the shoot. Skin tones looked realistic and shadow/black levels were superb.

    Aliasing could be seen occasionally, but nothing too severe.

    Overall, a definite improvement from the previous release but still a notch below what's expected at the current stage of DVD's life cycle.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    Like the previous R4 release there are two great audio options; English Dolby Digital EX 5.1 (448Kb/s) and English dts-ES (768Kb/s).

    Both are fantastic tracks, but I prefer the dts track. It has a greater range and the bass was very impressive.

    The dialogue came through clearly, but in a few instances seemed a little softer when compared to the surrounds. Sync was fine.

    The music sounded great. David Arnold did an inspiring job reworking some of Barry's classic pieces and of course the famous Monty theme.

    This is a big movie with many explosions and earth shattering action. As such, the surrounds got a serious workout - the cracking of the ice shelf as Icarus blasts the ice away is fantastic and there are many other similar instances.

    The LFE track is similarly intense and extremely busy. This is where the dts track outdoes the Dolby.

    There are also 2 English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s) tracks.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Main Menu Audio & Animation    

Disc One

MI6 Datastream

    Same as previous release. Informative Subtitles that pop up during the movie and provide interesting production notes and bits of trivia.

Audio Commentary 1

    Same as previous release. Lee Tamahori (Director) & Michael G. Wilson (Producer) provide interesting behind-the-scenes anecdotes and other information. Their commentary is joint, and screen-specific. Dry at times, but it seems like the two have a healthy respect for each other and are proud of how the film turned out.

Audio Commentary 2

   Same as previous release. Actors Pierce Brosnan and Rosamund Pike provide a separately recorded, but screen-specific, commentary. I thought Brosnan might have been a bit more interesting, but I just couldn't get into it. Pike had a lot of enthusiasm.

Disc Two

Featurette-Behind The Scenes-Just Another Day (22:37)

    A great look at one day of filming, interviews with cast, director, security, assistant directors, location co-ordinators and so on. This day is the filming across the road from Buckingham Palace when Graves parachutes in to get his Knighthood. A massive amount of work for 30-40 seconds worth of footage.

Featurette-Behind The Scenes-A British Touch; Bond Returns To London (3:31)

    Brief look at Bond flying British Airways back to London and how Roger Moore's daughter has a bit part as a hostess.

Featurette-Behind The Scenes-Location Scouting With Peter Lamont (13:50)

    Beautiful and amazing handycam footage as Lamont is out scouting locations but his narration quite bland - no anecdotes, he just simply tells the viewer what is appearing on screen. A little disappointing.

Featurette - Shaken & Stirred - On Ice (23:34)

    Same as previous release. This extra looks specifically at the amazing car battle on ice. This featurette is fascinating, as it covers how the film-makers had to reconstruct these beautiful V12 sports cars into 4WDs (with weapons) and still make them identical on the outside -- a very tough call. The engineers seem to have their work cut out for them.

Featurette-007, Women, Allies, Mission Combat Manual, Q Branch, Exotic Locations   

    This set of extras consists of highlights from the film separated into small segments and categorised into 007, Opening Titles, Women, Allies, Villains, Mission Combat Manual, Q Branch & Exotic Locations.

Featurette- Script To Screen Comparison (51:39)

    A great look at how Bond 20 came to fruition. Extensive interviews with producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson, and cast and crew members who've worked on previous Bond productions. They have pretty close knit teams. A great making of production that more DVD releases could do with.

Web Links

Gallery-Photo-Experience The World Of Bond In 2002

    Lots of photos from the production and media blitz around the theatrical release.

    The new Ultimate Editions are identical in different regions, so I vote the same!

    Bond 20 is a great homage to early films and a great intro to the 21st century.

    The video is good, but not great.

    The audio is first class.

    Special features are very good.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall