Dreamer (2005)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	Main Menu Audio Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	2005
Running Time	101:01
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Ads Then Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	John Gatins
Studio Distributor	Roadshow Home Entertainment	Starring	Kurt Russell Dakota Fanning Kris Kristofferson Elisabeth Shue David Morse Freddy Rodríguez
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$39.95	Music	John Debney

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English Dolby Digital 2.0 mono (224Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.50:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	Yes, At the beginning

    Inspirational stories featuring horses are nothing new and in the case of Dreamer it was only through the involvement of Dakota Fanning, in a role originally intended for a boy, that this film got green lit for production. Though formulaic in nature the film rises above its ‘movie of the week’ potential through some fine acting performances and good production values.

    Cale Crane (Dakota Fanning) lives on the remnants of a stud farm with her parents Ben (Kurt Russel) and Lily (Elisabeth Shue). From her bedroom window she looks over a stable that is no longer home to any horses. Living in a cottage on the property is Ben’s father (Kris Kristofferson), whom we only ever know as Pop, who was once a horse trainer like Ben. Ben works for a man named Palmer (David Morse) who manages race horses for a Saudi Prince.

    On a day when Cale has joined her father at work, he is ordered by Palmer to run a racehorse despite the fact that Ben believes the horse is not ready to race. When the horse falls during the race breaking its leg, Palmer orders that the horse be destroyed and, in an effort to save face with his Saudi boss, sacks Ben. In an attempt to protect Cale from seeing the horse put down, Ben quickly negotiates a severance package that includes taking ownership of the injured horse.

    Initially Ben is hopeful that he can recoup some money by studding the horse when its leg mends but that soon turns out to be impossible. When all seems lost it becomes apparent that the horse may actually be able to run again. After upsetting Cale by inadvertently selling the horse, Ben buys back the horse but this time puts it in Cale’s name. Now it is up to Cale to train the horse and hopefully win a race, although many obstacles will be in her way.

    There are some very nice acting performances in the movie beginning with Dakota Fanning who brings a nice balance of innocence and determination to the role of Cale. Kris Kristoffenson and Kurt Russel as father and son bring a very nice unexplained tension between the two characters while maintaining an unspoken respect for each other. Lesser films would have felt it necessary to explain the tension between the characters but in this movie the filmmakers give the audience credit to understand that these characters have had a history that has been a little rocky in the past. Elisabeth Shue as Cale’s mother and Luis Guzman and Freddy Rodrigez as Ben’s assistants nicely round out the supporting cast. I did feel however that David Morse’s character of Palmer was a bit one dimensional as the baddie of the piece.

    Overall Dreamer is a nicely executed family friendly film that will probably entertain the whole family. While the final outcome is always predictable from the beginning there are enough detours thrown in to keep the viewer interested. If you enjoy your family films uplifting and inspiring then you are sure to enjoy Dreamer.

Video

    Dreamer is given a near perfect transfer on DVD.

    The film is presented at an aspect ratio of 2.50:1 (measured) which is a little wider (and noticeably so) than its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1.

    The image is very sharp and exhibits excellent image detail. Black levels are solid throughout and shadow detail is excellent, which is a good thing as a number of scenes, especially earlier in the film, are dark night shots. The image is free of low level noise.

    Colours are always well saturated and accurate throughout.

    The print used is very clean and even when projected onto a large screen there are no compression artefacts to report. The only thing I did notice was some minor aliasing (probably partially due to the sharpness of the image) such as on car grille at 33:03.

    The English subtitles are white and easy to read. They move around on screen so that they are closest to the character saying the lines which some may find a little irritating.

    The film is presented on a single layered disc so there is no layer change to report.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    Two English soundtracks are provided on the disc. The first is Dolby Digital 5.1 encoded at 448 Kb/s and the second one is Dolby Digital 2.0 encoded at 224 Kb/s. While both are very good the Dolby Digital 5.1 is easily the superior soundtrack with superior dynamics and (unsurprisingly) better low frequency response and use of surrounds.

    Dialogue was always easy to understand and I did not notice any audio sync issues with either soundtrack.

    The original score by John Debney is stirring and underpins the onscreen emotions very well but like the film as a whole, it feels a bit formulaic.

    The surrounds are used very nicely to add ambience as well as sound effects. A good example is a rainstorm at 13:56 which surrounds the listener with the storm.

    The subwoofer is also very well used such as during a horse race at 11:27. You can really feel the horses the pounding the ground as they move past the viewer.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    Only a theatrical trailer.

Menu

    The disc starts up with a series of trailers which can be skipped past. The menus have an animated beginning but once you get to the main menu it is a static image. I found a slight issue with the menu system. If you choose ‘Setup’, then select the desired soundtrack and subtitle options the menu automatically highlights ‘Resume Film’ (which is fairly normal) but when selected, it jumps back to replay all the trailers again.

Theatrical Trailer 4x3 (2:02)

    The Region 4 DVD misses out on:

• Commentary – John Gatnis (Director)
• "Who is Mariah's Storm" featurette
• "Filming With Horses" featurette
• "How to Groom a Horse" featurette
• "Meet the Dreamer Cast" featurette
• Deleted scenes
• Music video
• French Dolby Digital 5.1 Soundtrack.

    The Region 1 DVD misses out on:

• Nothing

    Online reviews of the region 1 version would seem to suggest that the transfer is excellent just like our region 4 version. The addition of a nice selection of extras make this a hands-down win for region 1.

    Dreamer is a ‘girl and her horse’ film that rises above its ‘movie of the week’ potential through some fine acting performances and good production values.

    The video and audio transfers are both top notch but unfortunately there are no real extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall