Cold Feet-Pilot and Complete 1st Series, The (Shock) (1996)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	Main Menu Audio & Animation-The Meaning Of Love
Rating
Year Of Production	1996
Running Time	352:21 (Case: 364)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (27:58) Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Declan Lowney Mark Mylod Nigel Cole Tom Hooper
Studio Distributor	Time Life Video & TV Shock Entertainment	Starring	James Nesbitt Helen Baxendale John Thomson Fay Ripley Robert Bathurst Hermione Norris
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$34.95	Music	The Other Two

    This very popular television series from the 1990s has had a slightly strange history on DVD. This first series was originally released 4 years ago by Universal. The review from then can be found  here. At the time many were annoyed by the fact that subsequent series were not released. Now in 2006, this first series has been re-released by Shock/Time Life along with the second series. One assumes the other series will follow. An excellent summation of the first series can be found at the link above, so I won't go into it in detail here.

    A direct comparison of the previous release and this one reveals very little difference except that the extras have vanished. They weren't overly exciting last time round but are completely non-existent now. Based on the previous review I would guess that exactly the same video transfer is in use on this release i.e. a very ordinary one (see details below). Both include the pilot and the 6 episodes of series 1.

    I think this series has aged a bit since its original British airings (1996 for the pilot, 1998 for Series 1) but despite this it is still entertaining television. The music in the pilot episode especially places it very much in the mid-1990s. The use of a different composer for the series itself is certainly a welcome addition. This first series gets better as it goes along and the last two episodes are both of excellent quality as the drama increases and the comedy reduces.

    Fans of the series who bought the previous edition of this first series need not consider a repurchase, however will probably want to keep an eye out for season 2.

Video

    The video quality is disappointing. In the previous review it was stated that all of these series were shown in widescreen in England, although I think the pilot and first series look right in 1.33:1. This is not true of Series 2 which looks like it has been cropped, but more about that in the next review. I cannot say for sure which is correct.

    The feature is presented in a 1.33:1 aspect ratio non 16x9 enhanced which  I would guess is the original aspect ratio for this first series.

    The picture was quite soft and grainy throughout. Shadow detail was poor. I didn't see any particular examples of low level noise. There was also some macro-blocking which was pretty regular. One quite obvious spot occurs at 10:57 in episode 7.

    The colour was quite dull. It was also afflicted by bleeding, especially from light colours, chroma noise and cross-colourisation although the last was uncommon.

    Artefacts other than those already mentioned included moire on a computer screen, lots of minor aliasing and some white specks here and there.

    There are no subtitles.

    The layer change occurs at 27:58 in Episode 6 and was reasonably well done.
    

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    The audio quality is decent.

    This DVD contains an English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo soundtrack encoded at 192 Kb/s.

    Dialogue was mostly clear and easy to understand and there was no problem with audio sync. Some accents and a bit of mumbling made some lines of dialogue hard to decipher. Subtitles would have been a great help.

    The score of this series is by Mark Russell which was a marked improvement over the quite dated music in the pilot by The Other Two.

    The surround speakers added some mild atmosphere when played with Pro Logic II.

     The subwoofer was not used.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    None.

Menu

    The menu included music, quotes from the dialogue and motion plus the ability to select episodes and scenes.

    This series is available in both Region 1 and 2. The region 2 version is the same as our original local release. This Region 4 version of this series (when compared to Region 1) misses out on;

• 16x9 enhanced widescreen video presentation (1.85:1) NTSC
• Couples Vignettes - featurette
• Interviews with cast members
• Photo gallery
• Cast & crew filmographies

    The Region 1 version of this disc misses out on;

• 1.33:1 video presentation PAL

    Region 1 is the pick here.

    The video quality is disappointing.

    The audio quality is decent.

    No extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall