Race to Witch Mountain (2009) |
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General | Extras | ||
Category | Family |
Main Menu Audio & Animation Deleted Scenes Outtakes |
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Rating | ? | ||
Year Of Production | 2009 | ||
Running Time | 94:21 | ||
RSDL / Flipper | RSDL (73:02) | Cast & Crew | |
Start Up | Language Select Then Menu | ||
Region Coding | 2,4,5 | Directed By | Andy Fickman |
Studio
Distributor |
Walt Disney Studios Home Ent. |
Starring |
Dwayne Johnson Annasophia Robb Alexander Ludwig Carla Gugino Ciarán Hinds Tom Everett Scott Chris Marquette Billy Brown |
Case | ? | ||
RPI | ? | Music | Trevor Rabin |
Video | Audio | ||
Pan & Scan/Full Frame | None |
English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Czech Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Russian Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Hungarian Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Ukranian Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) English Descriptive Audio Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) |
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Widescreen Aspect Ratio | 2.40:1 | ||
16x9 Enhancement |
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Video Format | 576i (PAL) | ||
Original Aspect Ratio | 2.35:1 | Miscellaneous | |
Jacket Pictures | No | ||
Subtitles |
English English for the Hearing Impaired Czech Hungarian Slovak Russian Ukranian Latvian Lithuanian Estonian Hebrew |
Smoking | No |
Annoying Product Placement | Yes | ||
Action In or After Credits | Yes |
Back in the 1970s, Disney produced lots of live action movies for kids. Two of these were Escape to Witch Mountain (1975) and Return from Witch Mountain (1978). Now Disney have decided to resurrect the franchise with this new film, Race to Witch Mountain. Once again, the story involves two kids with strange powers appearing suddenly and needing the help of someone with transport.
The film opens with a spaceship crash landing near Las Vegas which immediately grabs the interest of a government spook, Henry Burke (Ciaran Hinds) who sets off to control the situation and hopefully grab the occupants for research. Meanwhile, a taxi driver, Jack Bruno (Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson) is getting a hard time from his ex-employer's goons who want him to come back to work for the boss. When he leaves that altercation he finds that the back seat of his cab is occupied by two young blond teens who do not seem quite 'normal'. They ask him to take them out into the desert and provide a large wad of cash to pay for the trip. He becomes concerned that they are in trouble and need help, which they deny. It quickly becomes obvious to him that they are aliens with special powers. Sara (AnnaSophia Robb) is telepathic and can move things with her mind. Seth (Alexander Ludwig) can control his molecular density which allows him to go through obstacles or be unbreakable. Seth & Sara need to retrieve an experiment their parents started; avoid Henry Burke and an alien assassin sent to kill them and also retrieve their spaceship (which has been taken to the titular mountain) so they can return to save their planet. Obviously Jack, our hero, helps them out with the assistance of a scientist, Dr Alex Freedman (Carla Gugino). Cheech Marin appears in a small cameo.
This is a decent family film with good doses of action and excitement within a PG framework. There are some nice effects and mild humour. On the negative side, the story is quite clichéd and the kids have very little in the way of character development so they start to feel like background rather than foreground characters. Interestingly many of the deleted scenes included on the disc give more flesh to the bones of their characters. Dwayne Johnson is his usual amiable self and the film is quite focused on his character. Carla Gugino and the kids really don't have a lot to do but certainly don't embarrass themselves.
This is certainly not the worst family focused action film I have ever seen but really doesn't light my fire either. Worth a rent for your 8-15 year olds.
The feature is presented in a 2.40:1 aspect ratio which is the original aspect ratio or very close to it.
The picture was very sharp and clear. Shadow detail was also very good. There is some occasional minor MPEG artefacts such as at 62:00.
The colour was excellent, vibrant and well saturated.
There were no other obvious artefacts.
There are subtitles English, English for the Hearing Impaired and nine other European languages.
There is a layer change at 73:02 which causes a short pause.
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Shadow Detail | |
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Overall |
The audio quality is very good.
This DVD contains six audio options, an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack encoded at 384 Kb/s, the same in Czech, Russian, Hungarian & Ukrainian plus an English Audio Descriptive Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack encoded at 192 Kb/s.
Dialogue was easy to understand and clear throughout.
The music by Trevor Rabin is suitable but not overly memorable.
The surround speakers are used constantly especially during the action sequences for voices, explosions, music and lots of other stuff. Considering the limitations of a 384 Kb/s track this has a surprising amount of surround presence.
The subwoofer was used regularly for explosions and car crashes.
Dialogue | |
Audio Sync | |
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts | |
Surround Channel Use | |
Subwoofer | |
Overall |
The menu features motion and introduction and scenes from the film. This disc also features Fast Play allowing for the film to play automatically after language selection.
There are eight scenes here in total and there are introductions by the director, mostly explaining why they were cut. Some are extended version and there is also an alternate ending. As I mentioned above some of this stuff should have been retained in my opinion to flesh out the characters.
Better than most but that isn't saying much.
NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.
The Region 1 release is essentially the same as our local release although we have different language and subtitle options. Draw.
The video quality is very good.
The audio quality is very good.
The only extras are some deleted scenes and bloopers.
Video | |
Audio | |
Extras | |
Plot | |
Overall |
Review Equipment | |
DVD | Sony DVP-NS708H upscaling to 1080p, using HDMI output |
Display | LG Scarlet 42LG61YD 106cm Full HD LCD. Calibrated with Ultimate DVD Platinum. This display device is 16x9 capable. This display device has a maximum native resolution of 1080p. |
Audio Decoder | Built in to amplifier/receiver. Calibrated with Ultimate DVD Platinum. |
Amplification | Pioneer VSX-511 |
Speakers | Monitor Audio Bronze 2 (Front), Bronze Centre & Bronze FX (Rears) + Sony SAW2500M Subwoofer |