Cry Freedom (1987)

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General		Extras
Category	Drama	Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	1987
Running Time	151:10
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (90:16)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Richard Attenborough
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Kevin Kline Penelope Wilton Denzel Washington
Case	?
RPI	$19.95	Music	George Fenton Jonas Gwangwa

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.30:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired German Dutch Swedish Norwegian Danish Finnish	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Cry Freedom is the story of South African black activist Steve Biko (Denzel Washington) and the relationship he forms with liberal white South African newspaper editor Donald Woods (Kevin Kline). When we meet him, Biko has already been banned by the South African government which means he is not allowed to be in the same room with more than one other person outside his immediate family, nor is he allowed to write anything for either public or private consumption. Additionally, he is not allowed to leave his defined banning area. Initially, Woods is critical of Biko's views and actions in his newspaper but is persuaded to meet with him. Biko invites Woods to visit a black township to see the impoverished conditions under which 96% of South Africa's population live and to witness the effect of the government imposed restrictions which make up the apartheid system. Woods begins to agree with Biko's desire for a South Africa where blacks have the same opportunities and freedoms as those enjoyed by the white population. As Woods comes to understand Biko's point of view, a friendship develops between them.

    Cry Freedom was nominated for three Academy Awards in 1988, including a Best Actor in a Supporting Role nomination for Denzel Washington and two nominations for George Fenton and Jonas Gwangwa in the Best Music, Original Score and Best Music, Song categories.

    Both Denzel Washington and Kevin Kline, who is generally better known for light comedy roles, give very creditable performances in this movie. This is a compelling true story of events that occurred under the South African apartheid system in relatively recent history, and is based on Donald Wood's books Biko and Asking For Trouble. It's well worth a look.

Video

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 2.30:1 which is very close to its original theatrical ratio of 2.35:1. It is unfortunately not 16x9 enhanced.

    I watched this movie on my 16:9 ratio display in the 4:3 ratio rather than zooming the image to fill the display, which is my normal practice for watching non 16x9 enhanced transfers. I did this for two reasons, the first of which is that I found the image of this transfer to be unacceptably soft when zoomed. This is the reason why all widescreen transfers should be 16x9 enhanced, because then no matter what ratio display you use you can always get the best possible image. The second reason, which I'll elaborate on shortly, has to do with how the subtitles are displayed. The image is not overly sharp in either viewing mode but was acceptable when viewed on a 4:3 display. There is also some edge enhancement but this is neither frequent enough nor severe enough to be a distraction. Low level noise is not a problem in this transfer, nor is shadow detail.

    The transfer provides a rich full colour palette. Skin tones have a natural appearance.

    There are a variety of artefacts present in this transfer. Minor aliasing appears occasionally with the most noticeable example present on the fence at 32:16. There's also some moire which appears on the mesh screen at 5:01. As far as film artefacts are concerned, there are occasional small white or black marks throughout but these are not distracting. There is also a short-lived red streak at 28:25. However, the biggest problem with this transfer is the very noticeable and very distracting pixelization which occurs from time to time.

    There are seven subtitle options available on this disc. I sampled about 15 minutes of the English for the Hearing Impaired subtitles and found them to be completely accurate. The good news is that they are easy to read,  and use white text in the black bar at the bottom of the screen and so never interfere with the picture. The bad news is that if you have a native 16:9 aspect ratio display device and try to zoom the image to fill the screen, then the second line of the subtitles will disappear off the bottom of the display. It's also noteworthy that with the subtitles turned off they still appear when necessary to translate the infrequent African language dialogue.

    This disc is an RSDL disc, with the layer change placed between Chapters 9 and 10, at 90:16. The picture freezes as the Woods are walking on the beach and as such it is mildly disruptive to the flow of the film.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There are no audio problems to speak of in this transfer. This is a dialogue driven story with most of the work being done by the centre speaker so don't expect too much of a surround sound experience

    I listened to the English Dolby Digital 2.0 surround encoded audio track which is the only audio option on this disc.

    There were no problems understanding the dialogue which was always completely clear. I didn't discern any problems with audio sync.

    There isn't a lot of music in this film, however what is present is mainly African tribal music which definitely contributes to setting the appropriate mood. There's a good example of this towards the end of the movie at 77:08.

     For most of the running time of this movie, the surrounds are only used subtly to provide some ambience, and when required to support the musical score. There are, however, a number of occasions such as crowd scenes when they come alive and draw you into the action. The aforementioned scene provides a very good demonstration of this by positioning you amongst the crowd.

    The subwoofer never made its presence felt. If it was used to support the lower frequency components of the music score, then it did this with such subtlety that I couldn't detect it from my standard listening position.

    There is no LFE channel on this disc so if you want the subwoofer to operate you'll need to ensure your amplifier is set to redirect any low frequency audio to it. This is what I did in order to get the most of the limited bass audio that's present in this transfer.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    The extras on this disc are limited to a theatrical trailer.

Menu

    The menu is static and without any audio. It is displayed in an aspect ratio of 1.33:1 and is not 16x9 enhanced.

Theatrical Trailer

    This a pretty typical trailer and runs for 2:43. It is presented in a ratio of 1.33 and is not 16x9 enhanced. The audio is Dolby Digital 2.0 mono.

    The Region 4 version of this disc misses out on:

• Production notes, biographies, web link
• French Dolby Digital surround encoded audio track

    The Region 1 version of this disc misses out on:

• Nothing

    In my view there's no compelling reason to prefer one version over the other.

    Cry Freedom is an engrossing story about real people, made all the more interesting because it depicts events from recent history.

    The video quality suffers from a lack of 16x9 enhancement and noticeable pixelization.

    The audio quality is very good.

    If you consider a trailer to be an extra then there is one extra on this disc.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall