Flixmix: Ultimate Fights (2001)

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General		Extras
Category	Action	Main Menu Audio & Animation Featurette-Behind The Punches Notes-Fight Cards Audio Commentary-Tsui Hark Audio Commentary-Fightmaster Biographies-Cast & Crew Alternate Audio-Techno Party Mix Game-Name That Frame Programmable Track Selection-My Top 5 Theatrical Trailer-10 Trailer-Flixmix: Boogeymen Music Video-Control-Puddle Of Mud Informational Subtitles-Trivia Track DVD-ROM Extras
Rating
Year Of Production	2001
Running Time	49:52
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Various
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Jackie Chan Jet Li Jean-Claude Van Damme
Case	?
RPI	$19.95	Music	Various

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	Pan & Scan	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) English Audio Commentary Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) English Alternate Audio Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	None
16x9 Enhancement	No
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	Varies	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English English Audio Commentary English Audio Commentary	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    This DVD contains a collection of fight sequences taken from a number of movies. The movies are Legend of Drunken Master, Blade, Fist of Legend, Snatch, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Scarface, Crossing The Line, The Players Club, Gladiator, Time Cop, Dragon The Bruce Lee Story, They Live, Black Mask, First Blood, and The Killer.

    Each scene begins with a very brief text description of the participants, but there is no explanation of the context or reason for the fight. Watching this DVD was akin to watching one of those DVD samplers that have about 15 or 20 movie trailers on them. While it is marginally interesting, it never becomes an involving or satisfying experience.

Video

    The transfer quality was a little variable, but decent enough for a pan & scan release. Watching these clips, especially scenes taken from movies that I love, such as Gladiator, only proves what a complete abomination the pan & scan process is.

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.33:1, pan and scan, except for the scene from Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, which is presented letterboxed.

    The sharpness and shadow detail were reasonable.

    The colour was okay for the recent movies, but it was awful on some of the older ones, like Scarface, where the colour had suffered very badly with age.

    MPEG artefacts were never a great problem, but some scenes displayed some slight pixelization.

    Film-to-video artefacts appeared in the form of aliasing, such as the shimmer on the drain at 34:31.

    The number of film artefacts depended on the source material. The scene taken from First Blood displayed a variety of examples.

    Only English subtitles are offered, and they are accurate.

    This is a dual layered disc, but I did not spot a layer change.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There are five audio options on this DVD.

    Apart from the English Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track, there are also three Dolby Digital 2.0 surround-encoded tracks (two are for audio commentaries), and a Dolby Digital 2.0 music-only track.

    There's not a great deal of talking, but the dialogue quality and audio sync are okay on the default English Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track. There are some scenes which have been dubbed into English, and these obviously have audio sync problems.

    Each clip includes the original music from the movie, and the DVD's theme music is provided by Limp Bizkit's Break Stuff.

    The surround presence and activity is variable. While all the scenes are accompanied by a Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track, there has been no attempt to remix any of the scene's original sound into 5.1, if it was not so originally. In other words, some of the scenes still retain their mono or stereo audio.

    The subwoofer is utilised on occasion, and one of the better examples is the explosion of a block of ice at 32:40.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

    This DVD is jam-packed with extras.

Menu

    An animated menu, presented in an aspect ratio of 1.33:1, with PCM stereo audio.

Behind The Punches (9:52)

    Stuntman and fight choreographer James Lew explains how to stage a fight scene. There are also a few tips from Jean Claude Van Damme.

Fight Cards/Fight Master

   Text-based information about the various fighting styles featured in the DVD's content.

Fighter Profiles

    More text-based information.

Audio Commentary

    Martial Arts fight choreographer and director Tsui Hark provides a fairly flat commentary to accompany the scenes.

Ultimate Rumble Techno Mix

    Music-only audio option.

Name That Frame

    A game in which the viewer selects the name of the movie that a still was taken from.

My Top 5

    The viewer can select five scenes to be played in a row.

Theatrical Trailers

    Trailers for Legend of Drunken Master, Scarface, Crossing The Line, Gladiator, Time Cop, Dragon The Bruce Lee Story, They Live, Black Mask, First Blood, and The Killer.

Flixmix recommends

    Trailer for Boogeymen, and music video for Puddle of Mud's Control.

Flix Facts

    Text-based movie trivia and production notes that appear on-screen throughout the program.

DVD ROM features

    Games, sound effects and Internet links.

    This title was released on DVD in Region 1 in April 2002. The two versions appear to be the same, except that the R1 includes French and Spanish subtitles.

    This DVD's content is a collection of violent scenes, shown completely out of context. It seems clear from the special features that it has been aimed at the male viewer in his early teens. Considering that most of the movies included are R-Rated, probably because of the violence, I find this marketing to be a little unusual. The pan & scan butchery and overall cheesiness of the DVD make any of the movies included look a little cheapened by the experience.

    The video quality is decent enough for pan & scan.

    The audio quality ranges from reasonable to dreadful.

    The extras are plentiful.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall