Ticker (2001)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Action	Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	2001
Running Time	88:07 (Case: 90)
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Albert Pyun
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Steven Seagal Dennis Hopper Tom Sizemore Ice T
Case	?
RPI	$34.95	Music	Serge Colbert

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	Unknown	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired Dutch	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Steven Seagal would have to be one of those actors that you either love or hate. Personally, I class myself as someone that finds enjoyment in his films and I enjoy watching him literally kick the living daylights out of the bad guys. Unfortunately, the action in this particular film rarely gets off the ground and quite often leaves you wondering why these actors are even starring in such a lame action show.

    The story is about Nettles (Tom Sizemore), an LAPD "vice" cop that is currently on probation. Nettles and his partner stumble on a plot to blow up several public places and his partner is killed by one of the bombs. Naturally, this upsets Nettles and he almost takes on a personal vendetta to hunt down the killers who are led by Swan (Dennis Hopper). The poor accents used by the killers are at least some form of entertainment as they change between American and Irish accents.

    The bomb squad team is led by Glass (Steven Seagal), who plays the cool cop with all the answers. He, together with Nettles, embarks on a crusade to bring the terrorists to justice. But will they succeed?

Video

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 and is 16x9 enhanced.

    This particular transfer is quite clear and sharp with quite a lot of detail present in every scene. The shadow detail is also good, with a large amount of detail revealed in the murky lighting of the night-time scenes. There is no detectable low level noise.

    The colours were deliberately drab, mainly because Hollywood cops never appear to wear anything other than grey or brown clothing. There were no irregularities with the colour rendition of this transfer - just don't expect any splashes of bright, primary colours, since there really aren't too many.

    There was only one MPEG artefact that was seen which occurred at 46:07. Aliasing is very rare and very mild when it does occur. Film artefacts were more common, but are small and not distracting at all.

    The English subtitles were close to the spoken word and contained Hearing Impaired prompts. I did not view the Dutch subtitles which are also included.

    This disc is a single layered, so there is no layer change.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There is only a single audio track on this DVD; English Dolby Digital 2.0, which of course is the track I listened to.

    The dialogue was clear and easy to understand at all times.

    At around 30:41, the audio was out of sync with the on-screen action. Other than that one particular section, there were no other sync problems with the transfer.

    The musical score by Serge Colbert was often as flat as the movie itself. Personally, I felt that more thought could have gone into picking more appropriate pieces to match the on-screen action scenes. The volume levels did not drown out the dialogue at any point during the movie.

    The surround channels were rarely used for ambience, music or for special effects. Keep in mind that this is a Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack, so the surround use was limited to an echo of the front speakers during explosions and for music. At 21:39, there was some good synergy between the surround use and the on-screen action. More sections like this would have make this audio easier to listen to, but most were too loud and unnatural like at 41:20.

    The subwoofer was rarely active but one good example can be heard at 50:25.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Menu

Theatrical Trailer

    Ticker was a movie that had Steven Seagal rarely using his martial arts prowess and personally I felt ripped off as a result. Average performances from the cast didn't help matters.

    The video quality was quite good and there were no real problems.

    The Dolby Digital 2.0 audio left the sound rather flat.

    If you have nothing better to do and want to run down to the video shop for a no-brainer type of movie, then this is worth considering.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall