Cobra (1986) |
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General | Extras | ||
Category | Action | None | |
Rating | |||
Year Of Production | 1986 | ||
Running Time | 83:28 | ||
RSDL / Flipper | No/No | Cast & Crew | |
Start Up | Programme | ||
Region Coding | 2,4 | Directed By | George P. Cosmatos |
Studio
Distributor |
Warner Home Video |
Starring |
Sylvester Stallone Brigitte Nielsen Reni Santoni |
Case | Amaray-Transparent | ||
RPI | $24.95 | Music | Sylvester Levay |
Video | Audio | ||
Pan & Scan/Full Frame | None |
English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) |
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Widescreen Aspect Ratio | 1.78:1 | ||
16x9 Enhancement |
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Video Format | 576i (PAL) | ||
Original Aspect Ratio | 1.85:1 | Miscellaneous | |
Jacket Pictures | No | ||
Subtitles |
English French Italian Dutch Arabic Spanish Portuguese German English for the Hearing Impaired Italian for the Hearing Impaired |
Smoking | No |
Annoying Product Placement | Yes | ||
Action In or After Credits | No |
Cobra is one of those movies that you either love or you hate. Personally, I liked it because there really is nothing to get too serious about in the film. Even the serial killer concept is played out merely as a device to load up the body count (Silence of the Lambs this isn't). The blood looks fake and the jokes are really lame, but then so is the acting.
Stallone plays the anti-hero good guy (naturally), Lt Marion Cobretti, a member of the police's "zombie" squad (who tackle the jobs that nobody else wants). His partner, played by Reni Santoni, is a wise-cracking junk food junkie. Called into a hostage drama at a supermarket, Cobretti takes out the miscreant and learns of the "New Order". A couple of nights later, "The Night Slasher" (aka Brian Thompson who also plays the Alien Bounty Hunter in the X-Files and is suitably cast for this role) is seen by Brigitte Nielsen as he takes out his 16th victim. Brigitte also passes for the "eye candy" in this movie. In order to protect his identity, the Slasher goes after Nielsen, backed by his army of "New Order" psychos. Guess who stands in his way...
George P. Cosmatos, who formerly teamed up with Stallone to make Rambo II, keeps this movie motoring along with a substantial body count and some good old smash-'em-up car chases that are entertaining, if not strictly believable. You never feel like the movie is overly long and there is enough action for any aficionados of the genre. Some of the one-liners are heavy "groan" material like (Bad Guy) "I'll blow this whole place up" (Stallone) "Go ahead, I don't shop here", but then it never claimed to be a Shakespearean drama either.
The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 and is 16x9 enhanced.
The sharpness varies widely during the movie. Outdoor shots look fine, but many indoor shots are fuzzy. There is a fair amount of grain in the transfer but fortunately it is not a distraction for the most part. Some low level noise is visible. Blacks are mostly solid, but shadow detail is poor with little fine detail visible making some scenes barely discernible.
The colour looks faded or washed out in many scenes. One review I read of this DVD suggested that there was some colour bleed but I found no evidence of this. The Pepsi sign above Stallone's apartment does exhibit a halo effect, but this is caused more by reflection than any bleed through. I could detect no evidence of edge enhancement, the general 'softness' of the print basically precluded this.
Film artefacts abound in this transfer. Moiré artefacts can be seen on the venetian blinds in the hospital at 42:15. There is an obvious missing frame at 26:06. There are myriads of little scratches and pieces of missing emulsion throughout the movie. Prime examples can be seen at 2:05 (large spots that look like dirt marks on the left of the screen) and 45:04 (black line down the middle of the picture). The opening credits are especially noteworthy for artefacts, since the red background during most of it highlights the blemishes enormously. There is also a noticeable shudder in the picture at 62:04-62:12 possibly caused by telecine wobble.
Subtitles were nicely placed at the top of the movie and very readable (they are white and much of the movie is shot at night or in dark places) and weren't obtrusive.
Sharpness | |
Shadow Detail | |
Colour | |
Grain/Pixelization | |
Film-To-Video Artefacts | |
Film Artefacts | |
Overall |
Apart from Stallone's tendency to mumble his words, the dialogue was clear and discernible at all times. Audio sync wasn't a problem. You may find the sound effects used throughout the movie very 70s'ish in timbre. Explosions had no real bass undertone to them, and gunshots sounded hollow and dubbed. One very audible pop can be heard at 11:35, but otherwise the soundtrack is nice and clean throughout.
Sylvester Levay, whose musical credits include Navy Seals, Invaders From Mars, and Howard The Duck has adapted the score well to suit the action. Often using nothing more than subtle bass underlays, his score adds to the dialogue rather than being a distraction. Several songs litter the audio 'landscape' including Suave by Miami Sound Machine and Loving On Borrowed Time by Gladys Knight and Bill Medley amongst others and are quite reasonably located.
The surround channels barely get used throughout the movie with the exception of some action scenes. At 44:40 you get some noticeable activity as cars scream around corners and again at 47:02 with the sound of explosions being clearly discernible, but otherwise they remained fairly dead.
The subwoofer, like the surrounds is again barely used and only when there was action on the screen. There are some nice throaty rumbles emanating from the subwoofer at 43:44 during the car chase scene, but unless you really cranked the sound up you'd be hard pressed to really 'feel' any major activity.
Dialogue | |
Audio Sync | |
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts | |
Surround Channel Use | |
Subwoofer | |
Overall |
NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.
Video | |
Audio | |
Extras | |
Plot | |
Overall |
Review Equipment | |
DVD | Loewe Xemix 5006DD, using RGB output |
Display | Loewe Xelos (81cm). Calibrated with Video Essentials. This display device is 16x9 capable. |
Audio Decoder | Built in to amplifier/receiver. Calibrated with Video Essentials. |
Amplification | Yamaha RXV-595a |
Speakers | JBL TLX16s Front Speakers, Polk Audio 3MIIs Rear Speakers, Polk Audio CS245 Centre Speaker, M&KV-75 Subwoofer |