DragonHeart: New Beginning, A (1999) |
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DragonHeart: New Beginning, A (1999) |
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| General | Extras | ||
| Category | Fantasy |
Trailer-2 Web Links |
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| Rating |
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| Year Of Production | 1999 | ||
| Running Time | 80:32 | ||
| RSDL / Flipper | RSDL (57:50) | Cast & Crew | |
| Start Up | Language Select Then Menu | ||
| Region Coding | 2,4 | Directed By | Doug Lefler |
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Studio
Distributor |
 Universal Pictures Home Video |
Starring |
Chris Masterson Harry Van Gorkum Rona Figueroa Matt Hickey Henry O Tom Burke Ken Shorter John Woodnutt Robbie Benson |
| Case | Amaray-Transparent | ||
| RPI | $36.95 | Music | Mark McKenzie |
| Video | Audio | ||
| Pan & Scan/Full Frame | Full Screen, not known whether Pan & Scan or Full Frame |
English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) |
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| Widescreen Aspect Ratio | None | ||
| 16x9 Enhancement | No | ||
| Video Format | 576i (PAL) | ||
| Original Aspect Ratio | 1.33:1 | Miscellaneous | |
| Jacket Pictures | No | ||
| Subtitles |
English for the Hearing Impaired French German Dutch Spanish Italian Swedish Norwegian Danish |
Smoking | No |
| Annoying Product Placement | No | ||
| Action In or After Credits | No | ||
This movie is set many years after the original DragonHeart. There is one dragon left in the world; this dragon hatched from an egg found in the cave of Draco (the dragon in the original movie). I'm not letting out any secrets - all of this is revealed in a (somewhat irritating) narration over the opening credits. The dragon is kept in a cellar in a monastery, because of fear over a prophecy that the world will be doomed by a dragon's heart when a twin-tailed comet is in the sky. Also in the monastery is an orphan stable boy, called Geoff (on the cover), pronounced "Joff" (in the movie). Geoff is supposed to be the appealing plucky young lad who becomes a hero - I found him rather irritating, but I'm unsure if that was because of Chris Masterson's overacting, or the dreadful lines he was given.
Apart from the callow youth (Geoff) and naive dragon (Drake), the plot has some interesting ingredients: a villainous lord plotting to overthrow the king, a mysterious old man and youth from the Orient come to "test the dragon", an arrogant upper-class youth to confront Geoff, a wise old monk and a foolish young one... Shari Goodhartz stirs these ingredients together, and comes up with a run-of-the-mill plot with a few twists. I was amused to see that Patrick Read Johnson and Charles Edward Pogue are credited with creating the characters, while Shari Goodhartz is credited with the story. I won't give away any of the story, because the twists are one of the few things that make this movie worth seeing.
This is a "family" movie: no sex, no drugs, no adult themes, and only a bit of violence. I checked (twice) to see if it was a Disney effort - it felt like one.
The video is presented in standard 1.33:1, and is not 16x9 enhanced. As far as I can determine, this movie was made for TV, so this is understandable.
The picture is razor sharp, shows excellent shadow detail, and no noise. There is no edge enhancement to be seen. There are shots with dust dancing in the air that demonstrate how sharp the image is.
There is some grain to be seen in the image, such as a touch of grain in the opening scene, and again at 60:00 and 76:50. The grain is hardly noticeable, though.
The colours are good. At times it appeared that the colour of the film was a little muted in contrast to the colour of Drake, but that may have been an illusion.
There were no visible MPEG or film artefacts, except for one interesting effect. The credits rolling at the end of the film appear to ripple gently, due to an unfortunate interaction between the font size, pixel size, and roll rate. It is not hideous, but it is a bit distracting.
The disc is RSDL formatted, with the layer change at 57:50. It is placed at the start of a new scene, with no one visible, so it is not obvious - nice piece of work.
| Sharpness |  |
| Shadow Detail |  |
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| Grain/Pixelization | |
| Film-To-Video Artefacts | |
| Film Artefacts | |
| Overall | |
There are five soundtracks, all Dolby Digital 5.1, in English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish. I listened to the English soundtrack, but I sampled all of the others. I was a little confused at the start of the disc, which has a language menu which offers two additional language options: Dutch and Swedish. It turns out that choosing one of these presents a copyright notice in that language, then the menu (also in that language), but then they run the English soundtrack with appropriate subtitles.
Dialogue was clear and easily understood at all times, except for a word or two in the voice-over at the start and end of the movie. There were no sync problems.
The musical score was by Mark McKenzie, derived from the original DragonHeart theme by Randy Edelman. There was nothing particular wrong with the music, but it was quite forgettable. The song over the closing credits is sung by the female lead (Rona Figueroa) - she has quite a good voice for an actor.
Despite this being a 5.1 soundtrack, I don't believe I heard my surround speakers operating at all. The subwoofer was used to support the soundtrack, but quite unobtrusively.
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| Audio Sync | |
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| Surround Channel Use | |
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| Overall | |
NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.
The video quality is excellent, nearly reference quality.
The audio quality is very good, if a bit lacking in surround.
The extras are basic.
| Video | |
| Audio | |
| Extras |  |
| Plot | |
| Overall | |
| Review Equipment | |
| DVD | Pioneer DV-737, using Component output |
| Display | Sony VPL-VW10HT LCD Projector, ScreenTechnics matte white screen with a gain of 1.0 (280cm). Calibrated with Video Essentials. This display device is 16x9 capable. |
| Audio Decoder | Built in to amplifier/receiver. Calibrated with Video Essentials. |
| Amplification | Denon AVC-A1SE |
| Speakers | Front Left and Right: Krix Euphonix, Centre: Krix KDX-C Rears: Krix KDX-M, Subwoofer: Krix Seismix 5 |