Sudden Death

BUY

General		Extras
Category	Action	Theatrical Trailer(s)	Yes, 1 - 1.78:1 non-16x9, Dolby Digital 2.0
Rating		Other Trailer(s)	None
Year Released	1995	Commentary Tracks	None
Running Time	105:30 minutes	Other Extras	Production Notes Cast & Crew Biographies
RSDL/Flipper	RSDL (56:27)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Movie
Region	2,4	Director	Peter Hyams
Studio Distributor	Columbia Tristar	Starring	Jean-Claude Van Damme Powers Boothe Raymond J. Barry Dorian Harewood
Case	Transparent Amaray
RRP	$34.95	Music	John Debney

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	MPEG	None
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Dolby Digital	5.1
16x9 Enhancement	Yes	Soundtrack Languages Region 4	English (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384Kb/s)
		Soundtrack Languages Region 2	English (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384Kb/s) German (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384Kb/s) French (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384Kb/s) Italian (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384Kb/s) Spanish (Dolby Digital 5.1, 384Kb/s) Czech (Dolby Digital 2.0 , 192Kb/s) Polish (Dolby Digital 1.0, 96Kb/s)
Theatrical Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Macrovision	Yes	Smoking	Yes
Subtitles Region 4	English for the Hearing Impaired	Annoying Product Placement	Yes
Subtitles Region 2	English for the Hearing Impaired French Portuguese Danish Finnish Swedish Norwegian German Dutch	Action In or After Credits	No

    This is a strictly-by-the-numbers, cliché-ridden Van Damme vehicle. JCVD plays Darren, an ex-fireman who takes his ex-wife's kids to the ice hockey. Unfortunately, a VERY BAD GUY (Powers Boothe) is there, too. We can tell that he is the VERY BAD GUY because he dresses smartly, wears an expensive watch, speaks politely, and shoots people for no reason at all. This particular VERY BAD GUY wants money, and lots of it or otherwise he kills hostages. He has wired the ice hockey stadium with bombs which will be exploded if his demands are not met. Somehow or other, through an AMAZING COINCIDENCE, JCVD's daughter ends up a hostage as well.

    Let's see if you can guess the rest of the plot; JCVD gets really really mad, JCVD kills various underlings working his way up to the VERY BAD GUY, JCVD faces off against the VERY BAD GUY.

    One thing I just have to say is that I believe that this film holds the record for the longest amount of time spent at the start of a movie before JCVD gets into his kick-boxing routine; a whole 36 minutes goes by without a kick in sight.

Video

    The transfer is presented at an aspect ratio of 2.35:1. It is 16x9 enhanced.

    The transfer was generally quite sharp, however a lot of the movie is shot in very low lighting conditions. Shadow detail, unfortunately, in these scenes was severely lacking. Far too many shots depicted large areas of blackness with no detail whatsoever apparent. Low level noise was not a problem.

    The colours were variably rendered, from the limited colouration of the darker scenes, to the truly vibrant colouration of the ice hockey action.

    There were no MPEG artefacts seen. Film to video artefacts consisted of considerably more aliasing than I am used to seeing in contemporary transfers. This was another disappointing aspect of this transfer. Film artefacts were few and far between.

    Subtitles can be selected via the remote control, and all subtitles are available via the remote, no matter what Region the DVD player is set to. The subtitle menu, however, is dependent on which Region the DVD player is set to.

    This disc is an RSDL disc, with the layer change placed during Chapter 22, at 56:27. The layer change is well placed and minimally intrusive.

Audio

    There are seven audio tracks on this DVD; English Dolby Digital 5.1, German Dolby Digital 5.1, French Dolby Digital 5.1, Italian Dolby Digital 5.1, Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1, Czech Dolby Digital 2.0 surround-encoded, and Polish Dolby Digital 1.0. I listened to the default English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack.

    Dialogue was always clear and easy to understand.

    There were no audio sync problems with this disc.

    The score by John Debney is marginally above average for an action score, with the music appropriately underscoring the on-screen action.

    The surround channels were aggressively used to support the action sequences, with music and special effects being aggressively placed in the surround channels.

    The .1 channel was aggressively but very unevenly used to support the action sequences. At times, the .1 channel would be overbearing and draw attention to itself, and at other times, it would lend no support whatsoever to the on-screen action. This would often occur during a single sequence so some parts of the sequence were overly accentuated and other parts of the sequence were lacking in punch. A number of scenes with the helicopter fall into this category. The nett result is that the subwoofer kept calling attention to itself because it was either too loud or too soft.

Menu

Production Notes

Cast & Crew Biographies

Theatrical Trailer

    The video quality is disappointing, but I suspect that this is more a source problem than a transfer problem.

    The audio quality is variably enveloping, with a very uneven .1 channel.

    The extras are passable.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall

© Michael Demtschyna
9th November 1999