XXX (Superbit)
August 2003 Reviewed by: Anthony Di Marco Format: DVD	(all ratings out of 5): Overall Enjoyment Picture Quality Packaged Extras Sound Quality

My first impression of XXX was a bad one. Technical issues made it one of the worst theatrical viewings I have attended. The print was badly scratched and washed out, while the audio sounded like an AM radio broadcast delivered at maximum volume. Badly written dialogue and obnoxiously loud rock music didn’t help. I wanted to walk out but my wife made me stay with the hope that things would get better. They did not.

A few months later I heard from a friend that the XXX DVD was one of the best he had seen. Given what I saw in the theater, I was skeptical, but being curious, I picked up the DVD to see for myself.

The second time proved to be a charm. The music was still annoying and Vin Diesel’s acting was as stiff as his six-pack abs. What had changed was the presentation. Images were clean and colorful and the sound was excellent. Although the film was still mediocre, its production values were very high. I guess when you fail to impress an audience with a solid story and characters, the next step is to shock them with spectacle! And Columbia Pictures proved this point. A few months after the initial DVD release, the studio upped the eye-candy ante by releasing a Superbit version of XXX.

This film opens with an eye-popping scene in a German techno club. A pretty-boy secret agent fails to outsmart the bad guys and sticks out like a sore thumb among a less-cultured generation of thrill seekers. While the older transfer of this scene exhibits a solid, well-balanced image, the Superbit transfer of the same scene is absolutely stunning. Flames, bright lights, and edge detail jump off the screen with a snap and clarity that approaches high definition. All the softness of the standard transfer is gone, and every element within the frame takes on three-dimensional quality. The crowd in the dance club is not a collection of people clumped together but distinct figures separated by clear outlines. Colors never look smeared; blacks display increased solidity and whites are never harsh.

It’s not surprising that the Superbit version has increased detail and less softness. MPEG compression creates artifacts in high-frequency information, which causes edges between elements in a frame to "ring." This ringing can also cause problems with transitions between colors. To compensate, the video is sent through a low-pass filter which smoothes out high frequencies and effectively softens edges and smears the boundaries between colors. By decreasing the amount of MPEG compression, Superbit allows more high-frequency information through, which in turn reduces artifacts and ultimately reduces the need to filter the video. As a result, colors are better delineated and highlights are preserved.

There is absolutely no difference between the Dolby Digital mix on the original XXX DVD and the Superbit version, but there are differences between the Dolby Digital and DTS mixes. The noise floor in the DTS mix is lower, which allows for a clearer presentation of the sound. High frequencies have more air and extension, and dialogue is up front and crisp. The avalanche scene is very impressive. Bass is clean and displays harmonic texture and presence. I could hear and feel the overtones in the waves of bass energy that supported the massive collapse of snow that followed Xander Cage down a mountainside. Explosions have more punch and greater range as well. The reduced noise floor of the DTS track allowed the zip of artillery to appear from a very black background.

So is Superbit for you? Well, that depends on a couple of things. Comparing the image on my 46" 16:9 Mitsubishi to the one on my 32" 4:3 Hitachi does show the increase in color information apparent on the Superbit version of XXX. However, the Hitachi’s screen size and its interlaced picture compromise the depth of field and image clarity. Superbit DVDs do not come in full-screen aspect ratios, so a considerable amount of horizontal resolution is lost when your DVD player scales a 16:9 frame on a 4:3 screen. The increased space required for the Superbit image data also crowds out any extras that may have made it onto the disc. For example, the various documentaries and director’s commentary on the original XXX DVD are absent on the Superbit version.

Forfeiting features is acceptable if you want to see the best possible picture, but in order to see the benefit of a Superbit DVD you need a properly calibrated and configured home-theater system with a large widescreen monitor. Otherwise, you are better off saving the five-dollar premium that most Superbit versions cost. Or, better yet, spend the money on some quality refreshments for the movie.

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