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| Starring: Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom, Eric Bana, Diane Kruger, Brian
Cox, Brendan Gleeson, Sean Bean, Peter O’Toole Directed by: Wolfgang Petersen |
Theatrical Release: 2005
HD DVD Release: 2006
Released by: Warner Home VideoDolby
TrueHD 5.1, Dolby Digital Plus 5.1
Widescreen |
I found myself liking this sword-and-sandal
epic far more than most critics did, and I stated that in my review of the regular DVD. It
has grand battle scenes, a fire that rivals that in Gone with the Wind, costumes
that look like real clothing, and wonderful performances from Brian Cox, Sean Bean, and
Peter O’Toole. The movie is true neither to history nor to The Iliad,
jettisons the Greek gods as participants, and has a totally miscast lead in Brad Pitt. It
seems as if he was merely added as window dressing to insure box-office sales. But if you
can get around those things, Troy provides a good two-plus hours of entertainment.
| Also True  Though Dolby TrueHD seems the only
way to go for future sound, there are, as I write this, only four discs in addition to Troy
that have it, none of them exactly first-rate films. But each is made more desirable by
the inclusion of Dolby TrueHD tracks.
Over an hour of The Perfect Storm (Warner 80939)
takes place at sea during the convergence of three storms. When I watched it with Dolby
Digital Plus tracks I was impressed with the clarity of the complicated, tumultuous mix.
The Dolby TrueHD tracks have even more detail and subtlety, thanks to increased frequency
and dynamic range.
Training Day (Warner 80945), the cop film that
starts well and ends preposterously, has lots of gunfire, helicopters, and chases. Dolby
TrueHD renders these magnificently. In regular Dolby Digital 5.1, when a helicopter is
flying from back to front, there can often be a gap in the sound. With Dolby TrueHD, the
transfer is seamless, the darn thing starting in the back, passing overhead, and then
ending in the front. Sound without speakers! Constantine (Warner 80927), with its
many explosions and hyperactive Foley effects, demonstrates that same seamless
back-to-front (and front-to-back) pan.
I thoroughly trounced The Phantom of the Opera in
its SD release, and my main complaint was the bad quality of the voices. In the HD DVD
release (Warner 80940), Dolby TrueHD reveals subtleties in the vocals that have changed my
entire opinion of the film. By the way, all Dolby- trued tracks seem to be at much lower
levels than the corresponding Dolby Digital Plus tracks, but Phantom is the most
extreme. You are going to have to crank it up about 20dB (no kidding), but once you do,
the results are splendid.
By the time this posts, there will be more HD DVDs out with
Dolby TrueHD tracks. Look for TrueHD tracks on Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, End
of Days, 12 Monkeys, The Thing (1982), The Interpreter, and The
Fast and the Furious, along with its two sequels. In November, watch out for King
Kong, Superman Returns, and many others. One odd thing: For Charlie and
the Chocolate Factory, only the music track is going to be TrueHD. And that
raises this question: since the new process provides such magnificent advanced-resolution
sound, why not try some audio-only releases in Dolby TrueHD? It might revolutionize audio
as it has video.
...Rad Bennett
radb@hometheatersound.com |
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This is the first big epic to come to HD DVD, so it has
been eagerly anticipated. Though far from perfect, it offers a lot. The picture is not as
sharp as I might have liked, but then neither was the regular DVD’s, so perhaps the
original photography is the problem. But the images have bright and rich colors and a
three-dimensional quality that the SD version simply doesn’t have. Intimate and dark
scenes look better than the grandiose outdoor ones. And although the picture is not
demonstration-class HD, it is very good and far superior to the SD.
In the sound department, Troy comes out a clear
winner. This is the first big epic to benefit from Dolby TrueHD, a lossless sound format
that supposedly gives one the sound of the original master. I can’t say enough good
things about TrueHD. It's like marrying the sound of a fine advanced-resolution
multichannel SACD to a movie. This benefits the music greatly. In this movie, James
Horner’s score sounds as good as any Mahler symphony recording. Not that the music is
as good as Mahler’s, but the sound is the sort we usually hear on the best classical
music recordings. The thuds of bass drum are solid as a rock and the upper strings are
sweet and natural, never strident. The brass instruments, which have a lot to do, are rich
and sonorous and there is actually a soundstage: the brass image behind the strings and
winds.
There are also lots of sound effects, mainly battle sounds.
These are remarkable. The regular Dolby Digital 5.1 track was very good at reproducing
active surround, but Dolby TrueHD is better, creating a wall of surround sound rather than
two localized points where the speakers are. Cries, arrows, and the clank of sword and
shield image all over the place in a very natural manner, and the sound is full 360
degrees. Sound even images to the sides.
All of the extras from the SD version have been carried
over to this HD DVD. In addition, there’s a special HD-only feature, another of
Warner’s excellent "in-movie experiences." When you activate it, director
Wolfgang Petersen, along with various actors and production crewmembers, appears in small
windows over the movie, which keeps running in real time. It is a video expansion of the
usual commentary track.
For many, Troy might well fill the bill as HD DVD
demo disc, and it is certainly an awesome introduction to the next audio standard: Dolby
TrueHD. |
