DVD Review: The Ghost And The Darkness
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The Ghost And The Darkness
Paramount Home Video
2.20:1(?)/Dolby Digital 5.1/RSDL
Also:English Dolby Digital 2.0/French DD 2.0
Spanish Subtitles
English Captions
Michael Douglas's performance is fantastic in this adaptation of the true story of a couple of man-eating lions who terrorize a colony of workers who are building a railroad through Africa. "Ghost And The Darkness" is really not a great film, although strangely, it remains one of my favorites; it's a truely good, yet not great thriller and it's very entertaining, with a really fantastic performance by Michael Douglas as one of the two hunters(the other being Val Kilmer) on the tracks of the lions as they terrorize the base camp. "The Ghost And The Darkness" is a campy, fun thriller and although a lot of the critics hated the film and I don't remember it doing too terribly well at the box office, I definitely like the performances here as well as some of the goofier lines of dialogue. I liked the contrast between the clean-cut looking Val Kilmer and Douglas characters as well; it's not a great film, but it definitely succeeds in it's goal; to be a good, old-fashioned, epic thriller and to entertain.
The Disc:
Picture: After watching Paramount's "The Rainmaker" on DVD, I have a lot to say. I was very unhappy with Paramount's job on "The Rainmaker"; that disc had a lot of problems with shimmering and some pixelation. There are still things that Paramount is not doing right here. First off, this disc is not 16x9. Secondly, although I'll always perfer widescreen, the length of this film could have permitted the letterboxed version on one side of the disc and the pan/scan version on the other, so people could have the choice. I don't know why this disc had to be a Dual-Layer disc either, and there is definitely a noticeable layer change. Some of the darker scenes seem to be a bit grainy to my eye. There are good things here though; I was impressed with how good the outdoor, daylight scenes looked; the only problem is that I know that as good as the scenes looked, I think it's not the very best job that Paramount could have done; there is a little bit of shimmering, but it's not horrid, the picture is just a little too much on the sharp side. It's definitely not a flawless disc, but after watching Paramount's "The Rainmaker", I'm glad I'm not as unhappy with this disc as I was with that one. The layer change is at around 50:45 and you'll definitely notice it. Colors are very acceptable, but they don't seem as rich as the last time I viewed this film. (Added note: I do think that the film was spread across two layers to make it look it's best*I shouldn't say best, since I still think there's problems with the transfer*, but if they went to that level to make it look good, why not make it look 16x9 good?)
Sound: Very good. Sounds like gunfire and the lion's roaring are crisp and sharp; some of the sounds when the lions attack are kinda gross, though, but brought to life a little too well...ya know, when the lions are eating their victim. Kinda gross. I definitely love the score of the film and that sounds good here along with the various sounds of the jungle; you know, birds tweeting and the occasional lion growl. As always with Paramount discs, the sound defaults to 2 channel; you have to go into the menu to change it to 5.1
Menus: Weak. Another very basic menu from Paramount's DVDs.
Extras: The phenomenal trailer. Other than that, nothing.
Overall: If you liked the film like I did, I definitely recommend the disc. If you haven't seen it, I recommend checking it out as a rental first. It's not a badly done disc, actually. I would call it more along the lines of "average".
Languages:English/French(2.0)
Subtitles:English/Spanish
Region:1
Studio:Paramount
Running Time:109MIN
Dual Layer:Yes.
Rated:R
Ratings:
Film:A-
Picture:B
Audio:B+
Extras:D+
Menu:D-
Overall Rating:B