|
|
|
Hunt vs Lauda: Grand Prix's Greatest Racing Rivals
R2 - United Kingdom - Delta Leisure Review written by and copyright: Samuel Scott (14th January 2014). |
|
The Film
 ***This is an A/V and extras review only. For reviews on the movie from various critics, we recommend visiting HERE.*** The victory duel for the 1976 Formula 1 World Championship has become the stuff of legend. The spectacular battle for supremacy that raged between Austrian Niki Lauda and ‘True Brit’ James Hunt has never been equalled and now this amazing story is told in a fascinating new documentary Hunt Vs Lauda: Grand Prix’s Greatest Racing Rivals. After almost burning to death in his car at the Nurburgring track, Lauda came back from the dead and fought Hunt all the way to the last race of the season…But this film is no simple tale of driver-versus-driver: both men had their demons, but the forces that threatened them most were bred from the insane circus that surrounded them.
Video
Independent British distributor Delta Leisure release the critically acclaimed BBC documentary "Hunt vs Lauda: Grand Prix's Greatest Racing Rivals" onto DVD in the original broadcast aspect ratio of 1.78:1 which has been anamorphically enhanced. The feature uses a lot of archive footage, so quality changes throughout, but this is not the fault of the presentation on the disc. The newly filmed interview footage looks above average, though there was a little aliasing every now and again, most notably on James Hunt's sisters' glasses. Detail in these segments is generally quite high, and colours - especially skin tones - appear to be accurate. The archive footage is made up of British broadcast footage from the Formula 1 races, and interviews, as well as what I believe is Austrian footage for some of Lauder's footage. The vast majority is from 1976, and isn't of the best quality, but it's certainly watchable. There are scratches throughout the archive footage, as well as quite a bit of dirt, but I doubt this footage was ever stored with much care. There are no real issues to complain about, and the transfer looks just how I remember the original broadcast looking. The disc is PAL and the feature runs 49:02.
Audio
Surprisingly, Delta Leisure have opted for an English/Austrian LPCM 2.0 Stereo track here, rather than the usual Dolby Digital track we would expect, and it sounds great. All dialogue is consistently clear and concise, including the dialogue from the archive footage, and for the most part, sounds clean. There is the occasional little crackle from the archive footage, but nothing worth worrying about. The sounds of the Formula One engines are aggressive, even without 5.1 surround (which would be overkill for this documentary), and although separation is minimal, it is present. So, the audio track might not be reference quality, or particularly thrilling, but it does the job at hand without problem. A solid track. English subtitles are available for non-English dialogue only, and are burnt-in.
Extras
Just a trailer (2:26).
Overall
|
|||||
|