Review of Hunt For Red October, The

Introduction

Taken from the books of Tom Clancy this is the first movie outing for Jack Ryan (Alec Baldwin). Jack Ryan is an advisor to the CIA who is called upon to help when Russia`s latest top secret nuclear submarine is launched towards American waters. Equipped with a virtually silent propulsion system this signifies the biggest ever threat faced during the cold war. The sub is coammnded by Captain Marko Ramius (Sean Connery) but all is not as it seems when the sub goes missing and the entire Russian and American Navies are mobilised in the Hunt for Red October. Is the submarine in the hands of a madman intent on starting World War III?

I really like this film so was very pleased indeed when asked to review this disc, but would the disc live up to the quality of the movie?

Video

A classic film given pretty shoddy treatment on DVD, well at least in the picture department anyway. This is one of the worst pictures I`ve seen in a long time on DVD. The anamorphic widescreen presentation is grainy throughout and has numerous film artefacts all over the place. By artefacts I mean the little white sparkles and odd shape images such as small nicks and tears in the film itself. Dark areas are unclear and there is noticeable fuzzines on edges between areas of differing colour. This transfer is still better than the VHS but only marginally so. Disappointing in the extreme.

Audio

Unlike the picture this Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack is very effective. All channels are used to good effect with the LFE channel getting a good bit of work. It’s not quite up to the quality on other underwater discs such as The Abyss but it’s very good nonetheless. A remastered soundtrack would have been lovely though :).

The movie score (composed by Basil Poledouris) is very good also, being very militaristic in feel. You can here overtones of this score in his later effort on Starship Troopers.

Features

Erm, a trailer. Sigh.

Conclusion

This is a great film. The story is gripping and much more exciting than you would have thought bearing in mind that it`s set mainly on submarines. There are some excellent set action pieces and I seem to recall a movie reviwer calling it "Top Gun underwater" at the time of it`s theatrical release. Well it`s not quite that intense but it`s amazing what they can do with a submarine :).

Alec Baldwin plays the part of Jack Ryan pretty well but it`s odd going back to this movie after seeing the following Jack Ryan movies (Patriot Games & Clear and Present Danger). In these 2 movies the part of Jack Ryan is played by Harrison Ford and he makes the part his own. That said Alec Baldwin plays the part of a pretty much reluctant hero with enough enthusiasm to make it believable. It`s the Russian side of the movie that has the true star, and that is (of course) Sean Connery. As usual the guy`s presence is enough for him to carry off the role, he just fits in perfectly without saying a word so you know when he speaks it`s only going to get better. The supporting cast all do a great job as well and all come together to make this a great movie.

At the helm of this movie is Director John McTiernan (Die Hard) who does an excellent job of keeping the story and action watchable and more importantly enjoyable.

It’s such a shame that the picture is so poor on this DVD. It’s still a damn fine film regardless but this poor quality image does somewhat sour the experience for me.

A special edition DVD of this movie, remastered and packed with features, would be something to look forward too but looks extremely unlikely so we’ll have to put up with this one. If you loved the film you’ll still like the DVD but don’t expect a DVD to show off the format :(.