Visions Of England (Special Interest)
Picture: B-
Sound: C+ Extras: C- Main Program: B-
The WLIW digital High Definition series on lands and
history continues with Visions Of England (2003), the third release in
the series after installments on Italy and Greece, reviewed elsewhere on the
site. In one way, this is the least
exciting since we have seen England much more often than the other locations,
but on the other hand, these sky shots are unusual. They are also some of the first this critic has seen in HD of a
country he is used to looking at more often than most in the states.
Besides castles and churches, fountains, schools, theaters
and parks, we get industrial complexes and shipping that the female narrator
makes out to be as exotic as the historical locations traditionally associated
with the country like Stonehenge. These
moments are unintentionally funny.
Harrods and Piccadilly Square seem more in line with this, but for under
an hour, it is a good show. No pun
intended.
The anamorphically enhanced 16 X 9/1.78 X 1 image is the
best in the series so far by a slim margin, meaning that the best is being done
to capture as much of the digital HD detail as possible. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo has no
surrounds like previous volumes, but is just fine otherwise. The only extra is 19 extra minutes of
anamorphically enhanced footage that could not fit into the body of the show.
- Nicholas Sheffo
