Gone In 60 Seconds (2000/Blu-ray)
Picture: B Sound: B Extras: C- Film: D
How bad
is the remake of the 1974 cult car classic Gone
In 60 Seconds? Well, for starters,
it has one of the emptiest screenplays (by Scott Rosenberg) ever written for an
action or car film. Also, female lead
Angelina Jolie is in the film so briefly, I used to tell people that the title
referred to the full run of her screen time versus the performance of any of
the superexoticars. That leaves lead
Nicolas Cage with little else to do.
The film
is about cars being heisted for money and money being heisted with cars. Unfortunately, those cars tend to be the star
more than Cage in one of the biggest missteps of Producer Jerry Bruckheimer’s
career. Giovanni Ribisi (playing the
in-trouble brother of Cage’s character), Will Patton, Delroy Lindo and the
great Robert Duvall sadly finding a fast car film worse than Tony Scott’s Tm
Cruise vehicle Days Of Thunder to
appear in round out the known cast members.
So, does it make a good demo?
The 1080p
2.35 X 1 digital High Definition image was shot in Super 35mm film by
cinematographer Paul Cameron, but it is nothing special, though the odd thing
is that the cars look better than the people for whatever reason. This transfer is better than the DVD, but
there is nothing really memorable about the shooting here and you can see these
cars looking good in other stills, plus video and film footage. Digital tampering has made some color funny
and some definition blurry. The PCM 5.1 24bit/48kHz
mix is better than the standard Dolby Digital 5.1 mix, which has its moments
with bass and has one of composer Trevor Rabin’s lesser music scores. The combination is HD-worthy and as good as
any of the HD-DVDs from the overrated Fast
& Furious trilogy, but all four combined have nothing on the HD-DVD for
John Frankenheimer’s Grand Prix (all
reviewed elsewhere on this site) if you want real car excitement. It has a better director, better editing,
better script and the best picture we have seen in either format to date.
Extras
include highlights via a function exclusive to Blu-ray and an HD featurette
focusing on one of the action sequences, but that is all that could fit. That is probably for the best.
- Nicholas Sheffo
