Made for TV (and showing it, what with that jarring fade-to-black exactly 20 minutes in),this film tells the story of a group of men trapped together in a coal mine when they suddenly strike water and their claustrophobic environments floods. We cut back and forth between their struggle to survive, the struggle to reach them, and the experience of their wives and families. At times, what, precisely, is happening in the mine is a bit hard to follow, though the realism is quite strong.
Audio
Not very pretty. The music is okay, but could have more energy in the surround department.The music is so omnipresent that it tends to overwhelm the sound effects, but there are some good moments, as when the water rushes in. The dialogue, however, sounds atrocious. Distorted,rasping, buzzing, it sounds as if the actors were sending their lines in over radio transmissions.There are moments where the dialogue is almost incomprehensible.
Video
A fullscreen image, but it is unlikely that the film ever had any other format. The colours are good and the contrasts are solid. The all-important blacks are deep and grain-free. So the picture looks nice enough, even though it is hard to listen to.
Special Features
None, except for a Sports Night trailer that plays when the DVD loads. (It is not, however,accessible from the menu, at least as far as I could determine.)The menu’s main page is animated and scored, as are the transitions, and the secondary pages are scored.
Closing Thoughts
A stripped-to-the-bone disc with awful voice reproduction. The movie itself is pretty solid drama-in-real-life fare.
