...the first DVD to utilize the medium's full potential--over six hours of material on a single dual-layered, dual-sided disc.
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In reviewer Ronald Thomson's DVDTown critique of the previous release of "Terminator 2: Judgment Day," he called it "a landmark film in special effects development." True, and Artisan's "Ultimate Edition DVD" establishes yet another benchmark, the first DVD to utilize the medium's full potential--over six hours of material on a single dual-layered, dual-sided disc. It's what director James Cameron was said to have wanted with "Titanic." Now, he gets his way. The disc contains two versions of the movie, the primary theatrical release and a special, extended version, plus over forty special features. I'm not entirely sure I agree with Ronald's assessment of the film's having an entertainment value of 10, but I'm willing to concede the point in its "Ultimate Edition" trappings. I certainly concur with everything else Ronald said, especially that "Terminator 2" belongs in any sci-fi collection. Now, before I comment on the special bonus items, here's more of what Ronald said about the movie itself.
"The first terminator failed to change history. It's up to a second terminator to terminate John Conner in his youth years after the attempt to kill his mother. Granted, just another cyborg won't do. The terminator sent back to change history has the ability to emulate any non-mechanical object it comes in contact with, but Arnold Schwarzenegger is up to the task of saving the world, even against an indestructible, morphing adversary in this terminator-on-terminator battle.
Thanks to the marvels of time travel, John Conner was raised believing that the world would be devastated and he would lead the rebellion against the machines. His mother, however, was committed for being delusional. After all, how could machines take over the world? Now, two terminators show up, and he realizes that his mother was right."
Video & Audio:
The audio and video for the movie are fine. Definitely high quality. The sound and anamorphic picture are THX certified, but more important, the detail in sound staging is excellent. For instance, in one of the opening scenes, a motorcycle drives by on the road, and the audio definitely tracks with the location of the bike, even though it's a simple background noise. Amazing battles, fights, explosions, gun shots, and chase scenes leave the viewer enjoying the movie, not just admiring its technical perfection. The picture is slightly light, overall, and perhaps a tad soft. I would have liked a greater color depth.
More from Thomson: "'T2' is not perfect, the acting leaving much to be desired. But then, so is the acting in "Star Wars" imperfect. In both cases, however, the acting does not detract from the movies' overall effectiveness, presentation, or entertainment value."
Extras:
Thanks, Ronald, now let's hit those new bonus features, starting with side one, which is labeled "Side A" in print so small you have to hold it to the light and squint to read it. This is the main side, and the first thing you'll notice when it starts up is the snazzy new interface. The animated menu design looks like the inside of a robotics factory for terminator cyborgs. However, while it's beautiful to look at, it presents some problems getting around. A warning comes with the package (which is housed, by the way, in a handsome brushed-aluminum casing) stating that "due to the advanced features utilized in the creation of this DVD, some players may experience minor navigational difficulties." My Sony 7700 player had no technical difficulty navigating the menus, but I had trouble finding everything I needed to. Some of the directional arrows are so dark and so tiny, they can be hard to spot, and they are often not located with the rest of the items on a screen. It also took me a moment to locate the THX tests advertised on the box. They're in the audio section and indicated by a little "THX" sign on the skeletal metal head to the left of the main audio choices. Once you find these tests, though, which are about the same as those found on the "Fight Club" DVD and basically duplicate the tests on most standard DVD setup discs like "Video Essentials," you'll find them handy to use. They include checks for color calibration, brightness, convergence, channel balance, channel-phase polarity, subwoofer integration, and other such criteria for optimizing a home theater.
Now, you're almost ready to choose which version of the movie you want to watch. The first is the regular theatrical release at 136 minutes; the other is the special edition with sixteen minutes of additional material. Some of this extra stuff is in bits and pieces scattered about; and some of it is contained in completely new scenes, raising the chapter index to an astounding eighty selections, maybe a record of its kind, an index point for about every two minutes of screen time! If you have already seen the film, and who hasn't, I advise watching the special edition; it's one of the few instances where the added material makes sense and isn't just included as a gimmick. But the chapter selections menu is no longer animated as it was in the previous disc. I suppose some things had to go, and it's a miracle the engineers were able to cram as much as they did on both sides of one disc. Anyway, the side also contains four different audio tracks: one in Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround EX, another in DTS 5.1 ES, a third in Dolby Surround 2.0, and a final one featuring commentary by members of the cast and crew. English is the only spoken language option, but subtitles are provided in English for the hearing impaired. There are also extensive cast and crew biographies and filmographies, plus some DVD-ROM items. The keep case claims that the film was newly remastered in THX, but as far as I could tell in comparing it to its prior DVD incarnation, the picture and sound quality appear the same, with the anamorphic screen ratio an identical 2.17:1. Perhaps Artisan meant that the film was newly remastered for DVD previously. In any case, the picture and sound are still as good as could be hoped for and deserving of the highest rating that could be assigned them.
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[release]5100[/release]