DVDFile

Image Entertainment / 2004 / 48 Minutes / G
Street Date: October 14, 2008

Do you, like me, think that the best parts of Top Gun are the aerial scenes? Then have I got a Blu-ray Disc for you. This short forty-eight minute film documents a periodically held exercise for combat pilots to give them the experiences that will help assure their survivability. We’re told that if a fighter pilot can survive his first ten aerial combats, the likelihood of his surviving future encounters goes up exponentially. Operation Red Flag pits pilots against pilots in the world’s most advanced high performance aircraft. I was intrigued by the international nature of the training. Aircraft and pilots from many of America’s allies participated. And the aerial scenes, shot in the IMAX format, are simply stunning.

We follow one particular participant closely, Captain John Stratton, as he’s challenged by much more experienced combat pilots. He flies his F-15 Strike Eagle, armed to the teeth with simulated weapons. High above the combat arena in Nevada orbits an AWAC; onboard, flight controllers track both sides using the aircraft’s sophisticated radar and the fighters’ transponders. It’s their responsibility to ensure that no midair collision occurs during the fog of simulated war.

Director Stephen Lawson managed to gain the cooperation of the military and we’re taken into briefing and debriefing sessions, and into the cockpits of the aircraft. What struck me was how business-like everyone is. I have to assume that the best fighter pilots are calm under pressure, using a blend of instinct and judgment honed by extensive training to survive and defeat the foe. There is little human drama; the drama comes from the exhilarating sights and sounds of these powerful and deadly aircraft pushed to their limits.

There are a number of missions (exercises) that have each of the two teams either on the offensive or the defensive. Computers keep track of virtual hits and pilots are instructed to return to base once they are declared dead. The object of the exercise is, of course, to survive and complete the mission. And as Captain Stratton loses his first match, going down in virtual flames, we can detect a calm but tangible resolve to be the victor in the next matches.

After several air-to-air combat scenarios, the aircraft are armed with live ordnance to attack targets set out in the desert. During that mission, ground-to-air missiles are the major threat. The school has a museum of potential ground threats to illustrate the risks. Infrared flare countermeasures are used extensively for heat-seeking guided missiles. I have to assume that the aircraft also have electronic countermeasures onboard for, let’s say, radar-seeking missiles.

Boeing sponsored the film, and the sights and sounds are a love letter to high performance flight.

The Video: How Does The Disc Look?

The film’s theatrical aspect ratio of 1.44:1 has been cropped above and below to fully fill the 1.78:1 high definition frame. The transfer was compressed with the VC-1 video CODEC and it looks better than it has any right to considering the algorithm and the modest bit rate that hovers around 18 Mbps. I was particularly taken with the details and color of the stark Nevada desert and the details revealed in the various aircraft aloft. Color rendition is impressive, from flesh tones to the exhaust flames of the powerful turbojet engines. Shadow detail in the few dark scenes is very good. Contrast and video dynamic range is also admirable. The grain is extremely fine and very subtle; the horizontally captured IMAX frames are huge, greatly reducing the visibility of grain on any reasonable sized screen. I didn’t notice any compression artifacts or halos.

The Audio: How Does The Disc Sound?

This Blu-ray Disc has two English tracks: lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and lossy Dolby Digital 5.1. It’s no contest. The DTS-HD Master track has a pleasingly wide dynamic range. Deep bass is present, capturing the roar of the powerful engines and the blasts of ordnance as exercise targets are destroyed. The surround channels are used extensively for pans as aircraft fly through the theater, across, front-to-back, and back-to-front. Enable EX for the absolutely best experience and the most stable soundfield. Dialog is distortion-free throughout and is heard with satisfying timbre that falls ever so short of in-the-room presence. There are voice directional cues within the front three channels. Nicely done.

The Supplements: What Goodies Are There?

The supplements are minor, but might intrigue. There is a Making-Of featurette that runs about ten minutes. Director Stephen Low explains how military cooperation only went so far; he had to stay out of the way and not influence the training and the exercises. He discusses the challenges of aerial filming, particularly with an IMAX camera in a cramped cockpit. Fully aware that he had to engage the audience, he devised the means to humanize what are really technical and tactical concepts.

There is a Film Trivia Quiz that asks eleven questions about details the viewer should have gleaned from the film. Rather trivial trivia, you shouldn’t have any trouble scoring a perfect score. However, there is no payoff, like a hidden featurette or easter egg.

There are a few text screens with information about the feature and the director.

And the disc offers trailers for other IMAX presentations all shown in 1.78:1 high definition: Coral Reef Adventure; Journey Into Amazing Caves; The Magic of Flight; The Living Sea; Mystery of the Nile; Greece: Secrets of the Past; Hurricane on the Bayou; The Alps; Dolphins; and Super Speedway.

Final Thoughts

This Blu-ray Disc is for military hardware junkies, high performance aircraft enthusiasts, and for those who love the illusion of flight in their home theaters. The BD offers a very good presentation and a few modest supplements.


Here’s a note about the apparent duplicate Buy Guide. Our I.T. people are still hard at work on a large project and have not yet had the time to modify the underlying site database formatting code to accommodate the new 0-to-10 rating scales. So until they do, for HD on disc, I’ll insert this note and a Buy Guide at the end of the review text and leave the conventional 0-to-5 Buy Guide blank.