(2013 Universal Release)
BOX-ART
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While I much prefer the original theatrical art used on most of the the other releases, Universal's original Blu-Ray uses a more modernized look for the cover. Renders of the cast are on the top, with each actors name and the films' title on a white bar underneath. At the bottom we have the ruined city under the title, with the Blu-Ray logo. The original artwork featured the title, made up of pieces of the city crumbling, which is used on Universals re-release, as well as Shout Factory's Blu-Ray.
The back features more renders of the characters, in a strip though the middle. A description of the film overlaid on top of more ruined cityscapes, is featured at the top. At bottom we get cast/crew info. along with the discs tech specs.
MENUS
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The main menu is...well, the usual Universal menu. Options are overlaid on top of clips from the film.
VIDEO
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The video looks great, a little over-sharpened, but still very good. Colors & contrast are nice and there's no noticeable compression or DNR artifacts. This film is quite grainy, which the sharpening makes look a bit worse by introducing some very minor haloing. From images I've seen of the Shout Factory release, it looks a bit better. Nothing major though, no sharpening, and a bit more neutral color grading. Early versions of the Shout disc had a cropping error that was later fixed matching the 2.35:1 framing seen on this version.
AUDIO
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Three tracks are included on the disc. A 5.1 DTS-HD MA remix at 24 bits, a 1.1 DTS mix being called the "original Sensurround mix," and a 5.1 DTS French dub.
From my research the film had three audio mixes, 1.0, 4.0, 6.0, with only the mono and 6 channel mixes being able to tac on the optional Sensurround. Therefor I would assume the 5.1 is a remix of the 6.0 mix (With the Sensurround?), while the 1.1 is the mono mix, with the .1 being the Sensurround.
I'd like to note that since Blu-Ray does not support a 1.1 configuration, the mix is in a 5.1 DTS container with the center channel being the "1" and the low frequency channel being the ".1."
EXTRAS
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The Universal versions have no extras at all, while the Shout Factory version has quite a lot such as an extended TV cut!
FINAL THOUGHTS
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N/A
TECH. SPECS.
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ASPECT RATIO: 2.35:1 (Original Widescreen)
VIDEO CODEC: AVC (31.6 MB/s)
NUMBER OF DISCS: 1
DISC SIZE: Dual-Layer
REGION CODE: A
SUBTITLES: English SDH, Spanish, French
RUN-TIME: 2 Hours 2 Minutes
AUDIO: English DTS-HD-MA 5.1 (Remix; 4.94 MB/s)
24 Bit English (Sensurround Mix) & French DTS 5.1 (768 KB/s)
