Blu-ray Movie Reviews

The time is now. The place is aboard the U.S.S. Nimitz, America's mightiest nuclear-powered aircraft carrier on maneuvers in the Pacific Ocean. Suddenly, a freak electrical storm engulfs the ship and triggers the impossible: The Nimitz is hurtled back in time to December 6, 1941, mere hours before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. As the enemy fleet speeds towards Hawaii, the warship's Captain, a Defense Department expert, a maverick Air Wing Commander and a desperate Senator in the Roosevelt administration must choose between the unthinkable. Do they allow the Japanese to complete their murderous invasion or launch a massive counter-strike that will forever change the course of history?

It has been years since I’ve seen this rare classic. I grew up watching this one and always loved the photography for the aerial shots. The story is a basic time travel one but it brings up some interesting questions and I loved the production values, even if the time travel storm is a bit dated looking. If you haven’t seen this one before, it is a great military thriller.

I never caught this one on DVD but the Blu-ray looked considerably better than I was expecting. There is plenty of fine detail here and I was impressed with the level of depth the transfer serves up. The print is in excellent condition and although fine film grain looks a bit washed, fine detail is intact. Some of the stock footage looks a little rough around the edges but it never distracts from the overall presentation. If you’re a fan of the film you’re in for a treat.

While some studios are struggling to get one lossless mix onto their Blu-ray titles (ahem, Warner) Blue Underground has seen it fit to include both flavors with Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio mixes on deck. This is a dated presentation but it has held up pretty well. Dynamic range is average and the flight sequences don’t have quite the punch of Top Gun but they are still quite good. Dialogue is a bit thin but never boxed in and the main soundstage is reasonably open. Surrounds are used quite a bit but mainly for fillers. I wasn’t expecting too much from this mix but it delivered where it needed to.

Supplements include a feature commentary with the director of photography, an interview with one of the producers, a nice piece on the F-14 squadron from the film and the trailers.

It was great revisiting this old gem. Blue Underground has done a tremendous job with the A/V presentation and I would give this one a high recommendation for fans. If you haven’t seen it before, this is the perfect time for a look.