Rocky

The story of Rocky Balboa, the street bum who was given a chance to turn his life around by fighting the world heavy weight champion in an exhibition tournament is well known. Well not to me. You see, I'd never seen this movie all the way through, nor Rocky II but like alot of sequel fans I'd seen III onwards a few times each.

So it was with great pleasure that I took a Saturday afternoon to thoroughly enjoy this movie. Without a doubt, it's a great story of determination against all odds. Yes, I did cry toward the end and deservedly so as the emotional pull just got stronger and stronger.

A pity this transfer didn't receive the treatment it needed. The original film stock was obviouslyin bad shape and it shows on the screen, with occasions whereby that old film dirt and noise rears its ugly head.

The disc cover incorrectly labels the transfer as 16:9 enhanced. It's not, it's the same transfer to come out of the US so don't expect any dramatic improvement.

Color is dull, shadow detail is lacking and the image looks a little soft at times. All in all though, something better than a dated VHS version.

Ok, the audio was a little improvement on the video. Although this is a 5.1 soundtrack, it wasn't originally a 5.1 movie so the only time you get any surround action is when the newly remastered Rocky theme is playing or the final fight is on and we get the ambient noise of the crowd.

At times dialogue is a little soft so you may need to crank up your center channel slightly. A little disappointing but I wasn't expecting a sonic extraveganza.

We get the original Rocky trailer in a very bad transfer. Not that trailers on other discs are superlative, but this is very bad stock indeed.

This is a great movie, I'm glad I saw it now. The video quality let's this disc down but I'd still buy it. I don't expect to see a new & improved version anytime soon so this will have to do and it's good enough for me.