Starring: Viggo Mortensen, Omar Sharif, Said Taghmaoui
Director: Joe Johnston
Studio: Disney/Buena Vista
Video: 2.40:1 anamorphic/enhanced for 16:9, color, 1080p HD
Audio: English PCM uncompressed 5.1, English, French & Spanish DD 5.1
Extras: Featurettes, Trailers
Subtitles: English, French, Spanish
Length: 136 minutes
Rating: ****
Hidalgo is based on the true story of famed long-distance race champion Frank Hopkins and his legendary mustang Hidalgo. Hopkins and Hidalgo won more than 400 races over a period that spanned the late 1800s and early 1900s, and in the process bettered many horses and riders with much loftier pedigrees. This excellent film is loosely based on the pair’s entry into the grueling 3000-mile “race of fire” across the Arabian desert. As the film progresses, we learn that Hopkins, a former cowboy and pony-express messenger, is part native-American, and was the courier that conveyed the orders that resulted in the massacre of the Sioux at Wounded Knee. His guilt over that experience is overwhelming, and to make matters worse, he takes a job with Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show, where one of the featured attractions is a re-enactment of Wounded Knee – though told from a perspective much more flattering to the U.S. military. Hopkins medicates his anguish with copious amounts of whisky; however, when offered the chance to participate in the “race of fire,” he pulls himself up by his bootstraps, and over the course of the race not only finds himself, but also an opportunity for redemption. The story is told in the style of classic adventure films from a bygone era, and whether or not the storytellers stray somewhat from the facts (there’s a good deal of debate as to whether the “race of fire” even actually ever took place), the film still spins a good yarn, and makes for a compelling watch.
This Buena Vista Blu-ray disc is very close to reference quality. I recently saw a televised high-def broadcast of this movie, and from a video standpoint, the Blu-ray disc bettered that presentation in every aspect, with a much more vibrant color palette and excellent rendering of detail. The uncompressed 5.1 PCM soundtrack is magnificent, and provides ample opportunity for your system to shine; during the many race scenes, I often felt that I was about to be trampled by the thunderous hoofbeats of the horses! I just can’t say enough about how much more impressive these uncompressed audio tracks sound compared to their standard Dolby counterparts. [I second that!…Ed.]
I do have a couple of caveats, and they’re the only things keeping me from giving this film five stars. This disc is a 50 GB, dual layer BD, and while I fully understand that Blu-ray is still essentially in its infancy, the load times for this film are excessive. I’m willing to endure lengthy load times – for me, it’s a no-brainer, especially in light of Blu-ray’s obvious advantages over standard DVD, but let’s really hope that newer-generation hardware can more effectively deal with these massive discs. [Me too!…Ed.]
My second complaint is the more egregious of the two. At many points throughout this film, a number of non-English languages are spoken, and there’s no option that presents any subtitle text for the spoken Sioux and Arabic (among others) other than the full-blown subtitles. I’m not really a subtitle kind of guy, unless of course, it’s a foreign language film, and there are countless examples of films that offer subtitled text for the non-English portions of films, without subjecting us to over-the-top descriptions of the onscreen action. It was impossible to follow the story completely without the subtitles on, and a great distraction to watch the movie with them on!
I still give this disc a hearty recommendation; not only was the film a true visual spectacle, the acting was also superb (Viggo Mortensen is great in anything I’ve ever seen him in), and the disc’s many positives more than make up for its shortcomings.
— Tom Gibbs
