- Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
- Video Codec: AVC/MPEG-4
- Resolution: 1080p/24 (23.976Hz)
- Audio Codec: English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Stereo
- Subtitles: English, English SDH, Spanish
- Region: A (Region-Locked)
- Rating: Not Rated
- Discs: 1 (1 x Blu-ray)
- Studio: Lionsgate
- Blu-ray Release Date: October 4, 2011
- List Price: $19.99
[amazon-product align=”right”]B005DCJ1A0[/amazon-product]
BestBuy.com
Purchase Dead Alive on Blu-ray at CD Universe
Shop for more Blu-ray titles at Amazon.com
Overall
[Rating:2.5/5]
The Film
[Rating:3/5]
Video Quality
[Rating:2/5]
Audio Quality
[Rating:3/5]
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:0/5]
Click thumbnails for high-resolution 1920X1080p screen captures
(Screen captures are lightly compressed with lossy JPEG thus are meant as a general representation of the content and do not fully reveal the capabilities of the Blu-ray format)
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The Film
[Rating:3/5]
What a difference a big budget makes! This early horror film for Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson is clearly in the B-Movie category with poor special effects, and a rather mundane story to boot. Still, for horror fans, it has a lot of the elements that they love – it is downright gory and at times grossly so. The story is of a Sumatran rat-monkey that is brought back to New Zealand and ends up biting Lionel Cosgrove’s Mum (Elizabeth Moody). The overbearing woman was spying on the mousy Lionel as he was having a date with the pretty Paquita (Diana Peñalver). Well, if she was overbearing before being bitten, she was absolutely treacherous afterwords. The bite was fatal, but it brought her back to life as a grotesque, zombie-like creature who goes on a killing spree. Lionel and Paquita must stop her somehow before she kills and infects everyone.
Video Quality
[Rating:2/5]
I’m sure the low production budget didn’t help the picture quality of this transfer at all, but I’m positive they could have done a lot better than this. The AVC transfer of Dead Alive looks like very little effort has been put into bringing it to Blu-ray. It is soft, swarming with grain, heavy with noise, and lacking in detail. The image looks flat, black levels vary from grey to lighter grey and source damage can be seen from start to finish.
Audio Quality
[Rating:3/5]
The soundtrack is a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Stereo mix that has a wide soundstage and good dynamic range with clean dialogue.
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:0/5]
The only thing provided here is the original theatrical trailer in 1.33:1 1080p.
The Definitive Word
Overall:
[Rating:2.5/5]
This is a classic creature feature that won’t be winning an Oscar anytime soon, but will fit right in to the horror marathons for the October festivities. Too bad it looks atrocious on Blu-ray, so I’d recommend renting this one if you are a horror fan.
Additional Screen Captures
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[amazon-product align=”right”]B005DCJ1A0[/amazon-product]
BestBuy.com
Purchase Dead Alive on Blu-ray at CD Universe
Shop for more Blu-ray titles at Amazon.com
Overall
[Rating:2.5/5]
The Film
[Rating:3/5]
Video Quality
[Rating:2/5]
Audio Quality
[Rating:3/5]
Supplemental Materials
[Rating:0/5]
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