4K ULTRA HD REVIEW / HDR SCREENSHOTS
Sylvester Stallone stars as disgraced former NYC Emergency Medical Services Chief Kit Latura, trying to save Holland Tunnel patrol officer George Tyree, played by character actor Stan Shaw. A fireball consumes the tunnel from an explosion of hazardous chemicals.
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“DAYLIGHT”
4K Ultra HD & Blu-ray; 1996; PG-13 for disaster-related peril, death, and destruction
Best extra: Commentary with director Rob Cohen
THE 1970s were seemingly the decade of the Hollywood disaster movie: “Airport” (1970), “The Andromeda Strain” (1971), “The Poseidon Adventure” (1972), “The Towering Inferno” and “Earthquake” (1974), “The Swarm” (1978), and “Meteor” (1979).
However, during the ‘90s, the genre experienced a major resurgence. Topping the list was James Cameron’s $1 billion-plus blockbuster “Titanic” (1997), which dominated the Oscars with 11 wins, and Jan de Bont’s storm-chasing adventure “Twister” (1996), starring Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt.
Then, Roland Emmerich’s alien invasion “Independence Day” (1996), which made Will Smith a superstar; Ron Howard’s true-to-life space accident “Apollo 13” (1995), “Houston we have a problem.” In 1997, two volcano explosions “Volcano” and “Dante’s Peak,” and the next year, two Doomsday comets in “Armageddon” and “Deep Impact.”
In 1996, director Rob Cohen (“The Fast and the Furious”) decided to helm his high-octane disaster “Daylight” starring Sylvester Stallone, Amy Brenneman, Viggo Mortensen, Stan Shaw, Dan Hedaya, and Vanessa Bell Calloway.
(1) The hazardous chemicals are prepared to be loaded onto three trucks. (2) The 1.25-mile Holland Tunnel was completed in 1927 and runs under the Hudson River, connecting Hudson Square and Lower Manhattan. (3) Director Rob Cohen used a miniature helicopter - years before drones were available - to capture this shot in the tunnel. (4) Tunnel patrol officer George Tyree communicates with tunnel operation dispatcher Grace Calloway (Vanessa Bell Calloway).
Several truckloads of hazardous chemicals exploded inside the 1.25-mile Holland Tunnel under the Hudson River, killing dozens of people. Former NYC Emergency Medical Services Chief, Kit Latura, now a limo driver, played by Stallone, just happens to be entering the tunnel when the fireball consumes the north tunnel heading toward New Jersey. You guessed it: he walks out alive and offers to enter the tunnel, facing impossible odds to save any survivors.
EXTRAS
The enclosed Blu-ray houses the original 33-minute “Making of” featurette (1998) with cast and crew interviews. At the time, Stallone felt that “Daylight” was more of a psychological adventure – “the elements of nature working against the indomitable spirit of the survivors.”
The director himself had been a survivor of the deadly 1979 Copley Plaza Hotel fire in Boston. When he first read the script at his ranch near Lake Tahoe, he had a horrifying flashback of firefighters rescuing him from the hotel’s sixth-floor window. “The window exploded, and all I remember, he [firefighter] threw himself over me.” ‘Daylight’ became Cohen’s payback, “to the men and women who …risk their lives in these horrible disasters,” he said.
(1) Amy Brenneman plays inspiring playwright Madelyne Thompson. (2-4) Left, director Rob Cohen in a cameo role as an advertising executive, during a marketing campaign meeting with adventure gear executive Roy Nord, played by Viggo Mortensen.
Cohen sold the movie to Stallone as a worthy successor to his performance in the action-thriller “Cliffhanger” (1993), which dealt with heights. This time, it's “claustrophobia and the fear of drowning,” he told Stallone. “You’re not a life taker, but a lifesaver, and if that sounds intriguing, read it.”
Stallone initially had a list of excuses: I hate being wet, working in darkness, and small spaces. “I’m claustrophobic,” he told the director. But, Cohen reminded him, the reason he took the role in Cliffhanger was to conquer his fear of heights. “Here are a whole new bunch of your fears to conquer,” he told Stallone
The director’s commentary track is chock-full of behind-the-scenes stories and details of the Italian production. 90 percent of the film was captured at Rome’s famed Cinecittà Studio (“Ben-Hur,” “Cleopatra,” “U-571” “The Adventures of Baron Munchausen”) where they constructed the entrance and the interior of the Holland Tunnel.
He also details how “Daylight” was based on a 1949 explosion inside the Holland Tunnel. Writer Leslie Bohem discovered the incident while breezing through old copies of Life Magazine. A truck carrying 55 drums of hazardous chemicals lost one drum onto the roadway, and it ignited, causing a massive fire that burned for hours. Surprisingly, no deaths were reported, but 66 injuries and 600 feet of the tunnel's white-tiled interior were destroyed.
VIDEO
Universal and Kino Lorber scanned the original 35mm camera negative (1.85:1 aspect ratio) in 4K; the result is quite good. The 4K has plenty of natural film grain; the Blu-ray was also sourced from the new 4K master. The clarity is very good in facial close-ups and wide shots from Australian cinematographer David Eggby (“Mad Max,” “Pitch Black”).
There are shortcomings during composite effects shots, which lowered the resolution – especially the finale of Stallone and Brenneman in the Hudson River. It also suffers from weird color timing as the two actors bob in an obvious water tank, with separate footage of the Manhattan skyline in the background. My 11-year-old son and I saw the same color issue during its original theatrical run in December 1996.
Everything was encoded onto a 100 GB disc and varies from 50 Megabits per second to over 90 Mbps. The HDR10 and Dolby Vision grading provides a natural color balance with controlled facial toning and highlights compared to the 1080p disc.
(1&2) Limo/taxi driver Kit Latura picks up a couple at a Manhattan hotel and prepares to take them through the Holland Tunnel. (3&4) A crazed driver races into the tunnel after robbing a jeweler and crashes into the trucks, causing the inferno. A miniature tunnel and cars were used for this practical effects shot. (5) Latura quickly jumped into the rescue efforts.
AUDIO
The deep bass response from the six-channel DTS-HD soundtrack during the explosion and tunnel collapsing will not disappoint subwoofer lovers. Since its early physical media days on DVD, “Daylight” has had one of the best bass tracks. At times, the dialogue seems to get lost, so pumping up the overall level only increased the bass response. Randy Edelman’s score is one of his weaker offerings, compared to his classics “DragonHeart” (1996) and “The Last of the Mohicans” (1992).
“Daylight” is a welcome addition to the growing ‘90s disaster filmography on 4K Ultra HD. In May, the same team at Kino Lorber/Universal has scheduled Roger Donaldson’s “Dante’s Peak” from a new 4K master, starring Pierce Brosnan and Linda Hamilton.
— Bill Kelley III, High-Def Watch producer
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