BLU-RAY REVIEW

Dukes Of Hazzard, The

Featured In Issue 112, September 2006

Picture4
Sound4
WSR Score3
Basic Information on new release titles is posted as soon as titles are announced. Once reviewed, additional data is added to the database.
(Studio/Distributor):
Warner Home Video
(Catalog Number):
80928
(MPAA Rating):
Unrated
(Rating Reason):
(Retail Price):
$28.99
(Disc Type):
Single Side, Dual Layer (HD-30)
(Widescreen Edition):
Yes
(Full Screen Edition):
No
(Running Time In Minutes):
107
(Color Type):
Color
(Chaptered/Scene Access):
Yes
(Closed Captioned):
Yes
(Regional Coding):
1
(Theatrical Year):
2005
(Theatrical Release):
Yes
(Direct-To-Video Release):
No
(Disc Release Date):
07/11/06
(THX® Digitally Mastered):
No
(Director):
Jay Chandrasekhar
(Screenplay/Written By):
(Story):
(Music):
(Director Of Photography):
(Production Designer):
(Visual Effects):
(Costume Designer):
(Editor):
(Supervising Sound Editors):
(Re-Recording Mixers):
(Executive Producers):
(Co-Producers):
(Producers):
(Academy Awards):
(Principal Photography):
(Theatrical Aspect Ratio):
(Measured Disc Aspect Ratio):
(Disc Soundtrack):
Dolby Digital+ 5.1
(Theatrical Sound):
(Theatrical Re-Issue Soundtrack):
(DTS Bit Rate):
(Dolby Digital Bit Rate):
(Additional Languages):
(French Language):
(Spanish Language):
(Chinese Language):
(Subtitles):
(Cantonese Language):
(Mandarin Language):
(Japanese Language):
(Italian Language):
(German Language):
(Portuguese Language):

The Dukes, cousins Luke (Knoxville) and Bo (Scott), put the pedal to the metal in their '69 Dodge Charger, The General Lee, while wreaking havoc in Hazzard county. With Daisy Duke (Simpson) struttin' her stuff in her short shorts and moonshiner Uncle Jesse (Nelson) along for the ride, they try to stay one step ahead of the corrupt commissioner (Reynolds) and Sheriff Coltrane (Gainey). Based on characters created by Gy Waldron. (Tricia Spears)

Before you can get to the main menu, you have some up-front, fast-forwardable information lauding the capabilities of the HD DVD format. And now on to the special features, which are more or less the same as the standard DVD, and include a five-minute wardrobe featurette on Daisy Dukes: The Short Short Shorts, and a five-minute featurette on the beloved car in the show, The General Lee Lives. How To Launch A Muscle Car 175 Feet In 4 Seconds is a five-minute behind-the-scenes look at flying car stunts, and there's also another behind-the-scenes featurette, the 15-minute The Hazards Of Dukes. Also included is Jessica Simpson's These Boots Are Made For Walking music video, 25 minutes of additional scenes, four minutes of unrated additional scenes, a five-minute blooper reel, and the theatrical trailer. Added for this HD DVD edition, you can spend 23 seconds with Jeremy Potts (from somewhere in Louisiana) who has a tattoo of the General Lee on his foot, plus two minutes of a night on the town with dummies Luke and Bo.

The 2.38:1 HD DVD picture is clean and bright, with richly saturated colors and deep blacks. Fleshtones are slightly on the reddish side. Images are sharp and detailed using the VC-1 codec, although there is a slight softness in some scenes, which can be noticed in grass fields that look more like green fields and faces that lose the realistic textures that the format is capable of delivering. The picture does look good, though, overall. (Danny Richelieu)

The Dolby® Digital Plus 5.1-channel soundtrack sounds much better than the DVD when it comes to dialogue and effect clarity, most likely attributable to the new codec used for encoding. The surround channels aren't used as often as they should be, making the soundstage feel very one-dimensional. While this is a definite improvement over the DVD, it is still not one of the greats. (Danny Richelieu)