Plot: What’s it about?
This movie is about two brothers, Stephen (Kurt Russell) and Brian (William Baldwin) that are firefighters in the city of Chicago. Their father was also a firefighter, but they lost him in the line of duty when they were just boys. Brian is the younger brother who has tried his luck at several different jobs, but just can’t seem to hold onto a steady one. Brian graduates from the academy and ends up in his brother’s department. The department continues to fight fires, but there are some coincedental blazes that keep on occuring, backdrafts. These are a type of fire that burn all of the oxygen in the room and they just wait for some fresh oxygen, someone opening a door, so they can explode. And in doing so they have a tendency to put themselves out as well. Brian is put on a task force with Donald (Robert De Niro) to solve the case and find out who is starting these fires. The trail runs up and they stumble upon a conspiracy of some sort.
This movie was directed by Ron Howard. The special effects in this movie are excellent. They really make you feel like you are there with the men fighting these fires. They must have had about 50 stunt men on had to do all of these stunts. Either that or the cast is pretty crazy. The cast is excellent and it also stars Scott Glenn, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Rebecca DeMornay and Donald Sutherland.
This is a very well made movie and I was a little teary eyed when I first saw this movie in the theater back in 1991. It is a good thing that the theaters are dark. (funnin) I highly recommend watchig this movie if you never have and shame on you if you haven’t. The acting is excellent and the movie is very entertaining. The action sequences are great and this DVD is the best way you can enjoy this movie at home. You should at least rent this one, but I recommend purchasing and you should be able find it on the internet for about $17.
Video: How does it look?
This is a very good looking letterboxed transfer of the movie. The bad thing is that it came out before Universal was 16×9 enhancing everything. You shouldn’t let that hinder you from watching it as it still looks great. A lot better than the laser disc version.
Audio: How does it sound?
The audio was remastered in 5.1 Dolby Digital and it sounds great. The fire is literally alive in this soundtrack as it flows around the screen. The subwoofer gets some work in the explosions and in the heavy fire scenes. You rear speaker also get some attention when the buildings are ablazed. You can almost feel the heat. (sorry for the bad pun) A first rate soundtrack here.
Supplements: What are the extras?
You get some pretty cool production notes and biographies of the cast and crew of the film.
