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Time and Tide
List Price: Unknown [Buy now and save at Amazon]
The Movie:
"Time and Tide" is the return of famed martial arts director Tsui Hark to Hong Kong filmmaking after two dissapointing American releases ("Double Take" and "Knock Off", both with Jean Claude Van Damme). To describe "Time"'s plot would be rather futile, since it goes so quickly from place to place and from character to character (not to mention sub-plot to sub-plot) that the film becomes more of a visual experience, a 113 minute epic of action and beautiful cinematography. We connect to the characters enough to desire to follow them on the various journeys, but character development is rather minor.
The main character is Tyler (Nicholas Tse), a bartender who meets up with a lesbian police offer (Cathy Chu) after she's been dumped. The two have a one-night stand and she winds up pregnant. To help matters, Tyler gets a job as a rookie bodyguard with an unlicensed company. Enter Jack (Wu Bai), a former mercinary who also has a pregnant wife as well as a former gang that has come to see him to discuss business. That's about all that I understood.
The most remarable and impressive element of "Time and Tide" - and the reason to watch it, as well - are action scenes that are better choreographed than any I've seen in recent memory; scenes like a criminal grabbing a fire hose and scaling down a parking garage are the kind of moments that "Time and Tide" has more than it's share of. People seemed to be constantly jumping out of windows (with the camera jumping out after them), running down hallways, popping out from behind doors, etc. The camera often moves with amazing speed as the director also throws in some incredible visual tricks as well as beautiful use of color with all of the zooms. Hark also knows how to use sound wonderfully as well, with a minimum of sound or even silence before the surrounds fire up from both sides.
"Time and Tide" does not offer a particularly solid story - in fact, it lost me a few times - but it does provide enough character development to go on and it certainly succeeds in what it set out to do in the first place. The action often comes fast and furious, with remarkably imaginative visuals and excellent choreography.
The DVD
VIDEO: "Time and Tide" is presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen. Director Hark's often gorgeously filmed thriller does often look superb on this release from Tristar; although there are a few minor faults with the presentation, the picture quality is fine overall. Sharpness and detail are solid, but vary slightly - a few shots now and then looked slightly softer than the rest of the picture, but not soft enough to be overly concerned about.
The transfer's few problems were noticable, but didn't really distract from the viewing experience. The film consistently looked a slight bit grainy, but there weren't any other print flaws such as marks, scratches or speckles. A few scenes now and then had some minor edge enhancement visible, but definitely not a major amount. No pixelation was spotted, either.
Color use throughout the movie is excellent and colors looked very good, as well. Colors appeared well-saturated and clean, with no instances of smearing or other problems. Flesh tones appeared accurate and natural as well, and black level looked solid. Not as impressive as the sound quality, but the image quality does hold up very nicely.
SOUND: "Time and Tide" presents a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack that is suprisingly agressive and occasionally quite remarkable. The entire movie plays with the surrounds heavily, as sound effects and ambient sounds liven many sequences. It's the gunfights though, that really turn the volume up. Gunfire distinctly comes from both sides as the surrounds are heavily involved in the action scenes. The film's tense, terrific score also has a good deal of involvement in the proceedings as well, as it comes from all sides and does a great deal for the drama and energy of many of the film's scenes. Audio quality was excellent, as the score sounded warm and clean and all of the film's many sound effects sounded quite convincing. In terms of languages, give Columbia/Tristar credit for being a studio that offers all of the options with their Hong Kong films - audio is available here in English 5.1 and 2.0 and Cantonese 5.1 and 2.0.
MENUS:: Basic, non-animated menus livened by film-themed images.
EXTRAS::
Commentary: Fans of director Tsui Hark will likely be very pleased to have the opportunity to hear him discuss one of his movies in a commentary track and, for "Time and Tide" he does a very fine job. Hark gives a fine amount of detail about the production in general as the movie begins, but more interestingly, gives a lot of insight about some of the action sequences and how they were filmed. Hark is energetic and engaging during this track and his English is very good, so I I'd be suprised if anyone has trouble understanding his discussion.
Also: Filmographies and trailers for "Time and Tide", "Once Upon A Time In China", "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and "Miracles".
Final Thoughts: "Time and Tide" will likely delight action fans as the picture often has a stunning action sequence around every corner, imaginatively choreographed and exceptionally well-filmed. Columbia/Tristar's DVD offers fine audio quality, but where it really excels is the audio quality, with doesn't miss any opportunities for creative and agressive sound use. Highly recommended for action fans.
"Time and Tide" is the return of famed martial arts director Tsui Hark to Hong Kong filmmaking after two dissapointing American releases ("Double Take" and "Knock Off", both with Jean Claude Van Damme). To describe "Time"'s plot would be rather futile, since it goes so quickly from place to place and from character to character (not to mention sub-plot to sub-plot) that the film becomes more of a visual experience, a 113 minute epic of action and beautiful cinematography. We connect to the characters enough to desire to follow them on the various journeys, but character development is rather minor.
The main character is Tyler (Nicholas Tse), a bartender who meets up with a lesbian police offer (Cathy Chu) after she's been dumped. The two have a one-night stand and she winds up pregnant. To help matters, Tyler gets a job as a rookie bodyguard with an unlicensed company. Enter Jack (Wu Bai), a former mercinary who also has a pregnant wife as well as a former gang that has come to see him to discuss business. That's about all that I understood.
The most remarable and impressive element of "Time and Tide" - and the reason to watch it, as well - are action scenes that are better choreographed than any I've seen in recent memory; scenes like a criminal grabbing a fire hose and scaling down a parking garage are the kind of moments that "Time and Tide" has more than it's share of. People seemed to be constantly jumping out of windows (with the camera jumping out after them), running down hallways, popping out from behind doors, etc. The camera often moves with amazing speed as the director also throws in some incredible visual tricks as well as beautiful use of color with all of the zooms. Hark also knows how to use sound wonderfully as well, with a minimum of sound or even silence before the surrounds fire up from both sides.
"Time and Tide" does not offer a particularly solid story - in fact, it lost me a few times - but it does provide enough character development to go on and it certainly succeeds in what it set out to do in the first place. The action often comes fast and furious, with remarkably imaginative visuals and excellent choreography.
The DVD
VIDEO: "Time and Tide" is presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen. Director Hark's often gorgeously filmed thriller does often look superb on this release from Tristar; although there are a few minor faults with the presentation, the picture quality is fine overall. Sharpness and detail are solid, but vary slightly - a few shots now and then looked slightly softer than the rest of the picture, but not soft enough to be overly concerned about.
The transfer's few problems were noticable, but didn't really distract from the viewing experience. The film consistently looked a slight bit grainy, but there weren't any other print flaws such as marks, scratches or speckles. A few scenes now and then had some minor edge enhancement visible, but definitely not a major amount. No pixelation was spotted, either.
Color use throughout the movie is excellent and colors looked very good, as well. Colors appeared well-saturated and clean, with no instances of smearing or other problems. Flesh tones appeared accurate and natural as well, and black level looked solid. Not as impressive as the sound quality, but the image quality does hold up very nicely.
SOUND: "Time and Tide" presents a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack that is suprisingly agressive and occasionally quite remarkable. The entire movie plays with the surrounds heavily, as sound effects and ambient sounds liven many sequences. It's the gunfights though, that really turn the volume up. Gunfire distinctly comes from both sides as the surrounds are heavily involved in the action scenes. The film's tense, terrific score also has a good deal of involvement in the proceedings as well, as it comes from all sides and does a great deal for the drama and energy of many of the film's scenes. Audio quality was excellent, as the score sounded warm and clean and all of the film's many sound effects sounded quite convincing. In terms of languages, give Columbia/Tristar credit for being a studio that offers all of the options with their Hong Kong films - audio is available here in English 5.1 and 2.0 and Cantonese 5.1 and 2.0.
MENUS:: Basic, non-animated menus livened by film-themed images.
EXTRAS::
Commentary: Fans of director Tsui Hark will likely be very pleased to have the opportunity to hear him discuss one of his movies in a commentary track and, for "Time and Tide" he does a very fine job. Hark gives a fine amount of detail about the production in general as the movie begins, but more interestingly, gives a lot of insight about some of the action sequences and how they were filmed. Hark is energetic and engaging during this track and his English is very good, so I I'd be suprised if anyone has trouble understanding his discussion.
Also: Filmographies and trailers for "Time and Tide", "Once Upon A Time In China", "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and "Miracles".
Final Thoughts: "Time and Tide" will likely delight action fans as the picture often has a stunning action sequence around every corner, imaginatively choreographed and exceptionally well-filmed. Columbia/Tristar's DVD offers fine audio quality, but where it really excels is the audio quality, with doesn't miss any opportunities for creative and agressive sound use. Highly recommended for action fans.
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